Part two dealt with the impact of a novel on today's popular culture though one might wonder if the snake is beginning to swallow its own tail not only with the mainstreaming of incestuous romance in the media but also its own popularity in fan fiction. It can be said fan fiction has done an even better job at mainstreaming such subjects even if it wouldn't have taken off in a big way if it weren't for the Dollanganger series. A good number of present day writers have either done fan fiction or fanzines/fansites at one point. The tendency could have gone back as early as the 1950s and 1960s with many speculative writers and editors coming from a fanzine background.
There's nothing wrong with writing fan fiction though having an extensive history of doing fan fiction can be a bad idea, both economically and creatively. Economically speaking, while it's possible to sell fanfiction stories in conventions and even bookstores just like what happens in Japan, you need to have a substantial and willing audience to support these products. Creatively speaking, where does one draw the line between fan fiction and professional work? It's not even bad to turn fan fiction into an official work considering copyright laws. 50 Shades of Grey used to be a Twilight fan fiction though an even bigger problem is the lack of outside inspiration and experiences.
In the case with some programmes, there's a very close relationship between author and audience but one wonders if the pandering goes to far often to the point of backfiring in later stories as well as alienating everybody else. The problem with pandering to an audience for too long is that it doesn't organically happen in the canon, it's regrettable and that the writers would change their minds once they realised that the pandering isn't doing the story any good. Sort of like what happened to Olicity. Olicity (a pairing between two characters who don't have anything in common) took off in fan fiction and then the writers began pandering to them. With the help of social media, it was a thing.
When I mean by it, writers eventually grew tired of it and began pairing one character with somebody else. While it might have contradicted her prior relationship, on the other hand it's likely that writers realised she doesn't have anything in common with Oliver so that's why she acts like this and dates some other bloke. In a way, Felicity Smoak is the love interest that isn't. An earlier precedent has happened in Smallville with a similar character named Chloe Sullivan. It too took off in fan fiction before writers began incorporating it on air until they realised that Clark and Chloe were not only incompatible but they made her date another man. You guessed it, it's Oliver Queen.
It's deva ju because we're something similar happen again. You have a failed love interest for the protagonist (Felicity Smoak in Arrow, Chloe in Smallville). You also have a frequently shamed love interest of the protagonist who was intended to be one. There's Lois Lane in Smallville and Laurel Lance in Arrow. Likewise Game of Thrones, ImoCho and CW Flash have brothers who date their foster/stepsisters. The Flash has suffered from the same repetitive storylines possibly since the 1970s and 1980s where you have a character looking to avenge the ordeal of his/her loved one. That went from avenging a love interest (Golden Glider avenged the Top, Barry Allen avenged Iris West in the 1980s and Wally did the same with Linda Park) to avenging a relative.
That could have started with Weather Wizard avenging his brother's death as early as the 60s. That didn't take off until the appropriately dark 1990s. The 1990s Flash programme had Barry Allen avenge his late brother. Then in the comics Captain Cold avenged his sister Golden Glider. Later Barry Allen could come to avenge his mother and Iris would do the same with her father. In the CW programme, it's exactly and practically the same as it was in the comics. Likewise Barry Allen and actually any superhero dealing with his/her evil doppelganger has been done to death to. Barry Allen has Reverse Flash, Jay Garrick has The Rival, Superman has Bizarro, Batman has Owlman, Spider-Man has Venom and Fantastic Four have Frightful Four.
Even anime is not free from repetition. A lot of anime takes place in a school. Revolutionary Girl Utena, Naruto, Gunbuster, Evangelion, Gakuen Alice, Ouran High School Host Club, Negima, Ikki Tousen and Haruhi Suzumiya are those examples I can think of. Then you've got stories where characters are expected to fight against each other such as Yu Yu Hakusho, JoJo's Bizarre Adventures, Hokuto no Ken, Dragon Ball, Bleach, Naruto and Fairy Tail. Then you've got a lot of magical girl anime, harem anime and slice of life anime as well as anime with otherwise stereotypical characters in them. It's like the authors of more recent stories have ran out of any other idea so they rehash the same formula that worked.
To make matters worse, some of them have fairly small audiences to begin with. Combine niche audiences with creators neck deep in fandom that's where you run into trouble with both creativity and mass market appeal. Pandering to a fanbase can not only put off other viewers but also longtime fans. Especially the longtime fans who actually care about the franchise and don't give into headcanon crap. It also doesn't make much money. A Caitlin Snow body pillow makes less money than a Ghost Fighter card because more people would rather play with cards than hugging a pillow. It's only an example but a harsh one at that because fanbases this niche aren't that profittable.
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An Incoming Decline Part Three
Non-FictionThe third series is about the problems with a marginal industry and why it could stop at any time if people didn't pay attention to.
