Subject: On recruiting dead canons
Author:
Posted on: 2011-02-23 01:28:00 UTC
Is recruiting characters that are canonically dead allowed, or do they have to be carbon copies like Team Phoenix. Just wondering, because I have an idea and I would rather preemptively stomp it to death than go through with it and then be shot down.
To kind of perpetuate discussion about this topic (I think it's interesting) I kind of have to say that I think it's about importance.
PPC Agents go into badfic looking to fix a huge disruption of canon. Which includes who is alive and who is dead. So is it really right to then go double-standard and recruit somebody who ought to be dead by their canon?
Though, canon to me has partially to do with importance. Because of canon events, and because they're important the plot of that canon happens. So this is why Agents are allowed to be would-be background characters or extras snatched from various continua. You can snatch Doomed Orc Number 7 and give him a name and personality (if he's cooperative, and willing to join the PPC) but you can't snatch Boromir. Anymore. As was said before, collaborative efforts will have blips.
It's important to the canon that Boromir dies. But Random Doomed Orc Number 7 is not important-- thus that can be an Agent Origin.
There may be exceptions, but I think that's the basic rule of thumb you're talking about. If a character has a name, they have an important role to fill, even if it's relatively minor compared to the main characters. A name means their author took the time to give it to them, which is a signal to the audience to pay attention. Kinda like if your teacher bothers to write something on the blackboard. It means that no one else would have done the same, and it would have changed the story--for instance, if Sam loved "Primrose Bracegirdle" instead of Rosie Cotton, would the Scouring of the Shire have gone so well, without Rosie's brothers helping out? And would she be kind and understanding about Frodo? Chances are, not so much.
On the other hand, any well-developed world has lots and lots of people in it. They don't all have names (not that we find out, anyway). Heck, the vast majority don't even appear as a faceless extra, because they're off doing whatever it is that regular folks do in their world. Those types are absolutely fair game.
~Neshomeh, who is a big proponent of the importance of names, in writing and the real world.
It has been done before.
One, that's been established, see below.
Two, KGarrett don't make me get out the squirt-gun. Sign your name, dude!
I think that badfic clones of canons are the ones to be recruited, dead canonicals can do confusion.
For example, in Ace Combat 5 fics isn't a good idea to recruit a saved-by-Sue Chopper, since he should canonically die in the mission Journey Home. However, recruiting a Kei Nagase (Edge) in a fic not set in a specific game should be fine - there's at least THREE of them in AC canon, so it can easily be a clone and not a misplaced canonical Nagase.
Confused? Well, it's an inside shout out made by Namco. You have a Kei Nagase as your wingman in AC 2 (set in 1998) and 5 (2010), a plane you have to escort in 4 (2005) is piloted by a flight attendant named Nagase, and there is another Kei Nagase that joins Ouroboros in 3 (2045). And a character in Ridge Racer is called Reiko Nagase and is AC2 Nagase's sister. So, we have at least three Kei Nagase or Edge is a time lord.
What's the policy regarding the recruitment of Sues? Just for future reference, of course.
There are a bunch of reformed Sues who are PPC agents.
~Neshomeh
It created a lot of squiffy precedent back in '03 (wow, it's been eight years?) and I haven't done much with them in that time. It sounds cool, then you retcon it, then you retcon the retcon, and then you retcon it all into oblivion and forget how you made it work in the first place.
(I'd keep Alec, though, he makes a wonderful agent.)
Meaning, it wouldn't be the first time someone declared their stuff noncanon due to controversy. So, if you really want to, notes can be made on the wiki and such.
Alec could get by on the carbon copy clause, like the badfic copies. I think Suicide's excuse in-continuity is that he was originally resurrected by a group called the Society of Literary Rescue, not us, and the Flowers weren't exactly going to turn down warm, homicidal bodies. (I'm not sure his wiki page says as much, though. I should fix that.)
Or we can just continue to shrug and say "Yeah, we don't really do that anymore." Either way. {= )
~Neshomeh, who notes that all group projects have stumbling points, and we seem to have happily gotten back up and moved on.
It's always made me uncomfortable, even if it's just bit characters or extras from movieverse fics - bits from a badfic, yes, but anything that's part of original canon just makes me twitchy. So I'd rather you didn't.
Although it has been done before (Agent Suicide, anyone?) I think it should generally not be recommended, for the reasons mentioned by Dann and Phobos.
Elcalion
Also, there's the possibility of an in-Canon afterlife - in Lord of the Rings, at least, there's very definitely stuff that happens after death, and you'd be yanking the canons out of that.
I think that recruiting dead canon characters is something that should not be allowed. It has always seemed to me that recruiting such a character is akin to something a Suethor would do. They don't like that the character is dead so they resurrect them to be in their stories. It breaks that character's personal canon.
I am not saying that you could not pull it off and write it well; you very probably could. I am just saying that it makes me uncomfortable to have agents running around that break canon simply by living.
-Phobos
... the canons are still needed for their story. Even the dead ones. I like the idea as it was proposed in the Thursday Next novels, that canon characters continuously act out the story. If you take a canon away from that, the story will have a hole in it 'cause they can't play their part anymore. (Also it means canons aren't really dead; every reread already resurrects them.)
Anyway, that's the idea I have for a Thursday Next fanfic where I accidentally set Mr Rochester free in modern day London.