Thesis and Hypothesis

The second question I wanted to explore was whether the fandom poached more from the plot or the characters. Textual poaching refers to the artwork, stories, and videos of popular media products created by fans of the work (Jenkins 1). Fans tend to poach text when they are either really happy with certain aspects and really angry. I divide poaching into two categories: canon and alternate universes (AUs). AU poaching is defined as fanfictions that take characters from the source work and put them in an “alternate universe”. This type of poaching focuses more so on the characters than the plot. Fans take the characters from the source material and put them in different worlds and scenarios. A popular AU trope in the Supergirl fandom is a no powers universe, which reflects the universe that the viewers live in. 

Canon poaching focuses on the plot of the source material. There are three different types of canon poaching: Fix-its, canon divergence, and canon compliant. Fix-its take specific events from the plot of the source material and change it. Typically this means they will change a character’s reaction to or handling of a specific event. Two popular fix-its within the Supergirl fandom is Lena’s reaction to finding out Kara is Supergirl and how Lena finds out Kara is Supergirl. Canon-divergence is when the fanfiction follows canon until a certain point, then writers start to make a separate plotline. It could be argued that canon divergence is an AU, however for the purpose of this project AUs are strictly defined as above. Canon-compliant means fans stay true to canon, but add a scenario that could happen during canon as a side plot or after the events of the source material. For this tag, individuals try to stay as true to canon as possible and they tend to be shorter pieces of writing as they don’t usually deal with big plot events.

From my prior knowledge and preliminary research I hypothesize that there will be negative language associated with canon poaching and positive language associated with AU poaching. In addition to that I hypothesize that there will be more alternate universe poaching than canon poaching, due to the demographics of the fandom itself. By this I mean that a large portion of the fandom is from the LGBTQ+ community, so they are mostly in it for the relationships and characters rather than the plot. The reason behind this is there are very few shows with female/female relationships. Many lesbian and bisexual women watch any show that has the slightest hint of WLW (women love women) vibes. Shows with lead actresses being part of the LGBTQ+ community have recently been axed by several networks. In 2022 Warrior Nun, The Wilds, First Kill, Legends of Tomorrow, and more have been canceled. All of these shows feature a primary pairing of wlw. Fanfiction is written as they fall in love with the characters and their wlw relationships rather than for the plot itself.