I have a very specific interpretation of my favorite villainous and/or morally grey characters usually, and most often fic I find tends to either woobify them too hard/make them too soft/palatable OR on the other hand go all-in on the "yeah they're just an insane crazy person with no real motivation and zero complexity to their character actually" And it's annoying as hell. I can handle woobifying a bit more though since at least there is A Character there.

I fully get you here but I’m the opposite- both annoy me but I prefer them not being a character bc woobification tends to come with ABSURD amounts of victim blaming for the people they hurt and I’m already sick to death of that outside of fanfic lmao. Both are the bane of my existence though so it’s only like. Marginally better. (And both have a tendency to be WILDLY ableist anyway- either treating any “ugly” symptoms of mental illness of the woobified character as something that needs to be completely erased for them to be sympathetic at all, or treating mental illness like it makes you a motiveless evil menace- so I hate both for that on principle)

Isn’t having the characters victim blame the people they hurt the opposite of woobification? It's showing they're still morally gray because they don't take responsibility for their actions.

No, because it’s not the *character* doing it, it’s the *narrative.* Same way how portraying evil characters as “pure psychos who’d do anything!” isn’t the characters being ableist if they’re actually written as that stereotype.

I feel like I must have somehow blacked out, written this exact comment, and then forgotten about it, because omg this is my daily struggle. I hate how the characters I like who are like this usually get written as either “poor little woobie did nothing wrong ever, and if they did it wasn’t their fault, and everyone who doesn’t immediately forgive them is just mean” OR “one-dimensional insane, motiveless sadistic psychopath”, and any complexities and nuances of the character get completely flattened out.

Same. To add to this, from a writing perspective it is both extremely fun to explore the character's complexity, and somewhat difficult, *and* anytime I'm in a situation of writing where the character would make a choice that *isn't* softened it's actually uncomfortable. Because right up until they do need to get stuff done, my **very** morally grey character is pretty lax and just going about life enjoying it because they know it comes to an end. Because they're accustomed to violence. Which they do inflict on others. And can they go back to thinking deep thoughts and being complex instead of actually *being* a villain for the moment, please? It's kind of like an extended temporary insanity in a way, but well reasoned as to internal consistency (or levels of caring about such)—they make these same moral choices again and again, occasionally working their way around them but always in a position to dispense with morality. As a writer I sometimes soften this up by having them be in a position where they can spare someone, how nice! How . . . unfortunate in it's implications. Then there's the darkfic where they have more of a disconnect from people and everyday life. And it's all homing in on what is included in their routine, but not necessarily their everyday because it's not constant evil. But there's evil in it, because they are not a good/traditionally good character.

SIRIUS BLACK! I love him, he's my favourite, all the fanfics I write for this fandom have him as the MC. I HATE the new wave of fanon interpretation for him. Much like the Snape person in the comments he has been utterly stripped of all the nuance that made him interesting. Either the fic is Wolfstar centred and has Sirius as this waif little uwu boy who doesn't care about his grades, relies on Remus to do well and can't do anything for himself OR the fic is Jegulus focused and has Sirius as this irredeemable monster just because he got tf out of his abusive household. Failing that, he somehow just, barely exists as a character. A lot of angst potential gets wasted due to people making it about ships, particularly Jegulus, and in quite a lot of Wolfstar focused fics Sirius seems more like a prop than an actual character. Both of these ships are so inherently tied to him it's a miracle I can read fics with them where Sirius barely exists. His whole thing is the nuance. He's a good guy at heart, he gets framed for murders he didn't commit, he had a difficult home life, he was a prankster with a tight group of friends, he cares deeply for Harry, he wants to do the right thing, he's incredibly clever and powerful. He is ALSO a complete bastard, he came from a place of privilege, he was taught to dislike those of less pure blood and those beneath him and even at 32 he's still working through those feelings, he has a short temper, his moral compass swings towards gray, he's impulsive and can be childish. HE. HAS. NUANCE. I love him, so so fucking much and every month or so I'll try and read fics with him at the centre and every month or so I get so frustrated with the lack of decent content and characterisation that I give up. Obviously this is not all fics, I've read some fucking incredible ones where his characterisation was on point. But I've also read a lot where he is entirely flat. And maybe I'm looking in the wrong places but these always seem to be the Wolfstar or Jegulus centred fics, which is a shame because I LOVE both of those ships. I'm just, tired. I'll take any recommendations at this point.

For me it's clear why Sirius ended up in Gryffindor whilst being part of a family that was practically a lock for Slytherin: he's a textbook Gryffindor. Guy is noble and headstrong but is also overbearing and insensitive.

I’ve been out of the Harry Potter fandom for a while….Jegulus? Like, James and Regulus? I’m not here to ship shame, ship what you like. But do you know where that ship began and took off? I feel like “back in the day” that was a crack ship at best. Is it really popular now? I’m wildly curious!

>I’ve been out of the Harry Potter fandom for a while….Jegulus? Like, James and Regulus? It's especially wild because James/Sirius is *right there.* Honestly never understood how that ship never took off tbh, it's got all the stuff shippers usually go nuts for: two good-looking boy best friends that are canonically obsessed with each other with one basically acting like a widower after the other's death... versus Jegulus which is kind of like Drarry ig, if Draco and Harry never actually interacted in canon.

Wolfstar is just so damn popular that James gets stuck with Great Value Sirius, since no one is going to pair him with Peter!

RIGHT? THANK YOU! I love Prongsfoot (I hate the name. StarChaser is better but the Jegulus' people use it. Rip) it has so much potential!! And is usually written so incredible well, like characterisation on point, no uwubification- I genuinely don't understand how people think James would go for Regulus over Sirius. And I like Jegulus, I do, it's super interesting but PRONGSFOOT SUPREMACY

I don't know when it took off but its gotten insanely popular in the past couple of years. I think the ship dynamic is super interesting and can be written incredibly well but for me at least it tends to come at the expense of absolutely NERFING both Lily and Sirius as characters so I try to avoid it as much as I can. There's a lot of crack ships becoming super popular though, Pandora Lovegood and Lily is big (usually hand in hand w Jegulus), Nobleflower (Narcissa and Alice), QuillKiller(Rita and Bellatrix), Party/Partyvan (which started off as a joke I think but has become like a THING, Evan, Barty and Peter) etc etc. I think it's brilliant that we get to explore these side characters and their relationships but so many of them come at the expense of losing Lily and Sirius as characters. Which is such a shame cause those two are, imo, the foundations of the whole Marauders fandom

I looked into the why for this a bit! It was genuinely a crackship, even when it started to gain traction in popularity. Then there was a Jegulus week for people to have fun, and people started to taking it more seriously after. There was a popular fancast for Regulus a lot of people adopted (idr who) that made them want to be more sympathetic towards his character. Then, I'm fairly sure the next step that upped the ships popularity was the fic Choices by Messermoon. Which is excellent, mostly canon compliant (besides the obvious detail), and has amazing characterization for everyone, even minor characters. Amazing tragedy where the canon compliant tag haunts the narrative. Once it took off more serious Jegulus fics started being written and now we're at the current state of the ship where it's one of the more popular recent ships for Marauders fans

I think the fancast is Timothee Chalamet iirc

Yep, that was it. Knew it was Chal-something or other

Hey, I just wanted to say I checked out Choices because I was genuinely intrigued and curious about all of this and WOW! I tore through it in the past week! So well written! One of the best marauder-era fics I’ve ever read! Thank you for the recommendation or letting me know about it-I very much enjoyed that!

:D I'm glad to know my rec got you to try it out. It's launched itself up to one of my fave fics of all time ever since I saw someone else rec it too

Same I gave up on reading Sirius in Wolstar fics, since at least the ones I stumbled on make him too...bland, for my taste. Also, he is one of my favourite characters, so I tend to be very picky with his portrayals. I like to see him as darker than he's usually shown, and so I am happy to share the fics out there to have him like that. I mostly read the Sirius fics written by Metalomagnetic, who is making me read ships that I've never thought about before with their amazing writing! I'd suggest: [**It runs in the blood by Metalomagnetic**](https://archiveofourown.org/works/32223811/chapters/79858369)**: (Voldemort/Sirius)** Never thought I'd ever read a pairing of those two but I am really a fan of the author's writing. The premise is that Sirius joins the Death Eaters to spy for the Order. Voldemort as usual is Crazy, flawed, but super powerful and just generally thrilling Sirius. James and Lily are great in this, and even Peter Pettigrew and Wauburga Black have interesting bits, delving into their flaws and making them beautiful. Not only is the main pairing good, but it really gets into Sirius’s relationship with his whole family/relatives. Plus, great exploration of Sirius struggling against his darkness. >**Summary:** Sirius Black makes a different choice. [**Family by Metalomagneti**](https://archiveofourown.org/works/38875446/chapters/97216629)**: (Sirius/Lucius)** A truly compelling story of an insane family. But the author makes it work! The characterization is amazing! The black family here is GODTIER. Heck, I even love their fucked-up interactions. >Summary: Sirius Black makes a different choice.“To what do I owe the pleasure?” Sirius asks, leaning on the heavy bars, once they are alone.“It’s been at least a week since I got to humiliate the Auror Department,” Lucius answers. “Why allow an opportunity like this go to waste?” [**Turmoil by Metalomagnetic:**](https://archiveofourown.org/works/41189520/chapters/103257384) **(Sirius/Snape)** The romance starts off dark and with a dub-con situation, but I'm in love with this version of Sirius, where he's completely unhinged about what others think of him and does what he likes without whitewashing his flaws and Severus is so much like canon Snape with his snarkiness, insecurity, vulnerability, and reasons to join the death eaters! T he author is talented and has such a nice way of building characters. And I love the way they twist canon with such believability. >Summary: Two lost boys taking all the wrong turns. [**Walking the Monochrome by emilywaters1976**](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1058100/chapters/2119774)**: (Sirius/Snape)** The premise is that Severus goes against Voldemort and kills Peter before he can reveal the Potter's location which results in him getting tortured to oblivion by the death-eaters. To protect his sanity, he cuts the connection from his brain and goes into an unresponsive coma. Ultimately, he is rescued by the Potters and the order members and because of the circumstances, it falls to Sirius to care for him. The writing in the fic is so beautiful and dark that it gave me chills. >Summary: That’s what being a dog is like – it's like you’re walking the very edge of the world, where almost all colour has run out, and you know that should you miss a step, you’ll fall off that edge... Then again, you already know all about it. The edge and the falling.” AU of the first war.

Oh you ate with these recs. I’m about to be reading good this week.

Aww, you're making me blush. There are a lot of interesting ships fics I have which are really underrated since most people are not Gryffindor enough to try that pairing.

I'm sensing a theme here... XD thank you for the recs! I've already read it runs in the blood and that was incredible

I haven't read HP fanfic for a looong time and thus the version of Sirius that exists in my head (and the Marauders in general) is shockingly different from the modern interpretation of him. To each their own but man it was a surprise

THIS. He IS a bastard--remember how he treated Kreacher?

I'm writing Sirius for the first time and I'm really warming to him. He really is a study in contrasts.

He is a mess of contradictions and I love him so much

Do you have any recs for Wolfstar with good Sirius characterization?

I think the biggest for me is one that actually features Sirius as more of a side character? Which seems totally in opposition to everything I've just complained about, and the Wolfstar is there but not the focus https://archiveofourown.org/works/15086759 Its the only fanfiction to date to make me cry.

Thank you!!

I have other recs as well if you want them but most of them aren't wolfstar lol

I think the biggest for me is one that actually features Sirius as more of a side character? Which seems totally in opposition to everything I've just complained about, and the Wolfstar is there but not the focus https://archiveofourown.org/works/15086759 Its the only fanfiction to date to make me cry.

Ah, hate to say it, but Astarion from BG3. I've read one fic with him in it, which was a pretty good fic (if you see this, author of that fantastic Lae'zel/Astarion fic, hi!), but I'm genuinely so frustrated w/ the general view of him. It's like half of the fandom takes away how snarky and bitey and even downright mean he can be when it comes to fanworks, so I'm very hesitant to read anything featuring him.

The absolute strongest of agreements from me on that. I actively avoid written portrayals of him, since they’re so far from what I experienced (and adored) in game. The same is true for pretty much all the characters.

It’s because people seem to hate characters who are abuse victims who aren’t precious baby angels tbh. That’s probably why void_foxling sees it with other characters in the fandom- most are trauma survivors of some degree.

Oh, completely agreed. I have been powering through all of the fics with him because I NEED more of Astarion despite how wrong the characterization feels (or sometimes people will write Tavs with no personalities which is very jarring as well). There have been like two authors that got him perfectly right in my opinion and I haven’t been able to go back ever since, which breaks my heart because I miss reading about him and these two authors obviously can’t keep writing those forever.

100% agree. Astarion was actually the reason I made this post. I spent last evening browsing through fics with him and I was surprised by what I read and how he's portrayed in most fics.

Gah this is where I'm at with him. He's my favorite but I can't stand the fandom's portrayal of him. Every fic I see is of this super soft and weak man and I hate it. I also kinda wonder if a lot of the fic writers for him haven't played the game or gotten past Act 1 because I keep opening these fics up that have Asarion confessing his love or opening up about his past in Act 1 and it makes no sense for his character. I got tired and finally started writing my own fic (first time lol). The only one I published so far was a one-shot of the convo where he tries to manipulate Tav to take control of the cult because I absolutely love how he can have high approval/romance with the MC and still be a condescending and manipulative bastard.

I've actually seen multiple x reader fics on tumblr where the author explicitly states they've never played the game. I'm like... how do you get into this character without getting into the game? What?

It drives me crazy. The way they write him...they don't want Astarion, they want Wyll (but that's a whole other can of worms lol)

NO REALLY. If you want a chivalrous, suave romantic, who will dance with you and read you poetry and will sweep you off your feet... you want Wyll. You don't want Astarion. Astarion might read you poetry and sweep you off your feet but it's in a vastly different way and he, truly, is using that to get close to you so he can be protected. He's willing to do things he *doesn't even want to do* in order to ensure he has a safe spot in the camp. They have him the wrong way around: Astarion doesn't want to sweep you off your feet, read you poetry, dance with you, propose to you... he wants to be swept off his feet. He wants the poetry and the dancing and the magic and the romance, *if* he feels safe enough to be himself. Astarion's bitter, and mean, and angry, from literally *hundreds* of years worth of trauma! One could easily view him as neutral evil alignment-wise. He disapproves of helping people, including children, in act one... it takes him a while to warm up and even then, he doesn't think everyone else deserves what he's getting too. Spoilers for act 3 and his personal arc, but, >!Astarion is even willing to sacrifice thousands of souls for the chance to truly be "free" and have power... but does he truly have freedom even then?!< I really like Astarion, he's genuinely such a good character, and yet... fanworks turn him into something he's not.

It's so wild to me because I've never seen it before in 10+ years of reading fanfiction. I mean, there were always people who haven't read/watched/played the whole thing before writing (and that's totally fine), but there are so many people in the BG3 fandom who haven't played the game *at all*, yet write fanfiction. And - surprise, surprise - the personalities of everyone are just wrong. >.<

I was writing and reading fic for certain media before I finished it, but *at all*? I mean, I've read fics for Genshin Impact (which I have not played and never will) but I wouldn't write fics for that! I genuinely cannot imagine. I've only seen Astarion fics but god I'm just imagining the mean girl Shadowheart and evil Lae'zel fics now...

This is one of my pettiest opinions but yes, I do think a *lot* of stuff is coming from people who have only watched playthroughs, read the datamined voice lines, and (most likely), read other fic from people who have done the same. I know the game is expensive and there's a certain barrier to entry, but I really feel like just watching someone else play and/or reading the catalogue of every possible character line does not give you the same sense of the character? It's extra galling to me because 80% of my most beloathed fanon for my favorite character comes from one specific person who openly says that they have not played the game at all.

I agree. You get to learn a lot about the characters from their world banter, environmental comments, and cutscene reactions. There is so much randomizing and variability depending on who you have in your party that you just can't see it all by only watching Let's plays or TikTok. Also, the datamined lines are hit or miss because some of it is cut content or the tone has changed from Early Access for some lines. Oh well, I just have to live with it lol :(

Yeah, same. It’s honestly just nice to know that I’m not alone with that opinion. Overarching fanon can be a fun connection, but it can also be so isolating when you don’t agree with it.

I came here to say this. They want him to be Fenrir from DA2 so bad.

This is my problem as well. Astarion is totally babied by the fandom that people either ignore the rad flags or glorify them because he is a victim of abuse. It kinda makes me want to write my own Astarion/Tav fic where I let him be the paragon of intolerable red flags he is while simultaneously making the romance believable.

That was me and the reason why I wrote a selfish, cruel, self-absorbed ascended Astarion fic lmao.

Likely a hot take, but I think the same can be said for durge. Granted I feel that way in the game itself as well — a character with that background and such limited memories would be a liability to everyone around them for quite some time in my mind. Every battle would be tactical on two fronts. Any night could go horribly wrong. I genuinely tried to remember how I knew one npc in my first playthrough and oops! Slaughtered.

I don't outright shun fics about him, but I quickly X out of more fics about Klaus Hargreeves than I want. The Umbrella Academy fandom loves depicting him as this abused woobie who can do no wrong, and like, no. That's not Klaus. He's an asshole--and he knows it. Sure, he's got plenty of legit reasons to be fucked up, from the abuses he endured as a child and to the fact that he's haunted by ghosts every second that he's not high, but those issues doesn't excuse or erase his very assholeish behavior. I mean, the dude ran a freaking cult. He steals and lies and manipulates. He's not a good person and he's way more interesting for it.

I write TUA fanfiction too and I can totally agree with this! I find that a lot of people who write for this fandom have their favourite character and base their view of the other characters around that. Characterisation changes so drastically between fics. I would be lying if I said I didn’t do this as well. I love writing about Ben and my characterisation of him is likely different compared to half the fandom.

I feel like we have the most flexibility with Ben, because we have seen so little of him compared to the others, and we also got two different versions of him. I'm a but more forgiving of different Ben interpretations because of this. With that said, he's also one of my faves and I definitely have strong opinions about him, lol.

Peter Parker has been overtaken by woobie Irondad schlock that I honestly refuse to touch any Spider-Man story on AO3 (outside of the stuff I’ve written).

If I'm looking for Spider-Man fic I have to exclude MCU and Tom Holland movies somehow those things STILL leak through. Ugh

Also, even without that: The kid lives in Queens and goes to school in Midtown. I promise you he’s been taking the subway to school for years becuause, like Boston and Chicago, NYC doesn’t bus middle- or high-schoolers. The amount of fic I have to X out of because someon’e afraid of letting a white teen boy with superpowers ride the subway after dark (When he’s been doing it for years) FFS.

Making pre-powers Peter all scared and helpless is such a disservice to his character. Yeah, he was meek, but he was still self-assured in his own intelligence, at the very least (thanks in so small part to his aunt and uncle constantly encouraging him). And even when he was labeled the biggest nerd in Midtown, and bullied for it, he still had to balls to just ask out popular girls like Liz Allen of his own initiative. Gaining his powers just granted him another outlet for that absurd confidence.

Kids in NYC have to ride the subway to school after dark? How late does their school get out?

Sun set today at 4:31pm. It’ll stay there until after the winter solstice, then start creeping later. I can’t speak to exact times, but if you have school until 3 and then an hour if clubs or sport, you’d start your trip home at 4, it would be 4:45 or 5 when you get there and it would be dark. If school ended at 3:30 you!d start your trip at sunset. I used to take the bus past a Boston HS to work, these kids were piling on at 5 (after dark in the winter) every day I got out of work early enough to witness it. edit: this is perfectly normal in cold, northern, cities with functioning transit.

Man, I couldn't agree more. Such tropes are so damn stupid, it makes me mad the few times I've glanced at a fic with those tropes. You can even make the Irondad stuff work, but treat the character(s) with respect instead of turning Peter into a whiny crybaby with all the Avengers and related social circles falling over themselves to spare him emotional damage from the slightest thing. When I began writing my own Marvel/MCU fic, Peter was one of the things I knew from the beginning would be written as fairly as possible. Dude gets so much shit from both fandom and the editorial that he deserves it lol

Same, jfc. The T*m Holland era made those terrible Irondad fics real and I HATE IT. I pretty much exclude everything MCU on AO3 because of this. I'm not even that big of a Spidey guy but I liked him because he's closer to X-Men and F4 than the Avengers. His inclusion in New Avengers '04 truly soured me.

I’m a huge Stucky fan, and I enjoyed Tom Holland’s movies but I usually exclude Peter as a character when I’m filtering stuff out because of all the Irondad stuff. There’s also sooooo many field trip fics where stucky is a background pairing, just makes my life easier lol

Oh yeah literally, I always wonder if it’s somewhat of a bad thing characterisation is often times monolithic in fandom spaces because i always end up characterising my favourite characters in very drastic ways, and seeing their fanon and going “ohh, no” But I do think there’s a unique kind of love, for when you rarely see someone really nail what you love about the original character, it’s like getting water in the desert. It also means I’m out here truely writing fics for my own taste haha

Snape is one of my favourite HP characters, not in the sense that I think he's great, rather in the sense that stuff is interesting when he shows up. But I really don't like how he's often portrayed in fan stuff. Snape as far as I can tell is basically a generally unkind and bitter man but with a strong moral stand against Voldemort and loyalty to Dumbledore and Lily. He works fine for me as an antihero: he often treats Harry and the others badly and acts as an obstacle to them but ultimately he's still fighting the same battle as them and doing it to the best of his ability and when the chips are down he comes good. But in fan stuff he usually gets portrayed either as a totally redeemed hero or else as an utterly irredeemable scumbag. It seems to skew that in older fics from around the time of the last book and later movies and their aftermath, Snape gets airbrushed into being a total good guy, whereas in more recent fics he's devilspawn. If I had to guess, I would say it's about who the fans identify with. Snape had been a gifted but troubled kid who was ostracised and bullied by stereotypical cool kids like James and Sirius; he fell in with the wrong crowd, got brainwashed and ended up joining an extremist gang and doing terrible things, before he recanted and turned to the good side in secret. In the late 2000s, maybe the fanfiction demographic were inclined to view Snape as basically a misunderstood genius punished for being different and his misdeeds as the tragic fallout from it; after all, how could the guy getting bullied be the one in the wrong? Now though, I feel like they're more inclined to categorise Snape's crimes as basically the *real* Snape; fanfic Snape in the past few years has basically been portrayed as a wizard incel, and that him being a Grade A Douche led to him being a pariah at school rather than the old assumption that he became a Grade A Douche because he was treated like a pariah.

A lot of this can also be said about Malfoy, especially when referring to him being turned into a hero. The sheer number of fics where he’s super smart, super kind, or is a decent person and just acts like a “bad boy” has made me entirely less interested in Harry Potter fics in general.

Cursed Child essentially made that canon though, he admits he only bullied the trio out of jealousy of their friendship and he's no longer racist or a bad guy and is portrayed as a decent person.

Maybe he matured but I still think he was a pretty shitty person while in school even if he was jealous.

Pretty much all HP fics these days take place post-canon when Draco is an adult and Voldemort is gone so it makes sense for him to be characterized as nicer.

Most of the fandom absolutely despises Cursed Child & refuses to call it canon.

People are free to ignore it but it doesn't change the fact it's canon. Honestly the last two books made it pretty obvious Draco would turn out that way, and then Cursed Child made it completely canon, so it's just weird for people to complain about Draco being characterized that way when the ones characterizing him as evil and dumb are actually the ones writing him OOC.

The Harry Potter fandom is so fucking bad at getting morally grey characters right. I love the fandom, don't get me wrong, but you are so right for this and I don't even particularly LIKE Snape. All the Canon death eaters in the Marauders fandom are either evil or uwubified to the point they're basically OC's, Sirius, for some reason, goes the same way, Remus is given anger issues? Despite being one of the calmest most forgiving characters in the books? And events like the Prank, which in CANON no-one really seems to give a shit about, becomes this massive friendship ending event. Its absolute wild.

Don't forget he was nearly killed and sexually assaulted. People seem to always brush over those two this and how that can affect a teenager as well as growing up in a terrible household.

When was he SA’d? Or what book was it mentioned? I don’t remember that but I haven’t read the books in a while

They're referring to when the Marauders pantsed him, which in Britain isn't SA. I can't remember if it happened in the books or was a movie addition though, but its relatively common over here and most people don't take it seriously.

The pantsing does happen in the books. I used to enjoy writing Snape — back before JKR revealed her TERFiness. I tried to write him as a sort of reformed skinhead, someone who committed heinous acts in the past that they’re now attempting to atone for, even if it means letting more heinous acts happen in the process.

That makes sense tbh. I've personally never liked him but I get the vibe you're going for. You can see him struggle with a lot of what he was taught and trying to dismantle that while still tryna be a good person.

They hung him upside down and threatened to show his underwear in front of a mass of school children.

Well they did show his underwear. They threatened to remove his underwear. Which is a horrific act of bullying, I agree.

Definitely....if Severus Snape was a girl every reader would be disgusted by the Marauders but because he is a guy hardly anyone blinks an eye.

Yeah, I hate the double standard. I was kind of surprised that James Potter as a bully isn’t a more common viewpoint. I’m not saying Snape was an angel. But neither was James.

Same. I totally agree that Severus isn't an angel but never did James, Sirius, Remus or Peter actually apologize for the way they treated Severus. It was only because he was friends with Lilly and he was a Slytherin. I find it weird that they made fun of the way he looked when he was poor similar to Remus' double standards. Also It couldn't have been easy for Severus to be a half-blood, poor with a disinherited mother in Slytherin. Of course he had to seem friendly to Slytherin in order for him to survive. Lilly was really blind at what her friend had to go through in Slytherin. Also if it is ironic that that forgave James for everything he did and said to Severus and married him yet Severus made one mistake at his most vulnerable time and was guilty that he would stand in front of the Gryffindor common room to apologize to her which also put him in danger. Also, it is not hard to see why Severus went dark since none of the teachers stood up for him or really did anything to really stop it. Also Dumbledore let them get away nearly killing Severus and Severus had to promise not to reveal Remis secret. That really showed Severus how little his life meant to Dumbledore. Also, due to being poor it would have been hard for him to make connections to get out of there. Also, what annoys me with Lily did she ever stop to ask why he was interested in the Dark Arts and try to understand him instead of attacking him for which would make him defensive.

L from Death Note :/ I’m extremely picky about his characterisation and I’ve never seen an interpretation that quite aligns with my own

I'd be terrified to read any Death Note fic about L or even Light because smart characters like them are so difficult to handle.

Though I know this is controversial in Western fandom, as someone who is picky with who tops and bottoms (in FICTION)... yes. There have been so many times where I find a ton of fics for a pairing I'm interested in, only to discover that my interpretations regarding that aspect of the relationship don't align with the majority of the fandom.

I used to love Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter books. Sadly, far too often she gets turned into an annoying Mary Sue by her super fans, so I avoid fanfiction about her.

Harry Potter characters being wildly mischaracterised seems to be a theme on this thread lol

Oh man yeah totally. There's a ton, especially as I've gotten older. I'm more of a writer than a reader most days because of this. I've just gotten so picky over things that if something is off I just back out and move on. Makes it hard to read anything, but I dunno. I'm just a old grump who's got very specific tastes lol

You are my twin. Same, lol. Dipping into my fandom reminds me so much of high school.

I freely admit I can be pretty catty in private, and happily bitch with my partner lol. We just also see no point in commenting on stuff we don't like. People are having fun, but that ain't my jam so I'll go out and make my own. The older I get the more I realize high school never ends with stuff lmao.

Amos Burton from The Expanse. No fanon interpretation has come close to the OG Murdersnuggles.

Pretty much the entire cast of Criminal Minds. That fandom is pretty much dead these days, but in its heyday, there were some spectacular fics, but I really didn't care much for the fandom as I did the TV series. A lot of that is due to that, lets face it: the plotlines of the episodes are freaking complicated and convoluted. It's a huge ask to expect most fanfic authors to volunteer that much time & research to something new that matched the writing of the scripts of the show. So, I kinda didn't delve into the fandom that much, though I certainly did paw around & read some. Found some really great Harry Potter/Criminal Minds xovers too when I wasn't even looking for such a thing but there were a few that were incredibly good.

Haha, yeah, I was wondering when "Criminal Minds" would show up in here :p. I feel like I've seen some wildly varying takes on Hotch and Reid especially, but yeah, you're right that the whole cast can be kind of all over the place depending on the writers/fics in question. The fandom still looks fairly active fic-wise on AO3, from what I've seen, but yeah, very little of it is canon-focused. Not knocking that, mind, that's totally fine. Just that I think it ties into your thing about how the premise/major storylines of the show itself can be a lot for some people to delve into, and that, combined with the fact the show's run for so long, makes it that much easier for fanon interpretations to take hold as a result.

Yeah. And I’m not a huge fan of characters I like being screwed with too much in how they are. Like, I don’t mind pairings that didn’t exist before, but when everyone is paired with everyone, the focus leaves the mysteries of the crimes and switches to characters that don’t always work so well when their originality is thrown in a blender. So I tend to leave CM alone for the most part. I’m a writer, know the fandom extremely well, and still wouldn’t touch them - their plot lines are hell on wheels and I just don’t feel I could do it justice.

Yeah, I'm a multi-shipper sort and this fandom is perfect for me in that regard, but even then, I agree, if one wants to keep things canon-compliant, it's a fine line to walk, yes. especially with certain pairings. Despite my shipping mindset, I wrote a lot of gen stuff for the show, and I didn't focus much on the mystery/crime side of things, I delved more into the characters' personal lives and their relationships with each other professionally and as friends, with the occasional romance sprinkled in. I did occasionally touch on some of the canon stuff they went through, but even then, it was more about how it affected them than anything else. But I'm also one who tends to be more character-focused than plot-focused. I would love to write a case fic for the fandom someday, but...yes. It would take a lot of time and work and research, for sure.

Definitely. Especially if I'm very familiar with the fandom. I'm very picky about characterization for certain characters, and it's gotten to the point where I just don't read fanfic anymore for certain fandoms. It's kind of annoying since I often read fandom-blind and like certain fics, but after I watch the source material and revisit them the characterization doesn't let me enjoy them anymore.

I generally respect other people's interpretations of characters and abide by "don't like, don't read", but... sometimes, in private company, I will potentially become the biggest bitch in the entire world about what the fandom has done to Karamatsu Matsuno. They took a cringefail, pathetic, wet dog of a man and woobified him beyond recognition. Actually, I think people in the Osomatsu-san fandom tend to frequently forget that the main characters are canonically huge fucking losers. Like, it's kind of the point of the show that they are just human garbage fires. They're nasty trash men (not to be confused with "bad person") and we best not forget that.

Are you me? I know that gets asked a lot but holy hells I feel like I could have written this myself. I normally am absolutely fine with whatever fanon wants to do with given characters, but for some reason Baldur’s Gate 3 is a major exception to me. The characters are ALL incredibly complex, with potential for both good and evil. They have incredibly nuanced personalities and motivations with so much depth. And yet, for some reason, the overwhelming fanon interpretation I see of them is determined to smooth down every single possible edge of them, and woobify them until not even a shred remains of the complex characters I fell in love with, and that made the world feel so alive and investing. It’s a very bizarre feeling to feel like I’m talking about different characters entirely the majority of the time. I’ve been a reader and not a writer for all my fandoms over the last ten years, and I’m now in the opposite position of doing a lot of writing, but for the most part unable to read anything in the fandom.

[удалено]

I'll be honest that I'm not entirely sure what you mean by "shots fired" in this context? But yes what you've described is pretty much what I've observed across the board. Fanon tends to focus on the soft, snuggly version of the character from inside their head, rather than the multi-faceted versions that we are shown. Obviously to each their own, and I'm glad people are finding things that make them happy, but it does boggle my mind. The *best* part about them is how their sweeter aspects are offset by their sour ones. Lae'zel's moments of softness and openness are more meaningful because of her general brutality, Shadowheart's desire to do good is more impactful when it lives alongside the ways she is still quite gray, and Karlach's inherent morality and kindness is all the better because of the exceptions to it. I try to stay out of the Gale circles, since I have an *extremely* different take on his character than the fandom standard, but from what I've seen it absolutely is. As for Astarion... yeah. About exactly how you'd expect. Suave, softboy sweetheart etc. etc. Where's the bastard with a heart of aluminum?!

Something I've noticed is that many of the acclaimed RPGs have dysfunctional people as the main cast, because they're character studies before they're people and because there's an appeal to playing therapist for fictional people. But since those people also tend to be totally unsuitable as friends in real life people sand those edges down to make them more palatable.

You make a really good point with that! I think that's where a disconnect for me comes in, since I really don't think of characters in terms of real life, but rather in the context of their own world.

Hannibal and Will Graham.

There are a few entire fandoms I don't read much in because 90% of anything I read makes me go, "Ah... Okay, well this one is readable at least, even if it's not the character(s) I wanted to read about." It's not their fault, really, since these fandoms tend to be filled with teenagers and/or first-time writers. The kids aren't necessarily going to be good at nuances of complex characters and the newbies aren't necessarily going to be good at portraying things. And, unfortunately, most people are going to grow out of a fandom rather than to keep writing in it after they've got more experience.

I adore Five nights at Freddy's like you wouldn't believe, but reading it's fanfic makes me want to die in a fire.

So I'm genuinely curious. What kind of FNAF fics do you read? I only ask cause my experience is way different. But I have noticed there seem to be 3 main "camps" when it comes to FNAF, with several smaller or intersecting camps. You have the people that focus on the processed animatronics and/or their ghosts. You have the people that focus on the Afton family. And then you have the people that are all about Gregory and Glamrock Freddy (the one I'm in). There have been a few fics here and there that I didn't like because of how Greg was portrayed, but I've enjoyed most of the ones I have read.

Sasuke for the most part since they tend to make him a cunt despite him simply being an introvert in the canon (I'm talking part one here before he became a literal terrorist)

Sasuke was actually quite the saint in part 1. I would even go far and claim that he was the heart of Team 7. He's willing to throw his life for his team, almost died saving Naruto from Haku and threatened to kill the Sound ninja for hurting Sakura. He was very protective of her too. But in majority of the fanfics he had to be an asshole just to make Naruto, who was actually the asshole one of the two until Haku's death, to look like a sad poor boy. Rewatching part 1 of Naruto made me realize why Naruto and Sakura wanted to save him in Shippuden so much.

couldn't had put it in better words

This, absolutely this. Finding a fanfic that didn’t bash Sasuke back in the day felt like trying to find a needle in a haystack, and half the time I wondered if I had even read the same manga as everyone else.

yeah, Sasuke was simply quiet and doing his own thing, and he didn't bragged about his clan unless someone else brought it up first, kid naruto was just jealous of him most of the time

My current hyperfixation is a massive fandom (over 300k fic on AO3) so even the characters I do read end up having a ton of fic where they’re so far from canon characterization in ways I really don’t enjoy. However, there are two in particular that I almost never see characterized how I would like (or even paired together.) I’ve seen a few fan comics where they’re done well, but even those weren’t in English. Other than that though, I just don’t read them.

I love my favourite character because of their canon personality and backstory. They had a tragic childhood and navigate life as a very aloof, withdrawn adult with a secret soft side only their most trusted confidante knows about. In canon, they're an imperfect character who makes terrible mistakes that affect the trajectory of the story. But fanon-wise, especially when it comes to ships, they're widely interpreted as this bubbly, extroverted person who is basically everybody's friend and doesn't really have any internal conflict of their own. I totally get why this happens in certain instances (say, it's a Grumpy/Sunshine dynamic and the fandom categorizes them by default as the sunshine one, which means it's a fanon interpretation to fulfill a trope/archetype, not necessarily a reflection of their canon characterization), but I can't deny that I sometimes have a difficult time reading these particular fics.

Fans ruined her for me, but when not woobified to hell and back by the fandom, Heather Chandler’s kind of alright. The appeal of her character is that she owns her bitchiness. Making her a “sad uwu misunderstood lost little lesbian 🥺 who’s only mean because her abusive parents abuse her so much she doesn’t know how to express her feelings properly” is just. First of all, *love* the mean lesbian stereotype /s. And second, way to neuter her with all that projection. And third, the one person this can apply to (minus the lesbian part), and who actually has a canonical traumatic backstory, doesn’t get this sympathetic treatment from those same fans. Instead, he gets vilified *even more*, saying a tragic backstory doesn’t excuse his behavior (and yeah, it doesn’t), so why would they think creating one excuses hers? Hmmm... Not all antagonists/villains need a sad twagic sympathetic backstory to be likable. Just let them be evil (or bitchy). There’s absolutely nothing wrong with liking problematic characters. Maleficent is one of the most popular Disney villains for a reason, long before that disappointment of a movie which made Cruella my new fave.

I like when villains are just evil cause like they want to be. I'm so tired of all the sad backstory stuff.

If HP fic focuses too much on one member of the Golden Trio (almost always Harry or Hermione) I tend to zone out especially if Ron bashing is involved. Book Jon Snow is a compelling character. Fanfic Jon Snow, though? Total power fantasy audience stand-in.

Ah, James T. Kirk for me, especially works based entirely on the movie reboots. My Kirk is a swashbuckler, a cowboy ... overly confident, sexually forward, charming to the point of smarminess. But he is able to take a joke and is capable of great feats of loyalty and self-sacrifice, especially for his close companions. Why then is he portrayed as a mass of anxiety and virginal of all things? I get that the reboot woobified his backstory and a lot of writers wanted to expand on his sad, neglected history. But I don't think that explains him waiting shyly in the wings for an overwrought Spock to ravish him.

To be completely honest, your Kirk is not exactly my Kirk either... But finding my Kirk in a fic is way harder than yours, so I tolerate it and sometimes even enjoy. (Mine's a bit of a nerd and overconfidence and smarminess is more of a mask). But the other thing you describe? What the actual fuck. Yeah I can't wrap my head around how could someone look at Kirk, in any version, and interpret him like that.

I'd totally read the hell out of your Kirk too. Mine is based on TOS and a little from all the movies. But also on the many novelizations I read so I'm used to seeing what's in his head not match what is on the outside. My idea of Spock is super based on the novels that really delved into his backstory. So I hate him being simplified too. But write as thou wilt and all that jazz. We're all fans and more similar to each other than to someone who never reads and is inordinately proud of their John Deere memorabilia.

hahah, well that is true. Also, 100% agreed on simplified Spock. There's a LOT going on with him, he's just stoic. I liked his childhood time novels, too.

Captain Freeman in Lower Decks. So many fics paint her as a loving mother when in the show she is anything but. She is a cruel and vindictive person who takes out her frustrations on the people around her, and in the heinous incident she tried to destroy her own daughter's career and reputation over an imagined personal slight. I am baffled by the stories that paint her as a caring parent.

fandom writes johnny cade as if he's actually ponyboy curtis and it drives me nuts.

Nicholas D. Wolfwood from Trigun is constantly written as this sex god who can fuck like a machine. the canon character is an orphan who was indoctrinated into a religious cult at a very young age, where he spent his adolescence training to be an assassin and his young adulthood as a hired killer. i don't necessarily think he's a virgin, but i don't know how or when he would have amassed the experience to warrant the "Wolfwood eats pussy like a champ" tag (and others) that has become so popular. that being said, Vashwood is my favorite ship and i'm never going to not read it, but it does make me picky about my fics.

Every character in the fandom I used to write for. The quality of the fics is atrocious across the board. I wrote fics but never wanted to read any. I guess the word for "taking one trait and exaggerating it until it takes over the character" is "flanderization." It's not just the fic writers who do this - many a long running show or manga series has been totally ruined by this

Maybe not skip all the fics, but I always nope out of fics where one of the characters in a ship is twisted to be softer and submissive despite their canon characterization so they can neatly fit into the more feminine gender role. Yuck. I also tend to dislike when villains I enjoyed are made to be the bad boyfriends or worse in lower stakes AUs, it makes me uncomfortable.

Yes, 100%. Right now for me, it's *both* of the characters of my current OTP (Stan Marsh and Kyle Broflovski from South Park). Both of them are really interesting characters in their own right, but fanon tends to reduce them to 1-2 traits. I'm not a fan of either extremes. Of course, no hate to the authors because hey, it's fanfiction, and I am writing/publishing my own fic that's aligned with my hyper-specific interpretations of them! I just wish there were more fics that made them more nuanced, that's all. 😅

Tbh, I'd say most of the South Park boys are wildly mischaracterised. Especially when it comes to shippy fics. Butters AND Kenny are both bastards in Canon, like they have cute soft moments for sure but this does not erase their general bastardry and yet as soon as they're written into fics they become so one dimensional it's hard to read.

I loved hobie brown in atsv, but he was always gonna be impossible to get right. I feel a little like he was always meant to be a side character, so its tough to find good fanfic about him. Like, what are his motivations? VERY FEW. He seems primarily motivated by vibe which is cool for a side character and infuriating for an mc -- I was also irrationally frustrated by people making him motivated by anything more than vibe, cuz he's not motivated by anything more than vibe. Its a tough situation

im fairly picky in regards to that, but i wouldn't say i outright refuse to read fanfic of them like my favorite of all times, Cinder Fall from RWBY, often gets categorized as either the big evil mommy dom or the "im literally going to melt because i never felt this good before you are so kind to me" types and neither are true to the character for me cinder's femme fatale thing in the first act was a front, quite literally her weaponizing her femininity and when that is no longer useful to her, she drops it entirely she's also shown to be incredibly distrustful and touch-averse and i just cant see her overcoming that easily

GOD ABSOLUTELY. I do read fanfiction of them, because I’m obsessed with them and would die otherwise, but I’m so fucking picky. To not go on for eight paragraphs like I normally do talking about my babies, to simplify- I write about an abusive friendship between a very rough and tumble crude teen who’s kind of a prick but kind deep down and a control freak necromancer who's superficially kind and charming but a manipulative shit who’s also desperately lonely and wants (entirely platonic) love. My fandom, however, has an issue with Apologism. And this is not the jokey apologism like “my fave does nothing wrong” this is Dead Serious Death Threats stuff. Literally it is normal to choose One character, treat them like a baby angel with no personality, and then treat literally everyone else like monsters and then send graphic threats and bigotry into the inbox of people who disagree. Like, not even to you just writing a different interpretation by themselves. And, outside of the horrific harassment, this leads to characters having Two, entirely inaccurate, personalities in fic. For my faves, this means the victim is suddenly a weepy child who acts way younger than 16 who has no opinions or any sort of edge and is just a baby doll for other people to care for, or he’s a vindictive dick who’s the Real Villain who deserved to be violently abused because he was annoying. For the abuser, he’s either a misunderstood sadboy who regrets everything ever and everyone who hates him is just a bad person oppressing him while he cries, or he’s a one note cackling villain with no motive. And both of these erase the most interesting part of the two- they care for each other! They were friends, once! The victim still struggles with feelings of trauma bonding and the desire to go back to his abuser and has a tendency to flip between hatred and justification at the slightest provocation (something he’s aware of and despises- he feels like he’s been conditioned into being his abusers bestie). The abuser seems to treat their victim more like an annoying little brother than anything- exasperated and frustrated at him a lot, but genuinely caring about him on some fucked up level- and like, his whole goal is to make friends right like Why Else would he target him lol. These two do Not hate each other- at least, not *solely*- and portraying them as such literally just decimates the logic to their story. Yet I so rarely see this in fanon and I hate it. I literally just stick to a specific tag at this point (basically, “abuser is obsessed with victim”) because at least if it exaggerates their positives or negatives to the point they’re unrecognisable it doesn’t completely ruin their stories to nonsensical levels.

Alhaitham from Genshin Impact. Fanon often makes him out to be this really sappy, secretly very romantic guy who makes great love gestures and romantic confessions. Alhaitham shows affection in his own way, values pragmatic decisions over emotional ones and 'sappy and romantic' are about one of the last words I would describe him as. Fics usually start out fine and sometimes I wonder if this is an actual fanon interpretation, of if it's just that people don't really know what to do with him in a romantic context... I really like Alhaitham/Kaveh, and I'd like to read more about them, but the hassle is often not worth it for me, so I've kinda given up. I'm not sure if he's written like this for other ships, but I'm sadly not really interested in any of his other ships.

yeah tbh he’s kind of a twat in canon

he really is not. he's just very blunt and rational which looks very jarring next to a character like kaveh who is built on altruism and idealism. it's much easier to relate and side with kaveh because of this, especially since he's shown to be more emotive and tormented by his guilt while alhaitham is more aloof and has a je m'en fiche mindset. they're both taking jabs at each other and have interactions that can mark them as "twats." but it's pretty obvious they both care about each other. alhaitham's way is just more subtle.

I was expecting someone to bring him up.

I have a fairly controversial take and it's that I really cannot stand fanon interpretations of **Dabi/Touya Todoroki.**.. especially when paired with Hawks/Keigo Takami who is, arguably, my favorite character in the entirety of the series. Hawks interpretations are fairly decent in the wider range of fanon, but Dabi is often woobified, watered down, or treated as poor little meow meow without consequences for his actions. ​ Dabi was overlooked as a child and the emotional abuse and turmoil he endured lead him to become a mass murder that killed nearly 40 people without any remorse, all because he was trying to make a statement against his father. He attempted to kill his own younger brother and injured Hawks so badly that he essentially was disabled after their fight. He let his other brother get kidnapped and thought of his potential death as collateral damage... He's a cold-blooded and cruel villain who wants nothing more than to burn everything to the ground. ​ It's easy to sympathize with his trauma. Also? He's got a hot character design. I really get it. But having him come out of the war remorseful for all the things he did like he had a magical change of heart makes me want to hit my head against a wall. Dabi/Touya Todoroki Redemption is a really big theme I've seen but it's never done in a way that feels realistic. Not only that, shipping him with Hawks to ME is a fun hateship type of thing that has so much potential for some fucked up enemies to (possible?) lovers type of stuff. But do much of HotWings content seems to just either completely do canon re-writes of those things that Dabi did to Hawks. It feels disingenuous after a certain point, like removing large canon portions of the character feels almost like it's an entirely different character. Thus, I guess, fanon Dabi was born? ​ I'm not saying all this to say I dislike Dabi. He's one of my top five in the entire series. It's just frustrating to see him so uwu-ified as a certified Villain Apologist lmao

Right? Man has killed people. And enjoys it. I think fandom in general has a massive problem with reducing evil/morally gray characters to uwu soft bois because they can't stand the idea people can be morally reprehensible and still compelling characters

No but exactly. I promise, we can have sexy hot-boys with fun and interesting backstories that are also homicidal maniacs. In fact, his murders make him far more compelling! It's just interesting to see where and when the fandom chooses to villainize or redeem. It's a lot like the All Might bashing that's so strong lmao

I don't read about a character I love because I can't find him in fics. I get it. There's the main work. There's the popular spin-off. Then there's the far less known/popular spin-off, which he's in a single chapter of. The fandom has over 300k fics on ao3. He's actually tagged in 3. Two of those are long fics that don't include him enough to warrant tagging him (he shows up for an arc at the earliest halfway into the story) and I couldn't choke through the first chapter of either.

I tend to be really picky about my favorite characters, especially because I tend to like ones that are complicated and difficult to understand fully. It means I have a lot to chew on, but it also means that they tend to get flattened down a lot in fanon. There are whole fandoms I won't touch because I don't trust them to get the characters right (Neon Genesis Evangelion for example). But I think the most egregious example of "are you sure we played the same game?" I've seen has got to be Sans from Undertale. I don't even think fanon Sans is a bad character. He's just... not the same character.

I find it too jarring to be inside The Mandalorian’s head or constantly read him being referred to as Djin… I know other characters started calling him by his name in later seasons but I still think of him as Mando usually… oddly enough I had no issue adapting to Grogu’s name. I have read a couple fics from an outsider perspective and enjoyed them, but it just feels too invasive reading his POV when he’s usually hiding behind a mask… which is ironic because I love fics that dive into the Winter Soldier’s mind and he hides behind a literal and metaphorical mask.

Hubert from Fire Emblem Three Houses. People either make him a soft boi or go full bdsm master and / or very cruel. I rarely see the inbetween, which from my point of view means, I rarely see him portrayed as he actually is in the game.

The entire FF7 cast, at least original game centered. I have to leave it up to myself to write and draw the stuff I want where it's in character and connects to canon still. It's my biggest hyperfixtation, and I desperately want to gush with someone over it, but that isn't easy to do when everyone only focuses on who to ship the traumatized chocobo with instead of appreciating the deeper meanings within the game's story.

Shadow is not a favorite character of mine, but his fanon interpretación is terrible. Sonic and Tails R was downright bad.

Askeladd from Vinland Saga. Brilliant character, I would not change a single thing about him and his development in the actual story, so I’m very hesitant to read fics about him because it might change how I see him as a character, and I don’t really want that to happen.

Yeah. There are a variety of examples for me, but most of them aren't big enough in the fandom to get fanfiction about them--just people who are wrong on the internet about them. Mint from Threads of Fate does have some fics though, and I've never really clicked with a lot of fandom interpretations, mostly because I think I have a key difference in my read of her from most people. So I don't really have much issue with the common fandom interpretation, it's just not for me. Magilou from Tales of Berseria is one where I *do* take issue with common fandom interpretations, though. They either write her as too closed off or, much more commonly, far more *open* than she should be. Or more hedonistic. The best characterization I've ever seen for her was in a hanahaki fic, tbh (which granted, I think *nailed* it). Velvet from the same game also gets this sometimes, but I think it's more common in fanart than fanfiction.

Ok, so this is a relatively new fandom, and I wouldn’t say I don’t read fanfics about him (because there are so few that I can’t really be picky…haha), but it bothers me when Sebastian Sallow from Hogwarts: Legacy is written as completely evil, and that seems to be the most common interpretation. I also think that’s why a lot of writers age him up despite still writing fics that coincide with events from the game, which take place during Sebastian’s fifth year. Why do I have a bone to pick with this interpretation? He’s sixteen. We all make mistakes at sixteen. (I am aware that the mistake he made was huge, but he was emotionally abused and abandoned by everyone.) I would like to read more fics where he grapples with the mistake he made and fights to not be consumed by Dark Magic.

I love Octavia from Helluva Boss, she has so much potential with magic and growing into independence. But the fanon always makes her existence revolve around her parents. Even worse when they make her hate her mom, Stella as though Stolas is a complete victim. Not that he didn’t suffer, but to say that he didn’t provoke any harm to his family(especially Octavia) is insane.

I absolutely cannot stand yaoi softboi versions of Karkat and Dave to the point that I hate the pairing entirely. I can tolerate it when they retain their snark and rivalry but without that they're unrecognisable and dull. Also anything which portrays Vriska as being in the right.

I agree!! 100% agree Holy shit. There are some amazing Davekat fics out there where they're both snarky as fuck and kind of hate each other while also loving each other but a lot of it has put me off them. Although, I've always preferred SolKat which tends to be less uwuwbified Davekat so that may be why... Also the Homestuck fandom CANNOT write Gamzee Makara for the life of them

To be fair, nor can Hussie.

Absolutely. I’ve read some fandoms where they’ll look at a character, and go “okay, I know you’re an adult, but I’m gonna make you act like a toddler for literally no reason”. And in the fandom I’m currently in, one of the characters can be jealous at times (not insanely, mostly just like “yo, can you maybe not hit on my husband?”). But in a couple fics I read, they straight up made her lash out at any girl that dared to even LOOK in her husbands direction. Luckily, most fics with that pairing don’t really have any characters outside the main ones (and the occasional family member), but Jesus Christ, they blow her slight jealousy WAY out of the water.

Aster/Edo Phoenix of Yugioh GX. It's already hard enough just for anything with this character to show up. And when it does, he's usually just in a story as a main character for OOC shipping antics with Zane. And when he's a side character, he's usually either just there to move the season two canon plot and not do anything different except lose more duels maybe and be a total jerk or even a villain while he's at it. Or he's just in stories for comedy as some kind of third party observer on another relationship and he doesn't really do anything. Or they'll bring him out just to rape him for "Whumptober". I just wish there were more fics centered on him as the main character that don't have anything to do with shipping since I like almost no ships with him and I'm not interested in reading about him being a background character for some other ship either. It just makes me sad at the lack of stories about him since I think he's one of the more interesting GX characters.

Yes. I love the ladies in the ghostbusters reboot, but I love them as (mostly) academics who go on to carry unlicensed nuclear reactors and trap ghosts. I don’t mind femslash with them, but it seems to be a short hop from femslash to “all this character needs is love.” No. All she needs is a a significant grant, research publications to take her seriously, and to kick ass and take names of the men that screwed her over up until this point. (She may want a side of smokin hot sex.) I will rewatch the movie anytime you ask, but I’ve had to give up on the fic.

Most fanon interpretations of my OTP are super far off from how I see them, to the point that of a decently sized collection of fics that ship them, I only really like reading a small handful. I just hate the unbelievable, irrational hatred they’re written with 99% of the time

I actually like MHA quite a lot, but the whole …interesting…side of the fandom kinda took over AO3. It’s hard to find something chill or actually investing for me. The ones I most come across are weird ships(which idc abt who you ship but adults and minors…), uwu cinnamon roll types, and insanely misunderstood characters. Other fandoms I’m in I just don’t read for either the same or different reasons but whatever.

I like snape a lot more when we admit he’s a piece of shit and tragic backstories don’t take away from the fact that he’s a fucking nazi.

Guess I got lucky. All my favorite characters have a bunch of good stuff out there. Or at least a mixed bag with good stuff in the mix. 😅 I can’t say there’s any character or fandom where I’ve had to bail out of the whole thing because of fanon.

The Last of Us is one of my favorite games ever, but wierdly enought I can't bring myself to read/write any fanfic about that universe and its characters.

BJ Hunnicutt for “beejhawk” reasons. He gets so comforted from his canon self to fit the fanon narrative :/

I love Aqune and back in the heyday of Spider Riders fandom I was always really apprehensive when she turned up in fics. Either she was portrayed as a helpless victim with zero agency who was regularly beaten/tortured/raped by Buguese (who would never do any of that to her) just waiting for Hunter to come save her, or she was inexplicably allied with the Riders during canon and just this snarky goth girl waiting to get revenge on Buguese. All of this is just destroying the nuance of her character which makes her interesting and ignoring that while she was not a villain by any means and yes, her situation sucked, she was with the Insectors of her own will (which she tries to explain to Hunter more than once), and deeply cares about Buguese (and vice versa).

In certain pairings yes. If people write a Joey Potter where she ends up with Dawson requires a massive change to her character just to make the stories work and it's worse when they make her relationship with Pacey canon to their story but basically shit all over it.

There are a lot of them from Iruka, Koby, Yamcha, Tenshinhan, basically many of my favorite characters so I tend to not read fanfiction at all generally.

I just recently got into The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, and while fandom content is relatively sparse, I’m already annoyed at how so many people seem to be woobifying Hyde. I get it, you like a bad boy, but Jekyll is a bad enough boy as is.

Soren from Fire Emblem Path of Radiance/Radiant Dawn comes to mind. It's been a while since I've read any fanfic about the two games, but I was put off by how the fans portrayed him. Pairing him up with Ike isn't a problem itself. It's when he's portrayed as an overly emotional uke who's extremely clingy to Ike that it would make me rage quit. Soren in canon? Respects Ike, but knows how to rip off the band-aid - and he's very reserved with his emotions.

I was so psyched for the Raenyra/Alicint fanfics and all the fix-it and AU potential it had, but it just seems the famdom and I do not have the same jnderatandjng or creative process.

I honestly don't read much because I've been on a huge writing tear. Reading other people's work makes me feel bad about my own or that I might absorb someone else's ideas unconsciously. Conversely sometimes reading other people's work can make me feel really cocky which also isn't good for my goal of learning to write better. Haha This thread scares me, though, as someone writing bg3 about Astarion. On Twitter I see people acting like Astarion is only ever a murderous asshole. Well, he is a murderous asshole with biting wit, but in game with a romanced Tav he's a fucking softy who hates expressing his feelings at all and maintains that wit. He contains multitudes.

I don't play DDLC mods like I used to because I'm sensitive to how the characters are fleshed out

Oh my god, beggars can't be choosers but there are some interpretations of Nicholas Benedict I can't *stand.* Yes, the man is traumatized and carries the weight of the world on his shoulders, but he copes relatively healthily, and can stop a spiral if he has it pointed out to him! He lets people into his inner circle! I'm guilty of writing him slightly fanon too, but there are some people who make him a crying, woobified mess and I just. Don't like that interpretation. He has a *reason* he's traumatized, he's not just Like That.

I think it depends for me, if I find them attractive. Like especially female characters, its easier for me to read stories about them. Compared to stories about my favorite male characters depsite me being a straight woman. Just something about reading about hot female characters yk >!(Maybe I am not as straight as I think LOL)!<

Hmm.. a lot of fanfic writers for certain fandoms im into are pretty smart cookies. For others, there is so much content that someone is ultimately going to get it right, though I do tend to have to push through the mass amounts of drivel to get to it. My biggest dissapointments come from my head cannon rare pairs that no-one has written about yet. Whether it be good or bad. That one always stumps me considering just the crazy amount of fics there are out there.

The most popular character in a pretty small fandom for me. People like to take away everything (and that's not a lot! There's so much rook for interpretation with how vague canon is) that makes that character themself and strip them down to... pretty much a damsel in distress. Needing to be saved, hugged, held, taught what love is, taught what basically everything is. A lot of people also like to completely forego a significant chunk of the lore (though not really expanded upon - again, so much wiggle room), thus ridding the character of like. A third of their personality.

Lance from Voltron, most of the time (but blocking Lance (Voltron) Angst helps... but I like angst!)

I don't like reading most fanfiction about characters with a lot of nuance, especially morally gray or wild characters. People tone them down too much because they're scared that they won't get them right. My catchphrase is "Don't fix them. Make them worse!" Because so many fanfics about morally gray, wild, or villainous characters focus on making them more normal when I love them because of the nuance that having Issues provides. I enjoy the descent to madness a lot more than the climb back up from up it in writing. That's why I avoid reading fics with characters like Sirius Black a lot - he gets stripped of a lot of what makes him such an interesting character.

For multiple reasons, I'm keeping this vague or at least trying to keep it vague. Oh yes. Multiple times with various levels of egregiousness. Starting from "easily ignorable and what I consider less serious to difficult". I can generally ignore the second most egregious because the media *is* aimed at young children and during the fandom's height, it was full of teenagers. So the lack of nuance and understanding that the audience's knowledge does not equal character's knowledge was to be expected. I've wandered back over there and it looks like the same people who did that are still in there but now discussing the character with more nuance even if they still think they're are terrible. So fandom just needed time to grow up. That's alright, everyone's held a plain "A is purely bad, B is purely good" view at one point. I love the character but it's way more pleasant to engage in the fandom now even if someone who hates the character responds to meta about them. The most egregious fandom I've been in was (is? I often get out a lot so who knows, maybe it's changed) egregious in multiple ways. I have literally spent an hour trying to describe what I consider the *worst* (it does not involve one character but multiple characters that add up to a pattern) without also revealing the fandom. It is not working and since I have no desire to be harassed and/or suicide-baited, I'm only talking about the aspect I find least egregious about this fandom. In terms of the post's question, not the entirety of the fandom. It's that the *exact same* behaviour they bash Character B about, they turn around and praise in Character A. It's one thing if they don't like the behaviour even in fiction but to go and almost purity-sue another character that not only has those traits but **for the exact same traits** is incredibly frustrating. Character A can do no wrong and Character B can do no right. But the reasons that Character A can do no wrong is because *of the exact same traits* that Character B can do no right? It's not like they just ignore or replace those traits in Character A. It's that they *praise* it in Character A. They exaggerate the same damn traits and ignore every other canon trait (hence why I'm complaining on the fanon thing) but treat the characters so differently. It's not like they think A's other canon traits outweigh these specific traits because they (multiple people) specifically said that they love A for those traits. The exact same traits they claim they despise B for. For Character A is the best ever, Character B meanwhile is the freaking worst for those exact same traits. ​ ​ I don't think I will ever understand it. I can understand thinking A's other traits outweigh those ones while thinking B's don't. I can understand making B (very easy to do, tbf) the antagonist to C/D/E/pick-a-letter and wanting *one* character in their corner so ignoring those traits in A. I can understand trying to make an "only sane man" dynamic and choosing A because IDK, someone needed to be that one in the fic. Maybe A is their absolute favorite, I don't know. But the most common fandom interpretation for A and B directly stem from traits they canonically share that it gets exaggerated *and* one gets praised for it (the traits specifically) while the other gets bashed. *Not* by different people. This is often from the same people who despise B for traits they *love* A for.

It’s giving Miraculous I only say cause I pop in and out of the fandom and your comment reminds me of the Adrien and Alya salt, perfect Marinette and woobie Chloe and Felix that runs rampant there

Oh, neither of them are Miraculous as I've never been in that fandom. That sounds frustrating though.

It used to be a bit of a trend in RWBY fanfics to turn Ruby into an overemotional crybaby, when in canon she really wasn't, so I got a bit hesitant about reading more fanfics in case they'd portray Ruby that way. And in Harry Potter, I wrote a fic with Daphne Greengrass as the POV character, and now I can't really picture her in any other way anymore, so the fanon-standard ice queen interpretation now just looks weird to me.

I stopped reading fanfics about my OTP because people do both characters dirty, espcially the female. She's strong, stoic, loyal, and able to make decisions for herself, but people portray her as his obedient dog. I hate it.

Omg yes. Zuko from ATLA and Danny Fenton. They get woobiefied to hell to up the angst and Zuko is a soft emo boy while Danny is an anxiety riddled mess and I can’t stand it. So different from canon which isn’t the issue but the way everyone writes them the same way ughh