Canon v. Fanfiction

There's a Slate article that was posted yesterday about Before Watchmen, a series of prequel comics about the origins of the major players in Alan Moore's "Watchmen" universe. Alan Moore has made it clear that he does not approve of this, and while some fans are rejecting the new stories sight unseen, most have been fairly ambivalent. Everyone agrees that the move is a cash grab by DC, meant to capitalize on the higher profile of "Watchmen" after the recent movie version. Not many particularly care.

What caught my eye were the comments about fanfiction, first comparing a "Before Watchmen" cover image to "fan fiction detritus," and then suggesting that fanfiction was a more suitable avenue for this brand of derivative works than the "official" comics, and noting that Moore essentially wrote fanfiction himself with "Lost Girls." Cue multiple comments in the discussion section arguing the proper use of the term fanfiction, which I'm not going to reiterate here, because I've already had that argument and written those posts. Instead, I'm going to try to answer the question nobody quite managed to ask here - what makes a derivative work, a piece of intellectual property based off of a previous piece of intellectual property, a legitimate extension of the original? Where is the border between the canon work and the fanfiction? And what is the mechanism for granting that authority?

Well, you start with the original author first as the prime authority on their own work. If J.K. Rowling says that Dumbledore is gay, even though it was never stated anywhere in the "Harry Potter" books, then Dumbledore is gay. If she decides to anoint a new author to continue the adventures of the Potter kids, her word carries more weight than anyone else's. Film and television series, which are more collaborative mediums, often depend on a creator incorporating the work of others. There are only a handful television creators, for instance, who will write every episode of a show themselves, but if they retain creative oversight over the finished product, the show is still considered their work to a large degree.

However, you can't call something a derivative work until the original author is out of the picture. These days that's very common, as many creators of popular media don't have the rights to their creations. Legally, whoever controls the rights to the property controls the official canon, the right to add or change a story as their see fit. So DC can hire other creative talent to write "Before Watchmen" comics without paying any attention to the wishes of Alan Moore. When Bryan Singer made "Superman Returns," he chose to ignore the third and fourth theatrical "Superman" films and pick up the story after "Superman II," with Warner Bros' backing. In the case of comic book characters, they’re often passed around between so many different writers and artists, each making their own contribution, it’s hard to say who really was really the primary creator.

When most people think of fan fiction, they think of the amateur stories passed around online by hobbyists. However, what professional writers do when they work in one of these existing universes isn't any different, except for the money and the legalities. They're using existing characters and concepts to tell new stories. However, what the money and the legalities give them is immediate legitimacy because they also get the right to profit by the work's association with he original. Anything written for profit is taken more seriously than the stuff written for fun and self-indulgence, and the involvement of whoever is holding the rights, even if it's as licensor for a bad tie-in novel, will at least give the appearance of oversight. Something "official" suggests that there's quality control at work somewhere, that there is a protective gatekeeper acting in the best interest of your favorite franchise, Of course, most of the time it's really about exploiting a piece of IP to the fullest extent possible. Do you really think most "Spider-man" fans are all that excited about the new reboot?

Now when the rights holder and the original author clash over the canon, who wins? It depends in each case. J.K. Rowling’s reputation is such that she’d easily win out in the court of public opinion over any company that managed to wrest the “Potter” rights away from her, and try to launch additional sequels with a different writer. Her writing is so integral to those books, she is irreplaceable. However, there's hardly any fuss when Marvel plays musical chairs with the writers and directors of its "Avengers" universe movies, or make decisions about their content that any previous creative talent would disagree with. In the television world, fans raised a fuss when Dan Harmon was fired from "Community," but nobody blinked an eye when "Whitney" got a new showrunner.

The final arbiter is really the audience. They're the ones who draw a lot of the lines between what is considered canon and what isn't, who will challenge the authority of the people who control a beloved media property, and sometimes even the original authors. They're the ones who ignore lesser movie sequels, who pretend that "After MASH" and the third season of "Gargoyles" never happened, and are quick to remind you that Han Solo shot first, despite what George Lucas thinks. No amount of hype or marketing was enough to convince them that George Lazenby was meant to be James Bond, or that Halle Berry was Catwoman. The fans are the ones who care the most about what is and isn't canon, so it makes sense that they often have the most say over the matter in the end.

There are very few instances of something originating purely from the fans being incorporated into canon, because the amateurs and the professionals exist in separate universes to everyone's benefit. but it does happen once in a while. There's Derpy from the "My Little Pony" cartoon, "Figwit" in "Lord of the Rings," and Lt Uhura's first name. And of course that's not counting the number of fans who ended up writing for "Dr. Who" or "Batman" or "Star Trek" officially, with all the money and the legalities. You'll hear writers for many of these properties touting fan credentials these days, and for good reason. If the original author is out of the picture, and the motives of the rights holders are suspect, sometimes a derivative work can still be good and worthwhile if the new creator is significantly invested in it.

In the case of "Before Watchman," DC did one thing right. They put some of their best talent on the project, including J. Michael Straczynski and Brian Azzarello. You can argue that DC is disrespecting Alan Moore and that they're only doing this for the money, but nobody can say whether or not the miniseries are actually going to be any good. If the quality is up to par, and they're accepted by the fans, they'll become a part of the "Watchmen" canon whether Moore likes it or not. And if they're terrible, then the fans will reject them, like the "Psycho" sequels no one remembers, or "The Blues Brothers 2000," and we can all move on.
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