thoughts on canon:

[wisdomeagle]

This is actually more about canon in the sense of recognized body of works, though my question relates to how we-as-fandom use the term and, er, iffy things. To wit:

*West Wing 3x01 "Isaac and Ishmael". It seems to be, for lack of a better word, canon that this episode is not to be considered canon, or even an episode. This is the only case I can think of where, um, what the actors say seems to be, well, canonical. Where I'd feel comfortable saying that Bradley Whitford's advice not to attempt to fit this episode into the series timeline because it doesn't fit is a rule of the universe. But did it happen? Did this night happen? How do people think about this episode? It aired. It's on the DVDs. It's one of the twenty-two episodes of S3, and it doesn't have a neat place to go in the timeline but since it references the events of "In The Shadow of Two Gunmen," I assume that, you know, it's in the same universe. It's been bothering me since I saw it...

*inlovewithnight wondered if we'd have to rename the fandom "Firefly/Serenity" after September30, and in the comments someone compared it to X-Men vs X-Men movieverse, which caused me a moment of "huh." I've been thinking of Serenity as a continuation of the Firefly canon, much like Farscape: Peacekeeper Wars was a continuation of Farscape and canon in the 'verse. I would describe fic jossed by the movie "AU post-"Objects in Space," and that's fine; obviously there's a lot of fic out there that's AU post-"OiS." Some of it's already been jossed by the comics, and that's okay. Er.

So I tend to think that if a show is prematurely canceled and the creator continues it in another medium or in the same medium, then the continuation is canon. But that thing about "another medium" is weird. I mean, the 'Scape miniseries was aired on the same cable channel that aired the show; Serenity is a move from the little screen to the big-screen, which is a change of venue.

But -- are you expecting the Serenity movie to be canon? Even if you don't like it, will you treat it as you do other canon, using it if you see fit, ignoring it if you don't, but at least noting that you're pretending it didn't happen?

I guess the question is -- after September30, will there be such a thing as Firefly canon that doesn't include Serenity? Is there bookverse and movieverse, the way there is with HP or LotR, or is it all one 'verse? I'm voting for the latter, but I would be curious to hear what other people had to say.

see icon: spoil for for Serenity and I'll be quite irate.

Comments

[invisionary.livejournal.com]

Well, since "Serenity" is not a retelling of the story of Firefly, but rather an additional story set in the same universe, I think it's all part of the same canon.

That's my take, anyway.

[velvetandlace.livejournal.com]

I agree, man.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

I would describe fic jossed by the movie "AU post-"Objects in Space," and that's fine; obviously there's a lot of fic out there that's AU post-"OiS." Some of it's already been jossed by the comics, and that's okay. Er.

But I'd consider Serenity to be canon and the comics not, just as I don't consider Buffy comics or novelizations to be Buffy canon, but I do consider Angel to be Buffy canon. (What is the name of that fandom? Buffy? Angel? Buffy/Angel? Buffyverse? Jossverse-minus-Firefly?) Which is a discoursive move; canon (IMHO) is defined by the contingent within fandom with the most members, because they have the power to make competing definitions of canon idiosyncratic. (Which I suppose is why JKR's website is HP canon, which confuses me very much.)

I'm expecting it to be canon though, because it came from Joss. (Did the comics?) As much as canon is discoursively defined by the fan community, a lot of the fen commit the intentional fallacy anyway. (Again, see HP fandom.) So I don't really expect Firefly fandom to reject the movie as canon. But we as fen have the power to do so should we decide to.

So I tend to think that if a show is prematurely canceled and the creator continues it in another medium or in the same medium, then the continuation is canon.

Is the "the creator" here the integral part? Because I think that comes perilously close to privileging authorial intent, too.

I think crucial here is making a distinction between canon and the source text. The former is discursively defined by the fen; the latter is created by the creater, obviously.

Although the "it's canon that it's not canon" paradox is a stumper. Worthy of Epimenides himself.

[jfc013.livejournal.com]

All three comics list Joss as the first author. See my comment below...

[wisdomeagle]

I'm expecting it to be canon though, because it came from Joss. (Did the comics?)

Not sure how much he had to do with them (as have been avoiding articles on the thing out of fear of spoilers), but his name is on them, and he's listed in the credits thusly:

Story by Joss Whedon and Brett Matthews
Script by Brett Matthews

Which could mean anything from, "Hey, Brett, write a story with these characters I made up, would ya?" to "Hey Brett, would you put this story in script form, then let me do a final polish on it?" But the very fact that it has Joss's name on it implies that he wanted it to be included in his oeuvre.

But I'd consider Serenity to be canon and the comics not, just as I don't consider Buffy comics or novelizations to be Buffy canon, but I do consider Angel to be Buffy canon. (What is the name of that fandom? Buffy? Angel? Buffy/Angel? Buffyverse? Jossverse-minus-Firefly?)

Hmm! I don't consider the novelizations canon and don't know of anyone who seriously does, but I'm less clear on the status of Fray, which I haven't read, and which seems to have its own, smallish following (presumably composed of Buffy-people), but which Joss definitely wrote and which is defintitely set in the Slayerverse (which is one of the names I've seen for the nebulous verse -- I go with Jossverse and clarify whether I mean including Firefly or not.) (We could call them Jossverse-inclusive and Jossverse-exclusive! We could make our world even more impermeable by outsiders!)

But we as fen have the power to do so should we decide to.

I suppose, theoretically, we do. (Although, probably not us so much, since last I checked, I didn't get my BNF sekrit decoder ring in the mail.) But it bothers me on a fundamental level that we could, for instance, out-of-hand reject S3-4 AtS (which some people would definitely choose to do) and say, "That's not canon." Though I guess going back to original meanings and the Christian canon, when the list was set in stone, in stone it was, and the Gospel of Thomas, etc, was out.

Is the "the creator" here the integral part? Because I think that comes perilously close to privileging authorial intent, too.

I definitely see your point, and am having difficult pinpointing what, precisely, I mean by "creator." I mean, in the Jossverse it's clear, because the creator is Joss, but... but episodes not written by Joss, or even approved by him, have aired and are considered canon, although they do have his name attached. In Farscape it's even less clear, since the creator had less to do with the actual series than Joss does, and since the exec producer who probably had the most power over direction, David Kemper, didn't ascend to that role until partway through the first season, when there was a definite change of direction, but the episodes filmed and set before the critical change are still canon in the verse.

I'm also tempted to say, like Jennix says below, that it's about actors, but sometimes characters have different actors from one season to the next, and somehow we cognitively dissonate the weirdness and our heads don't explode.

I think crucial here is making a distinction between canon and the source text

Oooh, good point. I think actually there's:
Source text - anything the creator writes or puts hir name to in a particular 'verse -- or, anything generated in a particular 'verse
Canon, first level - those works generally accepted as definitive? (which I guess would, crazily enough, include JKR's website, since it's "generally agreed," and Angel as canon for BtVS, for the same reason)

But I really don't like having the "generally agreed" clause, though it's useful when problems arise.

[cont]

[wisdomeagle]

Hmmm. I haven't seen Serenity, so obviously don't know what issues it might bring to the forefront of this debate, but I've also suddenly been reminded of TV shows that spin off of movies -- the Stargate movie is, I believe, considered by most fen to be canon insofar as it doesn't contradict show canon, while Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the movie, is considered by most fen to be crap. And that's by Joss, in the 'verse, and precedes the events of the shows. There are even some attempts to reconcile the two portrayals... the actors are different... hmmm! (It might also be the case that the movie is canon in the same sense that the SG movie is canon, except that there are so many contradictions between the BtVS movie and show that it seems as if the movie is just rejected outright.)

Although the "it's canon that it's not canon" paradox is a stumper. Worthy of Epimenides himself.

*wins*

[jfc013.livejournal.com]

Joss himself has said that the comics come after the series, and give some backstory that you'll need for the movie. In other words, it's all canon. (There's a reason I don't write any Jossverse anymore!)

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

Does Joss get to decide what does and doesn't count as canon? If so, why?

[jennixen.livejournal.com]

I tend to think that movie = TV if the same actors + writers/creators are involved. I don't count books or comics to canon because it's just not the same as TV/movies.
I think Serenity will be a continuation or something after Firefly?
I don't know but that's how I'll see it.
Of course, it might change after seeing the movie...

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

What if a character is recasted? (Is Dick York Bewitched a different show than Dick Sargent Bewitched?) What happens when one writer takes over from another?

Here we have the ship of Theseus problem: if each change is insignificant, none of them individually will be enough to justify it emerging as a completely different canon. But by the end of the process, one might end with a situation where none of the people who worked on the original are still with the project even though new "canon" is still being produced. (One might argue that there's still a continuity from the original creators, but what if the original creators create a rival canon?)

It could be argued that this is the scenario we have in Trek fandom.

(As much as I problematize it, though, I think your stance is basically the same as my own.)

[velvetandlace.livejournal.com]

I think Serenity will be a continuation or something after Firefly?
That's how it's intended - the comic book series are bridging-gaps, a story that takes place between Objects in Space and the film.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

Also, will Firefly and Serenity be in seperate sections of fanfiction.net? Buffy and Angel are (which makes no sense from the perspective of someone within the fandom and who considers the canon to be shared by both), but they're both under the TV section.

And another thought: What about crossovers? Sometimes it's impossible to reconcile the canon from two shows even if there are canonical crossovers. What to do then?

And the phenomenon of a large segment of Trek fandom--myself included--disavowing Enterprise as canon? Or even Star Trek V?

I think what I walk away from is a firm gratitude to Joss for providing us with two universes, each of which hold continuity well enough so as to not raise these questions.

[jennixen.livejournal.com]

To me, Buffy and Angel are in the same universe. Just stories about different people (and sometimes the same people).

[rosewildeirish.livejournal.com]

Was Star Trek the same or different canon when it was on the big screen?

How about when it was simultaneous with, I think, Next Gen?

There was somone who had described something on the SciFi.com website, about Atlantis (a name of a character not spoken onscreen) as fanon, and that just seemed wrong to me. I mean, show creators, the network, had input, and it's freakin' fanon?? *boggles* It also turned out the name was listed in the credits, which I managed to finagle a screencap of, so if the individual still considers it fanon, I think they're nucking futs.

Only case I can really see it not being canon, or an alternate canon, is in cases like Star Trek and Star Wars novels, where TPTB have decreed will not cross over into TV or film media, but are held to be separate.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

where TPTB have decreed

So the key to all this is priveleging the intent of the creator?

[mari4212.livejournal.com]

For me, the dividing line would be if one canon disagrees with another canon.

For example, in X-Men verses the movie, timelines were changed, some characters were emphasised in different ways, some characters were exchanged or conflated. Basically, facts were changed between the mediums. Therefore, if you use the comics, Warren exists, and Bobby Drake was one of the original five trained by Xavier. If you use the movies, we haven't seen Warren yet, and Bobby is a member of the younger generation.

Whereas in Harry Potter, for example, each new book creates more canon, but it does not intentionally contradict the previously established timelines and facts.

From what I've heard, not being in the Firefly fandom, Serenity is supposed to add to the previous canon, not erase it and create a new framework. Therefore, if I was writing a fic, I'd just mark it as being Serenity complient or not.

[wisdomeagle]

I agree with that -- the movie versions of X-Men, LotR, and HP contradict book canon, and thus there are two verses -- the movieverse and the bookverse or comicsverse. I don't think that will the case with FF and Serenity.

On the other hand, canon contradicts itself all the time, in ways large and small. You're in the Gateverse with me -- I can think off the top of my head of Jacob Carter saying in S8 "I was supposed to die four years ago," and fans around the country going, "eight minus two is...? four?" But the Gateverse is just all one canon -- it's just got some continuity glitches.

So I guess with the show/movie, the question is -- are the glitches at that level? Or are they at the level that it's impossible to reconcile the two 'verses?

[executrix.livejournal.com]

I know there are unspoiled people reading this, so I won't give any details, but I would argue that Firefly the Series and Serenity the Movie are so different in theme and tone that they should be considered separate. And it takes a LOT of fanwanking to reconcile [stuff in the movie] with [stuff in the series]. I bet I'm not going to be the only one writing fix-it fics, either; but I suspect I'll just mark most of my stories "TV canon-based".

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

Firefly the Series and Serenity the Movie are so different in theme and tone

But theme and tone are exactly the elements of the source text that we disregard when we construct canon! Let's say there a character on a TV show for whom villainous music (something akin to the Imperial March) plays whenever s/he enters, and the story is structured so as to be a morality play denouncing hir worldview. Someone can still write a fic in that universe which thematic celebrates that character, while staying within the confines of canon. (Note the Slytherin debate within HP fandom.) Canon only covers the events of the source text, not the theme or tone.

I argue all this in more detail here.

Thanks for not spoiling Ari or me.

[inlovewithnight.livejournal.com]

Wow, I helped make meta happen. I'm so proud.

::too groggy from nightmare-ridden nap to help::

Um...I'm with executrix. I'm going to keep them separate them in my head.

[wisdomeagle]

Wow, I helped make meta happen. I'm so proud.

Yay! *cling* *stares at Jayne's ass* *is slightly worried that I recognized that as Jayne's ass before reading the alt text to confirm*

[seimaisin.livejournal.com]

I guess, in this case, I don't understand the reasoning for considering Firefly and Serenity separate canons. I've read the posts above, and I'm still not sold on any reasoning. It's a continuation of the same story. I'm one of those that's seen the movie, and I don't particularly remember anything that directly contradicted something we saw in the TV series. It's been created by the same person/team that created the series, as the next step in the universe they created for the series. It may not be in the exact format they intended to do originally, but it's still the story Joss and company intended to tell, as far as I know. Thus, continuous canon.

I think I know why some people want to consider them separate canons, and ... well, your journal isn't the time or place to discuss that, until after September 30th. Suffice to say that I don't consider it a valid reason. To my mind, anything that doesn't mesh with Serenity is an AU. AUs are perfectly fine, and I certainly wouldn't mind seeing one or two written ... but, the only definition of canon, fannish-wise, I know of is "the source material of a universe as written by the creator(s)." Serenity is written by the Firefly-verse creator(s) as a continuation of the series. That makes it all one canon. Anything written that deviates from it is an AU.

[grav-ity.livejournal.com]

I was going to say something witty about being jossed by The Maker, but you've pretty much covered it.

I think that Serenity will be Firefly canon. Because the 'verse is established and over and all done by the same guy, I think we'll be safe. Yeah, there will probably be some changes (and, god help us, we'll pobably have to sit through some of the exposition again), but I think they will be more developments that conflict with previously theorized fanon. We have had a couple years to play with it, and I think it's changed a little accordingly.

I can't wait!

[wisdomeagle]

I can't wait!

Me neeeeither! *squee*

[velvetandlace.livejournal.com]

After reading the comments, all I really have to add is that I thoroughly support comic books and officially released novelisations as canon; they're written for a reason and they're sanctioned, licensed, to be part of that particular fandom's canon.

The Serenity film, in that vein, for me, is simply another aspect of the Firefly canon conducted in a different medium.

Of course, fans can always choose to adhere/ignore to any canon they don't like, anyway, so perhaps it doesn't matter in a wider, more definitive sense, bur personally, that's where my lines are drawn.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

For canon whores like myself, however, who always try and remain within canon when writing a fic, where exactly the lines of canon lay is drastically important. Canon whoredom is only possible with a non-contradictory (or at least passably wankable and retroconnable) canon, and thus eliminating sources of competing canon, such as novelizations or comics.

Part of the reason for the disagreement, I think, is that I see the fannish usage as unconnected from the concept of a literary canon; my conceptual analysis of the term yields the definition "the set of all known facts regarding a fictionalized universe" and I consider it to be distinct from the source text. This is the best way I've found to make a clear line between fics which stay within canon (which is very important to me in my own writing) or go AU (which is a valid choice but should always be made deliberately).

[settiai]

Okay. *deep breath* Here we go.

Personally, I consider Serenity to be a continuation of Firefly and see no problem with merely saying that a story is "AU past 'Objects in Space'" or something along those lines. There are a few points in the movie that technically differ from established canon, but they're fairly minor and can be explained away without too much fuss.

Once Serenity is widely released in theaters, though, I'm not sure what will happen. I'm sure that there will be plenty of people who watch (and love) the movie but won't bother with trying to find information on Firefly before posting fanfiction in the fandom. When that happens, it's definitely going to be... interesting. I know that your post is more about whether or not to consider Serenity to be a "sequel" to Firefly, but what about Firefly being a "prequel" to Serenity? What will happen to the fandom(s) when people start posting fanfiction based on Serenity without knowing about everything that happened in Firefly? People who don't know anything about the characters other than what was explained in the movie?

As for the comics, I -- personally -- consider them to be an extension of canon, but I'll have no problem whatsoever with people who think otherwise. They pretty much just fill in some of the blanks between the end of Firefly and the beginning of Serenity, but there's nothing wrong people writing their own versions of the events that lead up to the movie without saying "AU from [insert comic name here]." Because really? That would be kind of crazy.

Now, about your mention of Fray in one of the above comments...

First of all, you need to read it. Seriously. That's an order. ;-)

Seriously, though, Fray... is unique. It's set several hundred years after the end of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, but several events mentioned in it would have had to have taken place soon after the end of those two series. (By soon, I mean within twenty years or so.) For people who consider Fray to be part of the Jossverse canon, that seriously narrows the timeframe for post-NFA stories. For those who don't... well, it really doesn't matter much.

Okay, I'm done rambling. In fact, I should have been done awhile ago. *makes face* I'm pretty sure that about half of this doesn't make any sense whatsoever, but... oh well.

[alixtii.livejournal.com]

It made perfect sense, and I agree with pretty much all of it.

Of course, that may be reason in and of itself to be worried.

[stoptocheer.livejournal.com]

Maybe I'm missing something here - I'm not a Firefly fan. But isn't the movie going to be the equivalent of another, longer episode of the show? It's the continuation, I thought. Que?

[wisdomeagle]

So I am led to believe. I haven't seen it yet so couldn't say for certain, but prior to the discussion in Samantha's journal, I totally assumed it would just be, well, another episode. More canon. The equivalent of the Farscape miniseries.

Until I see the movie, I feel I'm not really qualified to participate in that part of the discussion, though.

[beccaelizabeth]

I'm thinking comparison with Highlander canon
There is movie canon, which is different for every movie
and then there is series canon
and then there is Endgame, which I consider movie canon and therefore ignorable, but some consider series on big screen.
(there's also season 6, or not, if you wear red)

If Serenity fits the Highlander pattern something would have gone horribly, horribly wrong, and I don't expect that from that creative team.

as I understand it, Firefly and Serenity have the same team with a different budget and screen size. Serenity is intended as a continuation of Firefly. Same canon.

I think that was what happened with X files but I don't really remember.

But Highlander had a lot of the same people involved.

Sometimes canon just goes off somewhere so wildly inconsistent and/or traumatic you just can't fit all the pieces together. My Highlander never killed Richie in a demon induced hallucination, because there are no demons in Highlander. Five consistent seasons said no demons, one episode where they were all on crack decided actually they'd just forgot to mention it before.

I don't reckon Buffy ever did a retcon or u turn on that scale, other people disagree with me.

Canon is the bits that fits.

[mtgat]

In from metafandom.

Has everyone (possibly on purpose) forgotten the X-Files movie? It's the same fandom. It's the same canon. What people choose to consider their own personal canon is up for grabs, but it's the same thing.

[wisdomeagle]

Think it was mentioned once or twice up-thread -- and by the way, I think you get a prize for comment#100. :)

Anyhow, I'm not a 'Phile, so I wouldn't know; somewhere upthread I talked about the Stargate and BtVS movies (both of which are pre-series) and their respective roles in their universes. But really can't speak to X-Files.

[aingeal8c.livejournal.com]

Here from metafandom

I think of these things are a bit like parallel universes. Evryone who is watching a show is seeing canon in a slightly different way (even if they agree on basic points) as a result each person is in a way creating their own canon universe. For example some people may see slash in a show whereas others won't. Some will see het in a show, others don't. They are all essentially watching the same canon but interpreting it in their own ways. As a result what doesn't fit with the view of canon you have created for yourself can be ignored. If that makes sense.

So essentially canon doesn't change. If it's up there on screen written by the same people, made with the same actors etc. most people would say that's the same canon (it gets into all kinds of wierd territory when actors change from pilots/movies to series) but the way we look at it changes.

Canon doesn't change but our view of it does.

I hope that made some sense....

[wisdomeagle]

Hey! Thanks for chiming in!

I totally see what you're saying -- there are some things that get filed under "my personal canon" that aren't onscreen per se (and yeah, a lot of it is 'ship-related).

And that's a really interesting point about how canon doesn't change but our perception of it does. In shows where there are sometimes mid-season or even mid-series reveals of important plot points, our view of the canon can totally change in retrospect.

:)

[medie]

haven't seen Serenity yet...

But I do consider movie canon and tv canon of any series to be seperate and onto itself. ('cept the X-Files but no one can figure out what the hell that was anyway *G*) Can they be continuations of each other? Sure. They can be considered that. Just as the Star Trek movies can be considered canon for the series. They are. But on the other hand, they aren't. (In the sense that The Final Frontier pretty much got the boot out of canon by Gene)

Largely there's personal canon and then there's "i'm the man/woman writing the canon so this is what *is*." (though that doesn't always hold true. Stargate, for example, the producers have admitted if there's an episode in the past that they don't like? They handwave it out of canon. Didn't happen. It was filed. It was aired. That means canon usually. But...*handwave* it didn't happen. It's not canon.)

Usually, I'd say if Joss considers Serenity a direct continuation of the canon of the series then officially it is. But the fact remains if the series had continued on then there is a damned good chance what happens in the movie would not have happened at all. So while it is canon...there's the factor to consider that what works on the big screen might not on the small so if the plots on the big screen had played on the small, plot points (even major ones) might be dropped from it entirely. Thus, fans can take the canon of the movie with a grain of salt.

I haven't seen it yet, I accidentally got spoiled for parts but I don't know enough to really make a judgement on events or anything like that, but I would say yes, there are two different canons for Firefly that are, on some levels, interconnected.

I wouldn't look at it as 'is Serenity a continuation of Firefly's canon'. It's more like 'Serenity is founded on Firefly's canon' in this case, it really does make a difference which came first. Chicken or egg.

So, if I were to write a Firefly story set ten years in the future and it doesn't reference the events of the movie it doesn't mean I'm AU-ing from canon per say. I can simply put in the Author's Note: continuation of TV 'Verse and that will pretty much cover it.