Yeah, the "trash" thing is one I'm watching because many people are sensitive to it -- I find it kind of...ahhh there's no way to put this well, but it seems to be partly a generation gap except I ended up on the opposite side from the rest of my generation? ^^; Or maybe it's just a cultural thing; I'm used to mocking the people I love as well as the things I love...anyway, yeah, I'm avoiding doing it publicly because so many people I care about are bothered by it. But in private, yep, still doing it -- and Iron Fist sounds like it could be just the trashy fun I like, when I'm in the mood for it!
Though, for what it's worth, I tend not to call my own fic trash (or think of other people's fic that way) -- some of this is just that for me "trash" is kind of like "cheesy"...part of what makes a canon trashy for me is when I think a lot of it is just bad, and I'm focusing on the good parts; something that is just straight id all the time is not trashy in the same way...though that's maybe just how I'm thinking of specific examples. Hmm.
I think a very fundamental element of the way I relate to fandom and fic is that fic is always a step down from canon; it might be much more fannishly satisfying because it's written to supply our fannish ids, but canon comes first and fic is always derivative of that
This is fascinating to me because it's so fundamentally different from how I see things. I don't think something being derivative makes it lesser, or that an original idea is innately superior simply for being the original. I think the Gintama anime is more entertaining than the manga it's adapted from and prefer watching to reading, even though the former wouldn't exist without the latter. I usually think fics based on prompts are more interesting and better reads than the prompts that inspired them; most of the time I don't care about reading the prompt at all, and just want the fic. And yeah, I've read fanfic that I think are better than the original canon, at least on some axis of "better" -- for me, anyway; but then I think my opinion counts as much as anyone's. I'd much rather read Clex fic than watch Smallville! :P
Though mostly, for me, I don't compare them directly. Canon gives me something; fanfic gives me something else. They're both essential parts of my fanning experience, and even if one only exists without the other, without that one, my experience would be fundamentally different and lesser (and I wouldn't enjoy the canon as much anyway).
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winterfish
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Date: 2019-11-20 01:07 am (UTC)Though, for what it's worth, I tend not to call my own fic trash (or think of other people's fic that way) -- some of this is just that for me "trash" is kind of like "cheesy"...part of what makes a canon trashy for me is when I think a lot of it is just bad, and I'm focusing on the good parts; something that is just straight id all the time is not trashy in the same way...though that's maybe just how I'm thinking of specific examples. Hmm.
I think a very fundamental element of the way I relate to fandom and fic is that fic is always a step down from canon; it might be much more fannishly satisfying because it's written to supply our fannish ids, but canon comes first and fic is always derivative of that
This is fascinating to me because it's so fundamentally different from how I see things. I don't think something being derivative makes it lesser, or that an original idea is innately superior simply for being the original. I think the Gintama anime is more entertaining than the manga it's adapted from and prefer watching to reading, even though the former wouldn't exist without the latter. I usually think fics based on prompts are more interesting and better reads than the prompts that inspired them; most of the time I don't care about reading the prompt at all, and just want the fic. And yeah, I've read fanfic that I think are better than the original canon, at least on some axis of "better" -- for me, anyway; but then I think my opinion counts as much as anyone's. I'd much rather read Clex fic than watch Smallville! :P
Though mostly, for me, I don't compare them directly. Canon gives me something; fanfic gives me something else. They're both essential parts of my fanning experience, and even if one only exists without the other, without that one, my experience would be fundamentally different and lesser (and I wouldn't enjoy the canon as much anyway).