alexseanchai | (no subject)

(no subject)

...question

you know how fans of media properties reconsume canon lots for etc and so forth reasons?

concerning people whose paid employment is to create canon

(which is to say, TV writers usually, book writers not often?)

it doesn't seem to be part of their jobs to reconsume canon much at all

...

why not?

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For some, I suspect it is because they are elbows-deep into the next season by the time the first has completely aired.

Some shows go to the effort of maintaining a record of continuity and decisions made, so they don't cross themselves up, but I don't know how many do that as regular practice.

I've done work creating canon for tabletop RPGs, so I'm not sure how much my experience applies here. I was basically world-building, so I only needed to consume enough canon to have a feel for the world and to keep continuity. Reconsuming canon takes time and I was on a deadline.

However, I definitely think reconsuming canon is a good idea, especially when you're writing for existing characters.

to keep continuity

That's actually my point. Compare the two most recent posts in my fandom: miraculous ladybug tag, unless you know the show and you're waiting for Netflix: the early-S2 episode I just rewatched doesn't cohere so well with two of the most recently aired S3 episodes. It doesn't seem to be an irreconcilable difference, but I get the impression those comment threads have more thought put into the problem than canon does. Even if only because the canon creators just didn't notice.

True, about deadlines, though. Nobody's paycheck depends on their making a ficathon deadline.

Yeah, I think it's partly that they're working ahead of canon, so they don't have it there to review, and partly that they're not getting paid to review canon, because they probably aren't.

It's also possible that they're working completely out of order - the sixth season episode that seems out of place is a reworked first season script that never got filmed because one of their sixth season scripts got rejected at the last minute, so they do their best to revise this old thing in a rush but it still feels really off for season six. Or they may have had to pull in an emergency backup scriptwriter who usually works across the hall and has literally never seen the show.

In some cases I think it's also deliberate? Like, I'm still listening to that X-Men podcast, and they do a lot of interviews with writers who are taking over a long-standing character, and the impression I get there is that if they're not already a fan of the character (or sometimes even if they are) they get/make a reading list of the parts of that character's previous canon that they want their work to reflect off of, and only review that. Partly because *nobody's* getting paid enough to understand all of X-Men canon, but also because the new content usually isn't being aimed at people who have canon memorized- they'll consume it regardless. It's being aimed at casual readers, and new readers. So they don't even *want* to be scrupulous about continuity at the expense of telling a fresh and exciting story. As frustrating as it is for those of us who do care.

That probably applies less to something like Miraculaous Ladybug than something like comics or Star Wars, but I'm sure it's still something of a factor.

All of the above, plus turnover in the writer's room, plus writers with multiple projects/assignments going at once.

Still frustrating, though.

I swear to Maude I remember reading, back in my (everyone's) brief fling with MLP:FIM, that most of the folks who work on (animated?) shows don't like to watch the shows they work on, possibly even once.

A good show will compensate for this (or any other factors) with a comprehensive, well-updated Series Bible, and even then they can slip up. A less good show nets you the Miraculous Ladybug experience, among others.

The points raised above - though some series will have a continuity editor and a "series bible" (which condenses the important information about setting + character) to go off of.

Plus, I think unless it is specifically your job to do that and you are explicitly being paid to rewatch things, as a professional writer, you shouldn't do that for free since it basically tanks your effective hourly pay.

On the extreme end of just flying blindly into the future, though, you get wwe - where everyone is exhausted from putting out 5+ hours of live TV each week (to the point that turnover is super high), complete with last-minute rewrites - and also, allegedly, Stephanie McMahon thinks storyboards are for marks.

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