Chat corner 27: Queen

[annathecrow]

Welcome to this week’s chat corner!

Optional prompt

The topic for this week is “Queen’s Shadow, Queen’s Peril and Queen’s Hope”, the three books about Padmé Amidala by E. K. Johnston. (Not to confuse anyone, the last book hasn’t been published yet.)

 

Comments

[extrapenguin]

Do you dislike fanon in principle, or just specific things?
There are specific things I dislike the moment I see them as well as specific things I dislike when they go from being one person's interesting take to being fanon (Tatooine Slave Culture goes here), but mostly it's the fact that fanon overdosing tends to make fic same-y, and some fanon (like clones speaking Mando'a) is supremely ubiquitous yet completely unsupported in canon. I do enjoy reading the occasional quirky take, but not when all the fic uses the same quirky take, y'know? I also read different fics instead of rereading one fic ad infinitum because I want to see a different take on [a time travel fixit/Mace Windu getting a nap/whatever]. I guess I enjoy novelty and fanon deprives me of that?

I'd also be interested in what you'd consider to be the primary pieces of fanon for the PT/TCW! I have my own ideas, but it's possible I've missed some due to my reading preferences.

[annathecrow]

I guess I enjoy novelty and fanon deprives me of that?

Yeah, that's valid. I read fanfic as comfort food, so a certain level of sameness feels good to me. I do like it when a fic feels fresh in some way, but I don't read fic for New Original Takes, you know what I mean?

primary pieces of fanon for PT/TCW

oooooh that's a good question! I think you'll probably have a longer list than me, because I hadn't considered clones speaking Mando'a as fanon until you said it. Isn't that more an import from Legends?

Speaking of, that's also A Thing: some things I consider fanon - Mandalorian culture as a whole, for example - is in fact a "fandom-transmitted" amalgam of material from secondary media. Like Mando'a as a language: it's originally from Republic Commando, but then fandom adopted it, and now I'm certain that most people who use it in fic have never read those books. So, fanon or not? I say yes, but YMMV.

Anyway, some fanon (irrespective whether I like it or not):

• Fialleril's Tatooine slave culture
• Qui-Gon being Evil (abusive, bad master, etc)
• Obi-Wan being small as a kid (at least Jedi Apprentice says he's big for his age!)
• Mandalorian culture & traditions
• the relationship between Quinlan Vos and Obi-Wan
• Quinlan's personality (dubious - you could say it's from that one TCW episode, but in the comics he's a very different person, so the fact that the "playful jerk" characterization wins is fanon, IMO)
• Jon Antilles (I love blackkat! But this character is basically her OC, lol)
• Jaster Mereel (blackkat again I suspect, but I've seen him in fic by other people and there's some Legends material for him)
• Arla Fett (I say this with love; I adore her and I WILL write a fic about her, so help me gods)

[extrapenguin]

I do like it when a fic feels fresh in some way, but I don't read fic for New Original Takes, you know what I mean?
Yeah, I get it! When you click on something that promises X, you want it to be what it promised, not a super weird take that misses why you like it and/or total deconstruction.

Speaking of, that's also A Thing: some things I consider fanon - Mandalorian culture as a whole, for example - is in fact a "fandom-transmitted" amalgam of material from secondary media. Like Mando'a as a language: it's originally from Republic Commando, but then fandom adopted it, and now I'm certain that most people who use it in fic have never read those books. So, fanon or not? I say yes, but YMMV.
I guess I'm aware that it was in part from stuff in a Legends book, but it seems that I subscribe to the whole tiered canon thing, where the movies out-canon everything and TCW out-canons random legends books. And the fic is tagged with TCW, not Republic Commando, so the clones don't speak Mando'a in the canon the fic is for. So in conclusion, it's fanon for TCW, as it contradicts the canon we see there, even if it might be canon for some other piece of media. (The whole service corps and initiates aging out is also fanon for TCW, imo, since Ahsoka at 14 is said to be a bit young to be a padawan – whereas by the Jedi Apprentice canon, she'd have aged out at 13.)

Quinlan's personality (dubious - you could say it's from that one TCW episode, but in the comics he's a very different person, so the fact that the "playful jerk" characterization wins is fanon, IMO)
Quinlan, due to the nature of his job, always struck me as someone who was very hard to pin down – so he'd be several different people in different situations. As for who he is alone in the dark, I haven't consumed enough canon about him to form an opinion.

Though on the rest, I had honestly assumed there was more to e.g. Jon Antilles than just one comic where he is a random disposable dude hiding inside a cloak? Huh. Yeah, he's basically an OC. Actually, same for Quinlan Vos and his relationship with Obi-Wan – I genuinely thought there was some Legends EU material that had them interact (very plausible, as they're similar-ish in age and could've gone to some of the same classes) which I'd missed. Huh. I wonder whether this is the source of the fanon telephone? People see something and assume it's from an episode they forgot/some piece of EU stuff they haven't read.

As for things I'd label as fanon, you got the big pieces of Tatooine slave culture and Mandalorians, but if we're including characterization fanon I'd like to add:

• Padmé Amidala being a pure and wise flawless queen (whereas in canon, she's the one rushing headfirst into danger while Anakin Skywalker is advising calling for backup, and she also has a temper)


• relatedly, Obi-Wan being a flawless woobie (partially just because he's the chosen woobie and gets the woobie fic treatment, but he has a sharp tongue and a very wide streak of recklessnes)

Then there are the takes on Anakin and the Jedi Order which, uh, make it extremely clear which side of the "Anakin was born evil" vs "the Jedi are horrible abusers who ruined a child" divide the author is on. (Somehow, no-one ends up blaming Palpatine.)

[annathecrow]

tiered canon

I see what you mean. Hm, that's a thorny one, because some of us simply don't treat canon as a hard-and-fast rule. I guess people will warn about that in tags ("timeline what timeline", "Ignores XY", various jokes about canon), but not consistently...

I sometimes just decide not to use a piece of canon because it doesn't fit the story. Example: According to TCW (S04E11), Shmi and Anakin were sold to slavery after Anakin has been born. I have one fic that follows that, but another that doesn't because I wanted to write about a second-gen slave Shmi.

I don't remember if I've ever used Legends over TCW, but I would if it worked. *shrugs*

Quinlan Vos and his relationship with Obi-Wan

They do interact in Legends! In the Star Wars comics, they meet during the Stark Hyperspace War (issues 36 - 41, although I don't recommend it, that arc is boring as hell). It's just not... IDK, not fanfic-inspiring, at least to me. :D

fanon telephone

Ha, yes, absolutely! I have a few things that I used in fic, and then found out aren't actually canon. Fandom osmosis in action. You just can't double-check everything! Especially in SW - ye gads, is this canon a mess...

[extrapenguin]

tiered canon

My philosophy here is that since this is a take Lucasfilm took, if I default to the "top-level" worldbuilding and characterization takes, I'm less likely to accidentally introduce worldbuilding etc inconsistencies. (And some of the EU stuff had, uh, very bad takes on the Jedi I am 0% interested in.) If I want to intentionally substitute in another piece, then that's something I'll have thought about, basically? So it's a way of figuring out a default that has the least mismatch.

According to TCW (S04E11), Shmi and Anakin were sold to slavery after Anakin has been born.
WHAT. I don't remember that at all! I think a rewatch is in order...

(Though that does make sense considering that Anakin says that they only came to Tatooine when he was 3, all the way back in TPM. And all of everyone seems to have forgotten that too, lol.)

[annathecrow]

Anakin and Shmi trivia

I'm not surprised nobody in fandom uses it, it's extremely "blink and you miss it"! Anakin goes a bit off the rails when he learns that the Separatist General du jour is a Zygerrian, and then:

Ahsoka: "Why is he so upset?"

Obi-Wan: "Anakin has never talked about his past, has he."

Ahsoka: "Only to tell me he won't talk about it."

Obi-Wan: "As a child, Anakin and his mother was sold to slavery by the Hutts."

So, yeah! If you want to play by TCW canon, this is the Word of God.

Although, it's kind of... I still kind of suspect it's an accident born out of misremembering the movie. In TPM, Anakin says they were sold to Gardulla the Hutt, not by a Hutt. Why specify that it was the Hutts?

[extrapenguin]

Yeah, that's ... a bit weirdly phrased. Though given that it's Obi-Wan saying it, I guess you could paper it over by saying Obi-Wan got slightly the wrong idea from 9-year-old Anakin explaining it? I don't think Qui-Gon had the chance to tell him anything, and he doesn't seem to have met Shmi...