A Bit of Late Night Reading
/Fandoms can get a little creative sometimes, inspired so much by their favourite show or book. One way that fans release this creativity is by writing fanfiction and producing fanart.
Fanfiction is a variety of different written works, but mostly fanfiction is expressed through short stories. Fanfiction also includes poetry, script and roleplaying. Fanart can be expressed through any art medium, even through photo manipulations. Stories and drawings take up the majority of fanfiction and fanart.
I've spent many late nights reading and writing fanfiction.
Stories are also categorized by how closely they follow canon. Canon is defined as material that follows the original story line. This is a preference that widely differs across fandoms.
I would say that many people in the Supernatural fandom enjoy following canon in fanfiction. A lot of reasons that authors of fanfic mess with canon is because they would rather see their favourite characters in different environments or they would want to see characters they have created in a world that is already built for them. These are two main themes that appear in most fanfiction in general.
There are a lot of different types of fanfiction. One of the most popular stories to write is an Alternate Universe, where (like I described earlier) characters that readers are familiar with are thrown into settings that are far from familiar to the characters. Some popular alternate universes are public high schools, World War II or historical period pieces.
Another popular story idea that people use for fanfiction is a “song fic”. Authors will take a song that they think is relevant to the show and write a story based on the song’s lyrics or a story based on how the song made them feel about the show.
Additionally, I have seen a lot of websites hosting writing contests. A prompt is given and people submit pieces, and there is usually a word count involved. This is a great way for newcomers to the fanfic community to meet new people and integrate with the community.
Fanfiction communities are huge online. A few examples are FanFiction.net, LiveJournal and AO3. Using messageboards, fellow authors can communicate and read each other’s work, edit and give constructive feedback on stories. It is actually a great place to meet friends online.
Certain fanfiction stories can amass a following and become popular among the fandom. There are some notable stories that make their rounds through the fandom. There is some controversy (mainly the sexuality of characters) about fanfiction and the way that some authors achieve popularity. But, these are just some of the aspects that you have to deal with when you’re in fandom.
Between fanfiction and fanart, I prefer producing fanfiction. I’ll admit that I’ve written some fanfiction that I’d never want my mother to read. And that is also an aspect you deal with in fandom.
Alexa Batitis
is a 20-year-old student. In her spare time she likes to watch a lot of TV. Her favourite shows are Doctor Who, Supernatural, and Game of Thrones. She has been a part of fandoms since she was 14. She has also written a lot of shameless fanfiction, and you can get over it.
