Things That Annoy You in Fanfiction

[qwertyfatcat]

If a first chapter is really bad, it's safe to assume a writer may not improve much within the story.

Sometimes, people hope it can improve. Everybody hopes a fic does that if its premise is exciting.

[Xamusel]

...sheesh. How long have I been away from this thread?

Anyway, an annoyance I have is people dissing OCs, when they could very well help improve the canon characters.

[SINIB]

Self insert Sue ocs. Fucking hate those.

[Xamusel]

I never said what sort of OCs they were... at all.

[lantzblades]

Original characters are always going to be under the sword of Damocles no matter who they are. Unless they are just background characters they'll be attacked by someone in the fandom. Strangely I find the only place original characters get fair due is in superhero books (ironic considering how tightly wound CB fans are in general) the thing that annoys me most is the attitude of hate new stuff is the default in fan fiction. If people would give stories and characters proper chances in fan fiction I think the stigma around fan fiction would disappear.

[Cherry Lover]

Well, I think the issue is two-fold. Firstly, fanfic is almost by definition generally (although not always) less well-written than the original story is. After all, the original story is something that someone managed to get people to buy in reasonably large quantities, whereas fanfic is often written by 13-year-olds with no concept of how to write a story. As a result, OCs also tend to be less good characters than the characters they're placed next to, and thus that sticks out. It's not true of all OCs, of course, but it's true of enough that they get a stigma attached to them.

Secondly, people who are reading a fanfic are doing so because they are interested in the original story, which means the characters, settings etc. OCs aren't part of that, which means they lack the existing connection with the readers that the canon characters have and, therefore, the author has to work harder to get people to be interested in them, and may not be able to do so at all for certain people (I'm not going to be interested in an OC-only story unless the OC happens to have a connection to Sakura, and even then I'd be wary).

[SINIB]

I don't mind OCs, just ones that are Power-trip Mary Sue Author-insert OCs. I won't like a badly written oc, but I won't like a badly done canon character either.

[lantzblades]

Unfortunately your attitude leads to the stagnation of fan fiction Mike. If the world never grows the characters become stunted or otherwise parrot the original work. A lot of people disregard fan fiction because fans don't accept change or rail against any kind of addition or theoretical /alternative explanation, characterization and so on, thus making it a pain to produce anything that isn't a factory pressed disappointment to a would be fandom author.

[Cherry Lover]

I'm not making a judgement on whether it's a good or bad thing, I'm giving an explanation of why I think it's the case that OCs are often frowned-upon. Personally, I have no issue with OCs in stories. However, I am primarily reading them for the characters rather than the setting, so if the canon characters don't show up much or at-all I probably won't be overly bothered about the story.

[SINIB]

Also OCs are often poorly written, so people often disregard them.

[Xamusel]

Er... you misspelled "poorly". That's something I find annoying in fanfiction (misspellings).

[SINIB]

An addition on the OC thing: When they're paired with canon characters. That's never good, ever.

[Cherry Lover]

Actually, I don't agree. For a story like FSN or Tsukihime, where there are many heroines and only one significant male character, it's ridiculous to assume that everyone but the heroine whose route it is will end up being single for the rest of their life. They're going to get into other relationships, and sometimes those relationships are important to the story. Of course, it can be done very badly indeed, but it doesn't have to be.

[SINIB]

Well I've never, ever, seen it done well.

[Cherry Lover]

I think Nerroth did a reasonably good job of it in his fics (they're in the fanfic board if you want to check them out), and I have an idea for an OC that would be paired with Sakura post-UBW. I think it can be done fine as long as the pairing either makes sense within the context of the story, or else the OC is a side-character who is mostly there just to fill out the world a bit.