A canon, in terms of a fictional universe A fictional universe is a self-consistent fictional setting with elements that differ from the real world. It may also be called, variously, a fictional realm, fictional world or imaginary world. The terms multiverse, parallel universe, alternate history, story or screen bible, backstory and crossover have a considerable amount of overlap with, is a body of material that is considered to be "genuine" or "official", that can be directly referenced as, or as if it were, material produced by the original author or creator of a series. New works set within that universe are ostensibly constrained to be consistent with pre-existing canon, though the issue is somewhat complicated by several factors: pre-existing canon itself may also be subject to retcon Retroactive continuity is the deliberate changing of previously established facts in a work of serial fiction. The change is informally referred to as a "retcon", and producing a retcon is called "retconning". Retconning may be carried out for a variety of reasons, such as to accommodate sequels or further derivative works in, for instance, and some licensed works, such as movie or television novelizations Novelizations of films usually add background material not found in the original work to flesh out the story, because novels are generally longer than screenplays. Similarly, material from the screenplay or filmed scenes that are cut from the final production may still be present in a novelization, often because the novel is completed for or spin-off Media spin-off is the process of deriving new radio programs, television programs or video games or even novels from already existing ones. Spin-offs work with varying degrees of success. Some become very popular and last for a number of seasons, whereas others exceed the popularity of the forebearing show and others are poorly received and have novels, may not be considered "canonical" by some. Additionally, adaptations of a work into other formats, such as feature film In the film industry, a feature film is a film made for initial distribution in theaters and being the "main attraction" of the screening . The term is also used for feature length, direct-to-video and television movie productions or television Television is a widely used telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images, either monochromatic ("black and white") or color, usually accompanied by sound. "Television" may also refer specifically to a television set, television programming or television transmission. The word is derived from mixed Latin, may be considered either non-canonical, or forming a separate canon; and consistency with prior canon is not sufficient in and of itself to make a work "canonical" - fan fiction Fan fiction is a broadly-defined term for fan labor regarding stories about characters or settings written by fans of the original work, rather than by the original creator. Works of fan fiction are rarely commissioned or authorized by the original work's owner, creator, or publisher; also, they are almost never professionally published. Fan, for instance, often follows the original pre-existing canon but is not part of the canon.

Origins

The word "canon" originally referred to the books which the Church Christian Church and church (Greek kyriakon , "thing belonging to the Lord"; also ekklesia (ἐκκλησία) (Latinized as ecclesia, "assembly") are used to denote both a Christian association of people and a place of worship. In the phenomenological sense there are many such associations of people that call themselves officially chose to be included in the Bible (see also: canon law Canon law is the body of laws and regulations made by or adopted by ecclesiastical authority, for the government of the Christian organization and its members. It is the internal ecclesiastical law governing the Roman Catholic Church, the Eastern and Oriental Orthodox churches, and the Anglican Communion of churches. The way that such church law); by extension, it can be taken as referring to the authoritative (albeit metaphorical) "holy writ" of a fictional universe. However, the practice of defining a "canon" in terms of a fictional world likely derived from the concept of a literary canon The Western canon is a term used to denote a canon of books, and, more widely, music and art, that has been the most influential in shaping Western culture. It asserts a compendium of the "greatest works of artistic merit." Such a canon is important to the theory of educational perennialism and the development of "high culture", a specified collection of works considered to be both representative and the best of a particular form, genre Genre (pronounced /ˈʒɑːnrə/, also /ˈdʒɑːnrə/; from French, genre French pronunciation: [ʒɑ̃ʀ], "kind" or "sort", from Latin: genus , Greek: genos, γένος) is the term for any category of literature, as well as various other forms of art or culture e.g. music, based on some loose set of stylistic criteria or culture Culture is a term that has various meanings. For example, in 1952, Alfred Kroeber and Clyde Kluckhohn compiled a list of 164 definitions of "culture" in Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions. However, the word "culture" is most commonly used in three basic senses:. In that more common use of the word, works forming a canon do not have to bear any strong relation to each other, apart from their perceived high quality or historical influence.

The specific use of "canon" to describe the degree to which a given work adheres to the standards of its fictional world appears to have originated amongst devotees of the Sherlock Holmes Sherlock Holmes is a fictional detective created by Scottish author and physician Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. A brilliant London-based "consulting detective", Holmes is famous for his astute logical reasoning, his ability to take almost any disguise, and his forensic science skills to solve difficult cases stories, as a way to distinguish between the original works of Arthur Conan Doyle Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle, DL was a Scottish physician and writer, most noted for his stories about the detective Sherlock Holmes, which are generally considered a major innovation in the field of crime fiction, and for the adventures of Professor Challenger. He was a prolific writer whose other works include science fiction stories, and adaptations of those works or original works by other writers utilizing related characters and settings. However, much of the interest in and controversy over issues of "canonicity" have appeared in recent decades in the fan followings A cult following is a term used to refer to a small or large group of fans that are either somewhat or highly dedicated to a specific area of pop culture. A film, book, band, video game etc will be said to "have a cult following" when it has a small but very passionate fan-base. A common component of cult followings is the " of films and television shows, such as the science fiction Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with the impact of imagined innovations in science or technology, often in a futuristic setting. It differs from fantasy in that, within the context of the story, its imaginary elements are largely possible within scientifically established or scientifically postulated laws of nature . Exploring the franchises A media franchise is an intellectual property involving the characters, setting and trademarks of an original work of media , such as a film, a work of literature, a television program or a video game. Generally, a whole series is made in a particular medium, along with merchandising and endorsements. Multiple sequels are often planned well in Star Wars Star Wars is an American epic space opera franchise conceived by George Lucas. The first film in the franchise was originally released on May 25, 1977, by 20th Century Fox, and became a worldwide pop culture phenomenon, followed by two sequels, released at three-year intervals. Sixteen years after the release of the trilogy's final film, the first and Star Trek Star Trek is an American science fiction entertainment franchise. The original Star Trek is an American television series, created by Gene Roddenberry, which debuted in 1966 and ran for three seasons, following the interstellar adventures of Captain James T. Kirk and the crew of the Federation Starship Enterprise, following an earlier pilot film �.

When the body of work nominally set in the same fictional universe becomes large enough, it can happen that new material, such as might be found in spin-off Media spin-off is the process of deriving new radio programs, television programs or video games or even novels from already existing ones. Spin-offs work with varying degrees of success. Some become very popular and last for a number of seasons, whereas others exceed the popularity of the forebearing show and others are poorly received and have television shows, prequels A prequel is a work that supplements a previously completed one, and has an earlier time setting. The widely recognized term was a 20th-century neologism, and a portmanteau from pre- and sequel (a supplementing work with a setting later than its predecessor's, from the Latin sequella, thing that follows). The prequel forms part of the "back- and books, contradicts earlier material. Such contradictions may be a result of poor research, or an attempt to revise, or correct a perceived error in, earlier material (see also: retcon Retroactive continuity is the deliberate changing of previously established facts in a work of serial fiction. The change is informally referred to as a "retcon", and producing a retcon is called "retconning". Retconning may be carried out for a variety of reasons, such as to accommodate sequels or further derivative works in). The question is which material to favor and which to ignore when attempting to resolve all the material into a consistent whole. Two simple approaches are the "principle of first mention" in which information in the original work provides a foundation which later material must respect, and the revisionist Within historiography, that is part of the academic field of history, historical revisionism is the reinterpretation of orthodox views on evidence, motivations, and decision-making processes surrounding a historical event. The revisionist assumes the interpretation of a historical event or period, as accepted by the majority of scholars, needs model in which the latest work always supersedes earlier material. However, the situation can be much more complicated.

Nature of fictional canons

The word canon can simultaneously refer to the considerations of the publishers of a fictional series as well as what the fanbase chooses to consider as authentic.

Generally, "Expanded Universes The term Expanded Universe is generally used to denote the 'extension' of a media franchise (i.e. a television show, series of feature films, etc.) with other media (generally comics and original novels). This typically simply involves new adventures for existing characters already developed within the franchise; however in some case entirely new" are not considered canonical; by analogy with the idea of a canon of Scripture Scripture is that portion of literature deemed authoritative for establishing instructions within any of a number of specific religious traditions, especially the Abrahamic religions. Such bodies of writings are also sometimes known as the canon of scripture. They are often associated with the belief that they were either given directly, or (see Biblical canon A Biblical canon or canon of scripture is a list or set of Biblical books considered to be authoritative as scripture by a particular religious community, generally in Judaism or Christianity. The term itself was first coined by Christians, but the idea is found in Jewish sources. The internal wording of the text can also be specified, for example:), such stories are considered "apocryphal". However, there are exceptions. In the case of the Star Wars canon, the Expanded Universe is canonical, though open to interpretation in a way which the "gospel" of the films is not. Doctor Who Doctor Who is a British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC. The programme depicts the adventures of a mysterious and eccentric humanoid alien known as the Doctor who travels through time and space in his spacecraft, the TARDIS , which normally appears from the exterior to be a blue 1960s British police box. With his, which began life as a television series but has also been produced in prose, audio and graphical formats, has never had a single author or authority to pronounce on the issue of canon, and its fans run a spectrum between those who consider only some parts of the television series canonical and those who consider everything labeled as Doctor Who canonical.

In addition, a story can belong to two overlapping canons. One of the most obvious examples of this is Philip José Farmer Philip José Farmer was an American author, principally known for his award-winning science fiction and fantasy novels and short stories's Wold Newton family The Wold Newton family is a literary concept derived from a form of crossover fiction developed by the science fiction writer Philip José Farmer. Farmer suggested in two fictional "biographies" of fictional characters , that the (real) meteorite which fell in Wold Newton, Yorkshire, England, on December 13, 1795, was radioactive and. Some (but not all) of the adventures of Sherlock Holmes, Tarzan Tarzan is a fictional character, an archetypal feral child raised in the African jungle by the Mangani "great apes"; he later returns to civilization only to largely reject it and return to the wild as a heroic adventurer. Created by Edgar Rice Burroughs, Tarzan first appeared in the novel Tarzan of the Apes , and then in twenty-five, Doc Savage Doc Savage is a fictional character originally published in American pulp magazines during the 1930s and 1940s. He was created by publisher Henry W. Ralston and editor John L. Nanovic at Street and Smith Publications, with additional material contributed by the series' main writer, Lester Dent, etc. are canonical in the Wold Newton setting. This does not mean that the events of Farmer's books are canonical from a Sherlockian perspective. Similarly, fans of Laurie R. King's novels of Sherlock Holmes Sherlock Holmes is a fictional detective created by Scottish author and physician Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. A brilliant London-based "consulting detective", Holmes is famous for his astute logical reasoning, his ability to take almost any disguise, and his forensic science skills to solve difficult cases and Mary Russell consider all the Holmes stories to be canonical in King's setting.

The difference can be even less clear-cut than this. Current Star Trek novels maintain a tight continuity with each other, and avoid contradicting the television series. When a Lost Era novel set between the movies and The Next Generation Star Trek: The Next Generation is an American science fiction television series created by Gene Roddenberry as part of the Star Trek franchise. Roddenberry, Rick Berman and Michael Piller served as executive producers at different times throughout the production. Created 21 years after the original Star Trek, and set in the 24th century from the features a younger version of a character introduced in a Deep Space Nine Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is a science fiction television program that premiered in 1993 and ran for seven seasons, ending in 1999. Rooted in Gene Roddenberry’s Star Trek universe, it was created by Rick Berman and Michael Piller, at the request of Brandon Tartikoff, and produced by Paramount Television. The main writers, in addition to Berman novel, it is obvious there is some sort of "canonical" novel-setting, even if the TV series is not obliged to conform to it. This is where "fanon" and canon often collide, especially when a TV series, movie or other officially canonical source contradicts it. An example is the Trek novel Starfleet: Year One, which appeared in print before the TV series Star Trek: Enterprise Enterprise is a science fiction television program created by Brannon Braga and Rick Berman and set in the fictional Star Trek universe created by Gene Roddenberry in the 1960s. The series follows the adventures of humanity's first Warp 5 starship, the Enterprise, ten years before the United Federation of Planets shown in previous Star Trek series was announced, but was completely invalidated by the series. Generally, though, in the case of televised fiction, only facts which appear in the as-originally-aired version of a program are considered canonical (including scenes cut from re-runs, but not including such things as deleted scenes and scenes from unaired pilots and other such material that "leaks out" over the Internet).^{[citation needed]}

Furthermore, the issue is also complicated when the definition of a canon changes well after the fictional universe is established. As an example, a number of reference works for Star Trek were published between 1970 and 1988 by Franz Joseph and FASA Corporation. These books were considered canonical at the time (some even made with the explicit approval of Gene Roddenberry), sanctioned by Paramount Pictures Paramount Pictures is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still headquartered in the Hollywood district of Los Angeles. Paramount is, and were used almost universally by novel and comic book authors, as well as the production staff of the earlier Star Trek movies (information from these manuals appeared as background dialogue in some scenes, and many diagrams were used as computer displays). However, in 1988, as part of the release of Star Trek: The Next Generation, Gene Roddenberry and Paramount Pictures changed their policies regarding canonicity and stripped these books of their canonical status, as the new series quickly made many changes and revelations which openly contradicted earlier canonical books. Thus a book that was considered completely canonical in 1985, such as The Star Trek Star Fleet Technical Manual, would be considered non-canonical in 1995.

In recent years, complications have been created by the increasing popularity of supplemental web content Web content is the textual, visual or aural content that is encountered as part of the user experience on websites. It may include, among other things: text, images, sounds, videos and animations appearing on network's A television network is a telecommunications network for distribution of television content, whereby a central operation provides programming to many television stations or pay TV providers. Until the mid-1980s, television programming in most countries of the world was dominated by a small number of broadcast networks. Many early television show sites A website [citation needed] is a collection of related web pages, images, videos or other digital assets that are addressed relative to a common Uniform Resource Locator (URL), often consisting of only the domain name, or the IP address, and the root path ('/') in an Internet Protocol-based network. A web site is hosted on at least one web server,. Deleted scenes and webisode A webisode is a short episode which airs initially as Internet television, either download or stream as opposed to first airing on broadcast or cable television. The format can be used as a preview, a promotion, as part of a collection of shorts, or a commercial. A webisode can be part of an already established drama or series or it may consist of series, produced by the studio A television studio is an installation in which television or video productions take place, either for live television, for recording live to tape, or for the acquisition of raw footage for postproduction. The design of a studio is similar to, and derived from, movie studios, with a few amendments for the special requirements of television are often considered canon, while other materials, such as character profiles, stories, and games, often produced by the networks themselves, generally are not.

In some fictional universes, interviews and other communications from authors are also considered canonical—like the letters of J. R. R. Tolkien with relation to Middle-earth Middle-earth is a fictional place on earth where most of the stories of author J. R. R. Tolkien takes place. These stories include The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings; also items such as interviews, Internet chat sessions, and websites (e.g., the website of J. K. Rowling Joanne "Jo" Rowling, OBE , better known under the pen name J. K. Rowling (pronounced /ˈroʊlɪŋ/, ROE-ling), is a British author best known as the creator of the Harry Potter fantasy series, the idea for which was conceived whilst on a train trip from Manchester to London in 1990. The Potter books have gained worldwide attention, won in relation to the Harry Potter Harry Potter is a series of seven fantasy novels written by the British author J. K. Rowling. The books chronicle the adventures of the adolescent wizard Harry Potter and his best friends Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, all of whom are students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. The main story arc concerns Harry's quandary involving series). This usually only happens in cases where all works in the universe have the same author.

In almost all cases, fan fiction Fan fiction is a broadly-defined term for fan labor regarding stories about characters or settings written by fans of the original work, rather than by the original creator. Works of fan fiction are rarely commissioned or authorized by the original work's owner, creator, or publisher; also, they are almost never professionally published. Fan is not considered canonical, as fan fiction is usually produced by amateurs. Sometimes, however, events or characterizations portrayed in fan fiction can become so influential that they are respected in fiction written by many different authors, and may be mistaken for canonical facts by fans. This is referred to as "fanon". An intentional inversion of the exclusion of fan fiction came in Eric Flint Eric Flint is an American author, editor, and e-publisher. The majority of his main works are alternate history science fiction, but he also writes humorous fantasy adventures's 1632 universe; in February 2000, fans and other established authors were invited on the Internet forum Baen's Bar to shape the multiverse Parallel universe or alternative reality is a self-contained separate reality coexisting with one's own. A specific group of parallel universes is called a multiverse, although this term can also be used to describe the possible parallel universes that constitute physical reality. While the terms "parallel universe" and "alternative, and the fan-fic, once vetted, is itself published in the various Grantville Gazettes, themselves under the direct editorial control of Flint and a 1632 editorial board. This is an ongoing process that apparently will continue indefinitely, as the series continues to enjoy burgeoning popularity.

Additionally, works of foreign origins (as is the case with most Japanese Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south. The characters that make up Japan's name mean "sun-origin", which is why Japan is-produced video games A video game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface to generate visual feedback on a video device. The word video in video game traditionally referred to a raster display device. However, with the popular use of the term "video game," it now implies any type of display device. The electronic systems used to, manga Manga (kanji: 漫画; hiragana: まんが; katakana: マンガ; listen ; English: /ˈmɑːŋɡə/ or /ˈmæŋɡə/) consist of comics and print cartoons (sometimes also called komikku コミック), in the Japanese language and conforming to the style developed in Japan in the late 19th century. In their modern form, manga date from shortly after or anime) may have certain details of the original plot changed or modified during the adaptation from one language to another. The person in charge of the adaptation may choose to write an adaptation canon in addition to the original canon to maintain consistency when adapting a possible later work such as a sequel or a spinoff, although this is not always the case. An adapted version of the same work can sometime deviate completely from its source material, resulting a separate franchise from the original, as is the case with the Macross and Robotech franchises.

See also

• Cthulhu Mythos
• View Askewniverse
• The Tommy Westphall Universe Hypothesis
• Bible (writing)

References

Categories: Canons | Continuity (fiction)

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