Zack Snyder slams the concept of respecting canon
(boundingintocomics.com)
Comments (17)
sorted by:
I always wondered about the etymology of the term "canon" but I haven't found where it started. Obviously it's a descendant in some way from the term "the Western Canon," but that's a collection of great novels by different authors that are in no way related to each other. Somewhere along the way, "canon" became "what fans are supposed to believe about a made-up setting" which is useful up to a point, but quickly becomes byzantine.
Why do I have to accept that the events of Disney Star Wars took place? Because Disney paid money for the IP and now they get to tell me what to think? It's not integral to the original story in any way. Also, it's FICTIONAL.
It comes from the Hebrew word for pots. When the Hebrews returned to Israel after the Babylonian take over they found pots with their sacred texts in them.
"You can accept dragons, elves and talking trees, but you can't accept a 2021 BMW 5 Series 530i with optional heated seating. Why are you so bigoted?"
Canon and consistency matter.
you can just say nigger on this forum, it's okay, you won't get in trouble
I was quoting a meme...
I'm not a Snyder fan but the headline makes it sound worse than it is out of context. He's specifically talking about Batman not being allowed to kill and fans telling him not to put Batman in a situation where he'd have to kill someone, which is kind of a weird request.
Yeah, I don't necessarily mind tweaks to an established story if it's interesting. But the people who disrespect canon usually do it in ways to show you that the characters you liked actually were never that great to begin with and this new one is actually way better.
Or they completely invert the point of a character: e.g. nu Spock being a short-tempered emotional wreck.
It’s all motte and bailey. They make massive, unnecessary changes to established media, typically in service to their ego and/or pet ideology, and then they immediately revert to seemingly obvious and rational positions the moment you call them out.
“We have to make changes when we adapt for different mediums.”
“We have to make changes when we localize for a new audience.”
“We have to make changes when remaking media for modern audiences.”
All of their excuses sound reasonable, and that’s the point: to create plausible deniability for their self-insert bullshit and leftist propaganda.
I mean the issue is that often the "situation" they put them in is either super contrived or completely nonsensical, revealing that it wasn't just a part of the story but a deliberate shit on the parts of canon they don't like.
Like, you need to properly set such a thing up with justifiable in-universe reason if you are going to do it (which the "older, bitter Batman" angle did well enough), but so often the reason is entirely meta related instead.
Yeah, Snyder isn't like the Leftists -- he really is a geek about these things and more like Quentin Tarantino than someone like Neil Druckmann, the latter of which purposely subverts media to push "The Message".
I hated what Snyder did with Superman, but I could at least understand what he wanted to do with Superman. The problem is that Snyder just isn't a good enough writer -- and did not surround himself with good enough writers -- to pull off what he was trying to convey.
His depiction of Batman wasn't great, but it was far better than how he handled Superman, and I don't think I've ever come across anyone who really railed on Snyder for his depiction of Batman, other than that they didn't like how he killed, but they "loved" the whole warehouse scene because it reminded them "...of how Batman fights in the Arkham games".
That being said, I get Snyder's point, but challenging canon needs structure and consideration, as Adam points out in his reply. Contrivance or poorly fabricated structures to employ canon-breaking situations just ends up making people miffed, and that's sort of the problem that Snyder had with his whole depiction of DC's super heroes.
How about coming up with new characters and stories, then?
"M-a-a-a-a-a-a-r-r-r-t-t-t-h-h-h-h-a-a-a-a-a-a!"
The reason "canon" exists is because when retards got their hands on an IP and decided to add to the "canon" they often made it absolutely terrible so people came up with the term "canon" to essentially differentiate the quality IP from the retarded IP. If the non-Canon additions were okay, they might receive the label "expanded universe". If the additions were too retarded they might not even make it into the expanded universe.
No one would even care about distinguishing canon or not if the additions to the lore by some people weren't absolutely retarded.
If someone has a problem with people respecting canon it's because whatever this person is about to do is going to be disrespectful to whatever IP he's about to ruin.
Edited for inclusivity.
Not sure why you're downvoted because you're basically spot-on.
The downvotes are puzzling to me as well. Maybe I hit a nerve with some people who truly think there's something more to canon and non-canon... But the concept of non-canon was never even a concept until corporations starting wrecking havoc on the original lore so people had to come up with a way to explain it.
If George Lucas was involved in say making a Star War video game in the 1990s with an intricate storyline that followed the original plot perfectly then no one would have bothered distinguishing canon and non-canon but when you give a bunch of B-List sci-fi authors the ability to write anything they want for the IP such that half the books released contradict each other regarding timelines of events and characters, people are forced to distinguish otherwise the "lore" doesn't make sense. It has got so bad in modernity that some of the choices producers are making regarding characters and "lore" is outright self-destructive that people are forced to not consider it canon to preserve the sanctity of the lore even if theoretically it should be canon, it's just the producers do in fact want to destroy the original spirit of the lore. So now it's just a game between producers and consumers regarding what stuff the consumer likes and doesn't like. Whatever the consumer likes will be canon and whatever he doesn't like won't be.
At the end of the day, producers are trying to destroy the original spirit of these fantasy worlds and are mad consumers are fighting back with things like "that's not canon" to preserve the core essence of the fantasy worlds they love.
Why would anyone be surprised about that.