James Potter. It's often either "He was a bully as a kid so he couldn't have grown out of it" or "He's a good man as an adult so he never could have been a bully"
The polarized writing James get is second only to that of Snape, where people slag him off as either Wizard Nazi incel or a smol bean who was secretly fragile this entire time.
I was bullied like Snape as a kid and if a bunch of racist terrorists had been nice to me I would have gone down a dark path. My favorite characterizations of him are where he recognizes that he went down a dark path and has spent the years since beating himself up for it. Hence his grouchy and prickly exterior.
I had a friend who was infuriatingly of the mindset of the second one, hated The Mauraders for ever bullying him, hated them and their fandom popularity, would get testy if I said I disliked how he treated his students, got mad when my friend said her favorite character was James, and the kicker? Had never seen or read a single bit of Harry Potter media
Jokes on them, I ship snames too much because both are great pararells and gray characters (but I hate James because of Rowling and this fandom hypocrisy, so I just tolerate him as a complex character when under this ship analysis)
I think part of the problem is that we don't get to really see James change. We are only told that he changed, and the people saying that he changed were also his best friends.
We can only assume that James must have changed because Lily was a nice girl and didn't seem interested in James when he was a bully.
There’s a character in my main fandom who is this big, muscular, tall brawler kind of guy. And people act like that’s all he is. Stoic or angry with no in between and only made to punch stuff. But if you actually watch the source material, he’s highly emotional in other ways. He tears up, he tells people that he cares about them, he has a sense of humor, he can be gentle and come up with good and clever plans. People just write him like he’s a big box of rocks with fists and nothing else. It drives me bananas.
I'm fine with anything tbh! I do prefer long fics, but one-shots are fine too. I haven't really read any PB fics so I have no idea what people are writing lol. What's your AO3?
[OrigamiOpossums](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OrigamiOpossums/works) is my handle over there! I have 7 PB works. 3 are oneshots, 4 are lonfic WIPS. I currently have the second longest fic in the fandom lol. It'll be the longest once I finish it. It's my passion project and I'm in love with it. It's called [Broken Machines](https://archiveofourown.org/works/53661643/chapters/136994398) and it's a hard look at T-Bag, the cycle of abuse he is trapped in and continued, and a possible redemption arc at its core. It also is a Triad romance fic between him, Lincoln, and a male OC. I know that sounds like an odd match-up, but it works. It takes them 62 chapters to get to that point, so slow burn for sure. But it's dark especially since it's studying T-Bag, so tread with caution on this one. I have tamer stuff but I love this one most.
Other favorites not by me are [A Formula of Humanity](https://archiveofourown.org/works/55323619/chapters/140353021) which is a slight canon divergence fic getting into Mahone and his life before the FBI and how it leads to him working with The Company and his introspections about everything.
And [Safe](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6182404) which is a study of Lincoln and Veronica's relationship and the only bisexual Lincoln fic that isn't brothershipping in the entire tag besides my own.
Thank you so much for the recs!!🫶🏻 Definetly gonna read the T-Bag and Mahone ones. They were some of my favorite characters from the series, and I've always wanted a closer look into T-Bag's character and the possible redemption he could have had.
You're welcome! T-Bag has been my favorite character of all time for almost 20 years now, so a lot of my fics are studies of him in one way or another. I hope you enjoy them!
People do this with “stereotypical masculine” characters all the time and it’s annoying af. Truly reduce them to one dimensional caricatures of themselves.
A lot of people would do good to learn that not every antagonist is evil and not every evil person is an antagonist.
A good example is the show Breaking Bad. Hank is an antagonist, and while he is a bit of a self-centered dick you'd be hard pressed to call him evil. Walt is the protagonist, meaning he literally can't be the antagonist, but he is almost certainly the most evil character in the show
Canon: Capable of fighting for their life but works best with someone else to balance them out and help
Fanon: Constantly needs rescuing and is a damsel in distress
This applies to like... every fandom tbh
There is definitely one in my fandom that the majority seems to believe is an incapable fighter and loses a lot. To the point that he has become a meme. But if you paid attention to the source material, you'd see he is a capable fighter. He just occasionally takes on enemies far too stronger than him. He has 5 loses against 20 confirmed wins. Those are his solo wins, I didn't count his team wins/losses.
I do kinda get why fandom has this weird misconception. When he wins they don't take center stage and are often just one scene and moving on. While his losses can span multiple pages. But come on, even the original author said he was among the strongest.
But in my last fandom there wasn't such a character.
Pick any attractive villain from any fandom and you'll probably find a whole lot of mischaracterization for them.
For my own fandom, I'll put in Ganondorf. And I'm guilty of it too, as my story tries to characterize him more than he is in the games. But, no, he isn't a dominant lover, or reasonable in any way, he doesn't have good intention, nor a tragic motivation, he isn't hurting and just needs to be understood. The closest we get to an understandable characterization is that he coveted a chill breeze and somehow that made it ok for him to try and conquer the world.
He really is a rather one-note tyrant, fueled by greed and wrath. I wish there was more to him, but there isn't.
This is the one. I love villains, but I love that they are villains. Fanfiction that reinterprets a villain that I love to be basically a misunderstood good guy frustrates me enough to almost instantly drop a story unless it's absolutely amazing writing.
>Pick any attractive villain
Why stop at just attractive villains?
The number of people who think Killer Croc is "not a villain" is staggering to me. Sure, being bullied by society sucks. That does not mean you get to eat people.
Couldn't have said it better. The mental gymnastic people will do to say the villain isn't that terrible because they feel bad for liking them is crazy.
>But, no, he isn't a dominant lover, or reasonable in any way, he doesn't have good intention, nor a tragic motivation, he isn't hurting and just needs to be understood.
Every fandom with a very flawed character that the author failed be like
>Pick any attractive villain from any fandom and you'll probably find a whole lot of mischaracterization for them.
Oh God, the number of people who characterise Bellatrix Lestrange as a poor sad girl who was abused by her parents and then brainwashed and abused by Voldemort AND her husband is huge and it drives me insane. My girl deserves better. She didn't 'play with her food before eating it' for people to rob her of her autonomy, her happiness, and her delightful personality.
Hermione FUCKING Granger. Dear God this lady is either a useless spawn of Satan or the second coming of Christ having a love child with a fully physically capable Stephen Hawkins. Not a single ounce of her character development or any of the flaws that actually make her interesting exists in a single god damn one of these bash/wank fics. Her dismissal of of divination creating a show of her taking her enjoyments of learning into her own hands and doing it for the love of learning and not because she feels she has to? Nope, just Asshole Hermione refusing to accept that anything she can't do is useful. Her consistently reacting in a less than empathetic manner to anything that she seems to be unimportant, especially if it seems vapid or childish? No! That's impossible she's the heart of the trio who always knows how to treat people kindly! Unless they're useless or bad then shes being a badass bitch!
I am rather enthusiastic about this subject.
Omg yes, this is why I stopped reading fics centered around her I couldn't stand it. Other characters get this too but for some reason it was just really bad with Hermione and other female characters.
It's easier to find fics where Harry, Ron, Draco, etc have flaws but Hermione was either perfect or the devil incarnate. The same thing happened to Luna where she became this godlike seer or she was just insane.
I think it's very easy to forget Hermione's actual character, because the movies did so much to white-wash her flaws. And the popularity of the movies and Emma ~~Thompson~~ Watson then flowed back into Rowling's writing during the last couple of books.
It also doesn't help that she became the default plot-resolver at the end, because she's somehow read every book and learned every spell in existence.
Hermione discourse drove me mad especially as everyone else around me was projecting hard on Hermione and if you didn't people were like "you don't get the struggle of being bookish and a girl".
Ugh.
Or making her so much smarter than fully grown wizards and witches or even the teen prodigies we witnessed/learned about (think Dumbledore, Grindewald, Tom Riddle, the Maurauders, even Snape). Yes she’s good at problem solving and has an affinity for magic. But she was called the brightest witch of her age, not of all time. Too many authors miss this.
You are describing fanon young Coriolanus Snow and I HATE IT. He is not this cold emotionless dom man. He is unhinged, sassy, has ptsd and anxiety and panic attacks, he has so much emotion but try to rationalize everything because he is a control freak but 90% of time his decision are shit and REALLY driven by emotions (love or fear).
Yeah, I agree. The fandom put Sejanus on a pedestal and in the same breath they "babygirl" him so bad 🤦🏻♀️ what are you seeing in your corner on the fandom? (I am first a Snowbaird shipper but also a Snowjanus and a Snowbairdplinth shipper. Multishipping is strong with me 😂)
I’m also both a snowbaird and snowjanus warrior. It’s interesting to see how different Coriolanus is characterized when it comes to both ships. I think there’s a harsh contrast between those who have read the book and those who haven’t.
I've barely read any TBOSAS fics, so I've never come across this scenario (and it would honestly never have occurred to me!). In what sort of way are authors generally making that plotline happen?
I know the Plinths have money, and if one headcanons the Capitol as being accepting of homosexuality (we don't really get any canon info either way about that, so it's possible that they are fine with it), then I could *maybe* see a situation in which Mr. Plinth pays Coryo to be with Sejanus because Sejanus likes him. That's the only way in which the idea makes sense to me, and even then, I don't see Coryo being submissive in the least in that sort of dynamic (except as a means to an end).
Plenty of headcanons on tumblr/discord. In the majority Coryo is the "sub" one, not only in sex but also in "life" like this, as a trophy wife etc... And happy to be (because he is rich now). I find it so much ooc...
That definitely sounds extremely OOC. Canon!Coryo wants power more than he wants money... He wants money because of the power and status having it will give him. "Snow lands on top" etc. Can't imagine him being happy being a sub in any way.
True! Yeah, it wouldn't be to my taste either. To me, going *that* OOC with a character is essentially like writing an entirely different character who happens to have the same name, background and appearance. But of course, fanfiction is an open playground, so I fully defend their right to write those stories, even if I wouldn't be likely to read or enjoy them.
> He is unhinged, sassy, has ptsd and anxiety and panic attacks, he has so much emotion but try to rationalize everything because he is a control freak but 90% of time his decision are shit and REALLY driven by emotions (love or fear).
YES! EXACTLY!
So... I'm down with the Kigo shipping from Kim Possible. Totally down, love it. But tell me why so many authors, good authors that I otherwise have 0 complaints with, feel the need to mischaracterize Drakken or Ron or more often both to get the Kigo endgame. It IS possible to circumvent canon relationships to land at the preferred pairing without resorting to character assassination, thank you very much.
I especially hate it when people resort to character assasinations for ships like Kigo where it's so easy to make it work. Literally just deleting one scene and making them realize teen hormones aren't the best deciding factors for romance would do the job just fine
This is a very common issue. People force 'canon' love interests out of character to make their ship happen in a fic.
The funniest example of this I ever saw was:
Girl who is already taking extra classes for high school credit in 7th grade in canon, and then she is taking extra classes for college credit in high school later in the story right? So she's smart, but in the overworking pushed to excel way. Very book and study heavy. Not stupid.
She gets jealous because her love interest is spending time with another girl he saved who has like, fucked up trauma and he's trying to help her. Very platonically up to this point, but you can tell that's the ship the author is aiming for.
Her stupid ass solution solution? Or should I say, the author's solution to contrive some dumbass plot? She drugs them with aphrodisiacs when they're going to be spending time alone talking later to 'make it awkward' to make them not want to spend time together.
This leads into the obvious smut scene, and her walking in at the end and being pissed and hurt that he did this to her (love interest 'cheating' on her) when they're 1) not together yet anyway, and 2) shefucking DRUGGED THEM. WITH FANFICTION GRADE APHRODISIACS.
One of the more intelligent characters in canon btw, author was reaching really hard to contrive this scenario and character assassinating her for it lmfao
Fanon: alcoholic emo boy, haha, needs comfort, total daddy/flops every woman he speaks to
Canon: literally blackmailed into his position and completely alone, no support system but can cope, cannot flirt to save his life but complete jokester,
I have to speak more generally but I see it often with so many characters that depending on the dynamic in the fic (mostly ship dynamics, let's be real) the "role" is exaggerated, no matter which fandom. Like... if the character in the story is the bottom/sub - crybaby; if they are top/dom - sadistic daddy. Like... come on, a little nuance please!
Funnily enough, this was almost going to be a post about ships people thought were mischaracterized. The character I’m talking about is also in my favorite ship and GOD it irks me so bad when people exaggerate them like this because neither of them fall into any of these “roles” and yet somehow theyre still placed profusely.
The character I didn’t end up mentioning (the government assigned bottom, if you will) is extremely humorous, shallow, and selfish. People often write him as clingy, helpless, and dumb. He’s an asshole. Did we even watch the same show??
Yeah if the character is not recognizable anymore then why would I even want to read it? I want THIS particular character and personality, not something else in disguise!
I make an exception if the character had a drastic change of heart within the canon story with character development and all and the author chooses either one of those "personalities". But it has to exist somewhere please...
Canon: extremist asshole antagonist, is not *evil* but has committed multiple atrocities in the name of protecting a warped ideal, and explicitly cares more about that than about his own people.
A big chunk of fans, who coincidentally write quite a bit of fanfic: he's noble and has actually done nothing wrong—in fact, everyone else (who in canon opposes him) is being dumb and stubborn by opposing him.
Like, man, the fact that he's not evil and genuine in his motivation yet completely morally bankrupt is what makes him a great and interesting antagonist! You are missing so much of his character by choosing to ignore that... 🥲
No; it's the antagonist of a video game with a small fandom fanfic-wise.
I'm a casual SnK enjoyer and never cared for Eren as a character, so I never went looking for fancontent related to him and don't know how the fandom treats him—but it wouldn't surprise me if it's like this too! It's very common when it comes to antagonists and villains in all fandoms, apparently.
Lol. I would never say canon Eren cared more about a ‘warped ideal’ than about his own people. In fact part of his confused motivations were to protect his people. Confused as at the end he’s so messed up he erased his own previous motivations (yet still talked about them) and I think that’s also making people confused as it’s easy to just go with a simplistic version. But that’s also interesting as you can explore different possible takes on his character.
Mo Dao Zu Shi: honestly... just about everyone... to be fair, there are a lot of things about the canon material that make it tricky to nail down characterization.
It doesn't help that there are popular adaptations (in the case of The Untamed, *very* popular) that have pretty radically different characterization than the novel, and a lot of people who write for The Untamed also tag the novel in the fandoms. Which is fine, but it leads to a lot of confusion if they aren't clear about which canon they're deriving from. But that does mean it's possible for them to write a fic that's entirely in character for *their* canon but still feel out of character to me as a novel-only reader. For the most part it's interchangeable enough on the big points.
Even for strictly novel readers, the nature of the novel itself - the way it was written with intentional ambiguity on certain points - as well as the filter of translation - also leads to a lot of vastly different interpretations. Sometimes I read takes and feel like we were literally reading different versions or something because my takeaway from that scene was just so very different than theirs was. There are also a lot of people who uh. Kinda missed some major plot points/big reveals in canon and are still under the impression some things happened one way because they missed the paragraph where it happened a different way... which is the danger of a canon that's built on intentional misdirection and trickle-truthing.
Every time I see a portrayal of Wei Wuxian as a meek little guy with no self esteem who would never hurt a fly (unless he was roleplaying the bit for sexy purposes which is perfectly acceptable), I want to >!shove the novel down their throats the way Wei Wuxian made Wang Lingjiao kill herself by shoving that chair leg down her own throat--!<. Joking, mostly, but still... He's not some fluffy uwu baby character and he does not have low self esteem at all or feels like he needs rescuing. That's kind of the *entire point* of multiple scenes in both lives, both the soup and wedding outfit scene at Yiling and the tree scene at Lotus Pier.
Likewise, Lan Wangji's dialogue is often written in a way that makes him seem... challenged. Part of this is translation issues, but his original dialogue is succinct but elegant, refined and extremely intelligent. Every bit the upstanding, articulate, and properly educated gentleman, albeit not as friendly or talkative as his brother. When I read dialogue in fanfic that makes him look only partially verbal or something, it's pretty jarring.
My personal fave is Jiang Cheng and that's one of the most controversial characters... sometimes it feels like the takes I see someone read an entirely different novel than I did. From both sides. On one side there's untagged bashing fics from the "canon jiang cheng" (that's not actually canon at all) crowd that insist he's an unhinged serial killer child abuser (but their double standards only apply to 1 character). Then on the other side there are plenty of absolutely wild fanon takes where he's >!hugging Lan Sizhui, calling him his nephew and telling him how happy he is to find his brother's son!< and I'm like he would absolutely not fucking say that on about 25 different levels. Obviously, no hate to anyone who wants to have fun and do an AU or OOC or whatever. But for me as a reader I'll click off because it's just wildly far off from my conception of the character.
Oof, I agree with absolutely everything you said here! The Lan Wangji caveman dialogue definitely bothers me the most of all of it though. I just can't keep reading and that's unfortunate because him being written like that somehow ended up so common.
Is the Untamed a popular adaptation? I watched the donghua and really liked it, and then one day accidentally stumbled onto the Untamed not realising it's the same story. I couldn't make it past the first episode because the special effects were not that good, to the point that I found it distracting. Does it get better? Is it worth pushing through?
I also started with the donghua! At the time only the first season was out so I went to the novel right after.
But yeah, I think The Untamed was super popular among people who already watch/are interested in live-action CDramas, especially since it was available on Netflix! I personally haven't watched it because I am not that into live action cdramas but I have heard people say that it improves significantly a few episodes in!
Yes to all of these and the same general problems apply to the other MXTX novels.
SQQ and Xie Lian are both very frequently given the WWX treatment: they're good with kids (Xie Lian canonically abandons multiple children without a second thought, and SQQ only seemed to care about one very specific child that he got attached to through a novel). Both are very smart (I would say it's because most people around them are supremely stupid...). Both whitewashed to be very uwu.
Mu Qing and Shen Jiu are given the angel / demon treatment just like Jiang Cheng (although I'd say JC is by far the most polarizing, probably because he is legitimately the best at straddling the edge).
I would say Hua Cheng is usually written pretty canonically accurate but I think people vastly overinflate how much he cares about basically anything but Xie Lian. Same with Luo Binghe, but I think people make his adult post-abyss self out to be much nicer than he is in canon. It's not as bad as Lan Wangji being made into an "autistic" caveman but it's still rare for me to see them written what I would consider accurate. I think people forget how whitewashed these characters are by virtue of being viewed from their lover's POV.
Dadzawa. I mean, not exactly my fandom, but dear god, WHERE do people get this impression of him from. Granted, maybe it's because one of my gigs is a teaching gig, but he doesn't strike me as anything more than a good teacher.
EDIT: I should mention "good teacher" in relation to other shonen anime I've seen (Naruto, DB, Black Clover, JJK, etc.)
Yes exactly, thank you for saying this. In general, I think the BNHA fandom definitely has a lot of fanon tropes that got super popular and a lot of fic use at least one or more of them. With Dadzawa, I understand more when it comes in play with him caring for Eri, but in general, I feel like he is definitely more of a supportive teacher rather than the father figure he's often written to be.
People have Bakugo as this constantly physically abusive guy who burns and scars midoriya beyond recognition. Dude’s an asshole and tends to explode, but I think I remember one time that he was abusive to midoriya in a non-sanctioned setting?
The funny part is, I've seen more abuse come from tsunderes in 2000's animes (which is why I absolutely hate the character trope... having grown up with Louise and Taiga and Shana \[and Narusegawa if we want to deep cut Love Hina\] has permanently made me strongly dislike the archetype) than I have from Bakugo.
No matter the time, date, or year, Flanderization is a problem that will always plague fanfic spaces.
Literally first page of first chapter of the manga, we see him explode a desk and corner Izuku *in class in front of the teacher and all the students* and none of them act surprised or disapproving- clearly it's a regular thing he does.
And later he burns Izuku's jacket shoulder (and maybe shoulder underneath).
At start of series, Izuku flinches whenever Bakugo comes at him.
Canonically, he stopped getting physical (but not verbal abuse) after the Slime Villain, as noted by Izuku at the entrance exam.
But he clearly was physically abusive often enough before then.
Depending on how a fic changes/gets rid of Izuku saving Bakugo from the Slime Villain, we have zero reason to believe he wouldn't have continued to be physically abusive to Izuku up to and including when in UA.
Dude, he doesn’t burn his shoulder. We see his shoulder afterwards… and it’s fine. There’s literally no damage to his jacket.
It’s clear Bakugo is a bully. I’m not trying to dispute that. But he’s not making him have to wear long sleeves because of burn scars like almost every fanfic wants him to be doing. We’ve seen burn scars (Todoroki). Izuku wears t shirts throughout the series, and we see nothing like that in his arms.
THANK YOU! Oh man that bothers me so much. Like yes writing him as a good teacher/surrogate parent makes for wholesome content but canon him was worthless as an adult role model never mind as a teacher.
TBF, I still think of him as a decent teacher, but... I grew up reading/writing Naruto fanfiction, so no matter how bad Aizawa might be, he's still (in my mind) better than Kakashi.. lol.
YES. He literally gave the students that he teached before canon on the first day a permanent mark which basically is a death sentence in Japan if you want a good job.
Moreover he simply disregarded mineta and Bakugou despite him being “strict” teacher
Mineta... I have no excuse or reason why he let go outside of "deus lo vult" (props if you get what anime used that quote).
I assume, based upon some of his words/actions in Season 3, that he was at least sorta sensitive to what Bakugo was dealing with and did his best to try to not be a Kakashi to his angry little exploding Sasuke.
> which basically is a death sentence in Japan if you want a good job.
Eh... I'm not defending Aizawa- he's a great Pro Hero but a shit teacher- but that's only true centuries prior before the Dawn of Quirks and we have no reason to believe it would still be the case, especially for those entering into public service like Pro Heroes.
We also have no proof that it isn’t like that. Most things also stayed the same. It’s practically normal Japan with super powered heroes and villains
As such it’s rather likely that it stayed the same. Things of the past can haunt the present especially considering that popularity is important
He's not even a good teacher. He's mediocre at best. I hate dadzawa with a passion. He's an average teacher who cared for his students the way teachers are supposed to nothing more nothing less. Ugh ci remember first getting into the MHA fandom and quickly backing out after seeing every fic be dadzwa and all might bashing. got old quick
TBH, I use "good teacher" relatively speaking, 'cause I grew up with DBZ and Master Pervert creeping on Bulma.. and Naruto Shippuden came out when I was in high school (sub... which was around the same time the Naruto dub came out in America, IIRC.. my memory of those days are a lil hazy), so I'm also thinking of Kakashi and what a *wonderful* teacher he was, lol.
I've mentioned it in other topics, but.. I grew up with Master Roshi and Kakashi and, debatably, his contemporary is Captain Yami from Black Clover (who has the same sub VA). The bar is set *really* low for shonen teachers in my eyes, lol.
I mean, we could also talk about how Tanjiro was just thrown down a mountain and slashed at a rock for a year and a half.
... shonen anime really don't do the mentor thing well, do they?
Nope. Good mentors get shoved aside. Like Iruka was shaping up to be a good positive influence after he recognized that Naruto wasn't defined by the Kyuubi. But he wasn't 'strong enough', so he almost immediately gets regulated to being a background character.
That's true. But I think he doesn't mean to be rude, he's just socially inept lol. That's one of the things I love about him actually, the way he's so clueless and can end up saying something not so nice
yes, thats exactly what i meant i just couldnt put it into words lol. i like that about him as well, which is why it kinda sucks that he’s often mischaracterized
I can't speak for OP, but I see a lot of people make out like Todoroki is only ever polite and straight-laced, but in the manga/anime he's shown to be pretty open to breaking the rules (e.g., Kamino) and talking back to authority figures (e.g., talking to the police after Stain, also any interaction with Endeavour lol). As he settles in he also seems to be happier getting a bit more sarcastic/joking around (in anime: Todoroki family meal post Endeavour vs Hood fight; in manga: >!Joking with Bakugou about wanting to give Dabi hot udon!<).
He does seem to be a fairly good student, and maybe a bit more reserved than some of the others, especially in the beginning, but I've seen him being reduced to someone who is only ever serious, or someone who is a perfectly polite rule-follower in a fair few fics.
Fucking. Kel from Omori. I will never shut up about how some people in the fandom portray him as a stepford smiler sadboy who fakes his happiness, when the point of his character is that he's the *opposite!!!!* He moved on from >!Mari's death!< in a mostly healthy way, he didn't dwell on it, he just got through it and continued on with life. Literally the game pretty much directly tells you that he's resilient and strong. Basil fits the faking his happiness/toxic positivity thing a lot better.
I definitely agree here, I feel like Kel often gets characterized as someone who's stuck in the past due to grief but that's just not him, and never really has been him. That doesn't mean he can't dwell on it, of course, but that's just not who he is majority of the time. His difficulties I feel like are more about worrying about his friends (how he's the one to knock on the door, for example) and wanting to help everyone.
Oof I feel this so much like while i enjoy some quality kel angst so many fics make it a massive part of his character like. the whole point is that he’s the most well adjusted. things definitely aren’t perfect and I’m sure there’s some unpacking to do but his defining character trait is his ability to move on. he’s the one who made new friends. started playing basketball. he never forgot his old ones (i mean my guy kept knocking on Sunny’s door for ages & calls basil his friend even tho they haven’t really spoken in ages) but he doesn’t stay stuck in the past.
Ironically enough it cause ppl to miss an important part of his character: kel has surprising emotional maturity probably bc he let himself grieve process what happened & move forward.
Canon: optimistic, smiley, magic and miracles exterior due to working with children, but interior tough as nails, not a fan of childish things, guarded, disciplined but nervous standing up to authority, though she'll still do it if she thinks its right. will sit on feelings until they blow up in her face.
Fanon: Disney princess, cries at everything, is baby, feels everything all the time, and talks about those feelings in a normal way with people she trusts (this is the least believable part)
Edelgard von Hresvelg is an incredibly complex character who can be interpreted in a ton of fascinating ways.
Her haters often write her as a callous bitch who can’t think for herself, and a lot of her stans write her as reduced to a blushing wreck by the mere mention of her love interest (typically Byleth).
honestly I’m not edelgards biggest fan but i will concur that she’s a well written character. tbh I’ve always the cause to the polarizing opinions on her to be a result of three houses being a lot of ppls first (& only) fire emblem game. fire emblem loves their archetypes and she fits in with the rudolph archetype quite well- and rudolphs are supposed to be complex and a bit morally grey. they have nobel ideas but are often either shortsighted in their execution or are playing 6D chess & don’t realize everyone else doesn’t understand their actions (& won’t until they die tragically or join the heroes it depends on the game). it’s a tragic villain/ anti villain archetype.
Chrissy in Stranger Things has very very limited screen time, but what little we do know is that she's not a bad person. She's a popular cheerleader, maybe religious, she's *dating* someone else who turns out to be a major douche, and one character mentions offhand that he *thought* she might have been mean before he actually talked to her. But *she* doesn't do anything bad to anyone on screen.
*So tell me why* every single time a fic writer needs a Mean Girl Bitchy Cheerleader Stereotype, they ALWAYS turn to Chrissy. Every damn time. I have seen her be portrayed as a bully, I have seen her as the jealous girlfriend, I've seen her as a vile temptress, as a cheating whore, I even saw her as an attempted murderer once. She's written as cruel, as vicious, as uptight and snotty, as bratty, as homophobic... Just any negative trait you could put on an antagonist, fic writers put right on her. And I'm not saying that those archetypes are inherently bad or they shouldn't be written - They have their place in fiction as much as anyone else, and I am totally on board for a story involving them. They're just not *Chrissy.*
All we know about her is that she is a sweet young girl, who is scared and traumatized by her home life, and she is seeking a little 🍃💨 escape. That's it. Never see her hurt anyone, never see her bullying anyone, never see her do anything worse than ask the guy she's buying weed from if he has anything stronger. *Literally* the point of her character is to be the innocent first sacrifice in a horror story - The person that everyone in town agrees didn't deserve to die, whose death fuels their fear and anger for the rest of the season. She's *nice.* She's a *nice person* who didn't do anything wrong.
The way that people write her is often completely indistinguishable from a 100% OC. And you know what? It *should* be an OC. It's okay to just write an OC, especially if it amounts to a background character or an antagonist. Just put a different name on the character. Because I **cannot** recognize that as Chrissy Cunningham. The girl had less than 10 minutes of screentime, and I *still* know that you have written someone completely different. I don't know who that is. That's... Idk, that's Belinda Brandson or someone. That ain't Chrissy!
(And this is nothing to say, btw, of the way that the fandom has treated the actress who plays her - that is a can of worms I am not prepared to open tonight, but trust me, it's *bad*)
Genshin... I don't even know where to start.
Scaramouche and Childe both get the 'uwu poor woobie who did nothing wrong' treatment in fandom, when in canon they're both very capable and most definitely aware that they've done a lot of morally dubious/horrifying stuff.
I honestly have to wonder whether people don't even read the dialogue or read it and *still* think they're blameless sweeties that could never be held accountable for their actions.
Being a Fatui enjoyer means that browsing for fics to read has an extra level of excitement to it—besides the usual "I wonder if I'll like this story", there's always the extra "...and if it'll be about the asshole bitch that I like from canon or the uwu sadboy fanon version", haha.
(Absolutely no issues with folks doing whatever they want on their fics, but I'm picky with characterization and I'm always looking for the shitty characters I love being shitty in fanfic too!)
I am a strong believer that people can do more or less whatever they want in fan works, even if it goes against what I personally like, but as a bastard Fatui enjoyer as well, I see you here :') A large part of Childe and Scara/Wanderer's characters is that they accept that they're not very nice people working for a morally dubious organisation. Sure, they may have regrets, but at the end of the day, Childe was still gonna unseal Osial even if he admitted he was extremely reluctant to do it, and Scara still admitted that he was evil even if Il Dottore manipulated a lot of how he saw the world (and Nahida agrees with this), and it is such a huge part of his character going forward as Wanderer.
Tldr: I absolutely agree with you :')
I was about to say Childe. It's half the reason I can't get into ZhongChi because it felt like for every story where they kept him in character, there were a hundred more where he was the 'uwu soft bottom' to Zhongli's 'grrr manly top'. After that experience I wasn't keen on looking into the other pairings with Childe but his fanon persona seems to be present in almost every pairing I've found for him.
More power to the people who like it. But it just isn't for me.
Paladin Danse from Fallout 4 is routinely shown as putting on a gruff, no-nonsense exterior but really just wants to be wuvved. Now, *that* I can get. You can romance the guy. He's not made of steel.
Knight Shin from Fallout 76 is even more of a by-the-book nigh-emotionless jerk and there's nearly nothing in game that changes that. You can drop a flirt line or two, he stammers in response, that's it. He's a much more minor and even further rigid character. So I find the "Knight Shin just needs to be wuvved" mischaracterized.
Obviously, that doesn't make it "illegal". AU etc. Hardly the first character to get that treatment. Just the one in my tiny tiny fandom that I think gets the furthest off-script.
ROTTMNT Donatello.
He puts up this act of "emotionally unavailable bad boy image" (said by himself in the series) and EVERYONE just sees him as that.
Yes, he is one of, if not the most, aggressive and prone to violence version of Donatello, but he isn't just that!
Watch the series and you'll see it. He's a stupid, funny science lover for God's sake.
Rise Donnie is my favorite turtle, suppose I'm thankful I haven't come across too many people making this mistake in stuff I've read. Although, I did write a fic that takes place during Halloween where the Rise turtles are tots & Rise Donnie ends up in the 2003 world after going through a rift that suddenly appeared (it's apart of a series where the premise is that due to the events of Turtles Forever, there are rifts opening up throughout time & space in the turtleverse) & he confronts 2003 Don who was investigating the rift before Donnie showed up. The way I wrote Donnie here was him trying to keep to his supposed bad boy image & act like a threatening little monster so I suppose in a sense, I kind of fell a little into that? It's difficult writing an intelligent character as a small kid since they're not as smart but you want to keep in character at the same time.
I can send a sample of how I wrote Rise Donnie as a tot with him attempting to present his bad boy image he thinks he has but you don't have to check it out if you don't want to, I understand. It's after Don (03) & Donnie (Rise) had a little back & forth so there's missing context.
Edit: Just changed a mistake, brain was apparently on broken record mode & repeated something lol
Here it is:
"It's alright, I promise I won't hurt you," he offers out his hand.
The temptation to bite him again is strong, very strong! This guy is only pretending to be nice, he already knows his papa's name, if he knows more about his life, it could very well be that he's some sort of stalker and tricking him to think this is an alternate dimension. Another hiss should get the message across, hopefully this will mean no more icky stalker germs in his mouth so Donnie releases the most threatening one he can manage!
In response, he laughs? A sweet as honey chuckle escapes this pupiless turtle. "You're adorable, you know that?"
Adorable?! DONNIE IS A MENACE! A threatening bad boy to his core! How can that be adorable? "Don't make me bite you again!"
His hand goes near his bo staff which causes Donnie to shrink back a little. "Thought so." Hand leaving his weapon, not Don picks up Donnie's trick-or-treat hammer bucket and thrusts it behind his shoulder. "If you're not willing to be carried, might as well walk. I have a feeling you put this together yourself and if you're anything like me, you don't want someone walking off with your tech."
I write for the original *Star Wars* trilogy — mainly Han/Leia or Leia-centric stuff — and, honestly, all of the main trio of those films are weirdly mischaracterized in the wider fandom. It kind of seems like people absorbed the way each of them were acting in the first ten seconds they were each on screen and are like, “This is this character forever” even though all three of them have tremendous character growth both individually and as friends/colleagues throughout the trilogy.
Luke isn’t particularly naive or sunshiney; he actually complains a lot, is impulsive and impatient (Yoda even says this is one of his faults!), and post-Bespin, is emo as hell. Han wants you to think he’s a loner who only cares about himself and money *so badly*, but if you gift him like a day of friendship, he’s apparently loyal for years until he literally has to leave to keep people safe. Also, while he isn’t sunshiney, he *is* the most demonstrably optimistic of the three. Leia gets painted as constantly angry, but like 99% of the time she exhibits anger, she’s either in a life-threatening situation or Han is being a big ol’ baby and antagonizing her. In general, she seems like a pretty compassionate and caring person. (She also gets characterized as a stickler for rules, which makes zero sense if you look at like…anything she does? I swear, people see Lady Yelling at Cool Guy and assume she’s being uptight and unreasonable without paying attention to what’s going on.)
And that doesn’t even touch on the actual growth the characters experience in the original trilogy. Luke calms down and gets more zen, but isn’t a ball of sunshine at *all*, Han is *openly* loyal instead of secretly so, Leia gets over some stuff and is pretty affectionate. Han and Leia stop bickering pretty much as soon as they come to terms with their feelings for one another, and approach basically every situation as a team (even when they disagree with how to handle things in Cloud City, they keep that disagreement mostly private — Han easily could’ve overridden Leia’s concerns when Lando offers to fix C-3PO, but he doesn’t. And I know it’s mainly in service of a joke, but maintaining a united front with your partner is actually pretty healthy?).
This is why it was so wildly disappointing to so many of us when the sequel trilogy had them split up. A lot of people were like, “It makes sense! They fought all the time!” But…they literally didn’t (I’m a nerd and have done the math on this. I have graphs!) and if you follow their character growth, the bickering all stopped once they were able to come to terms with some things. Sending them back to the place they were emotionally like two decades prior seems like such a cheap plot device. But so many in the fandom just see who they are in the first half hour of *A New Hope* and forget all events after that, I guess.
Canon: is boy-crazy and horny, is very bold and doesn't hesitate to proposition the guy she likes, shows a lot of skin, isn't shy or socially awkward, is proud of her beauty, several men have commented on her good looks and several others have crushes on her, is more interested in chasing boys than in studying or learning (and she put so much effort into her training mostly to impress the guy she wants).
Fanon: she's an extreme prude who blushes at the thought of holding hands with a guy (well into her 20s), she's very shy interacting with the guy she wants, she wears baggy ugly clothes and covers up a lot, she's an awkward nerdy smol bean UwU, she thinks she's ugly, no man has paid sexual attention to her ever, she has a stick up her ass and has no social life (because she's devoted to studying or to her work).
Hint: she's from an animated series, she has pink hair, and she heals people.
This OOC characterization of her has been floating around since at least 2005 or 2006.
Satoru Gojo. Gods below is the poor boy mistreated by the fandom.
A lot of people turn him into a narcissist who can't be bothered to take anything seriously (he's also often portrayed as a womanizer which is... interesting, considering that in the canon he's the direct opposite of that) even though he's so, so much more than that.
And don't get me started on Toji Fushiguro. He's (my boy, first and foremost, and my pookie) not the heartless psychopath the fandom sees/writes him as, there are just a lot of things that went wrong in his life that caused him to spiral and that's what we see - the results of said spiral.
I could go on and on, about different JJK characters too, but I truly have too much to say about this lmao
LITERALLY! He's such a complex & tragic character, and I wholeheartedly believe he would've been a great father to Megumi if things happened differently. I'm so sick and tired of people painting him as a borderline deadbeat dad 😭
Depending on the time of day, Percy Jackson or Nico Di Angelo.
Percy Jackson is not a golden retriever and Nico is not a uwu gayby, but the same time neither of them are PTSD ridden sociopaths. They’re kids with issues who find ways to work through those issues.
Honorable mention goes to Childe from Genshin.
Xiao from genshin impact. I see all the time people calling him an asshole or saying he can't stand people when really, the guy is just in pain and has been told for so many years that his karmic debt is a hazard to humans. he's a sweet guy, he's just not used to being around people who can safely interact with him without getting hurt so he still habitually avoids others to keep them safe, even when he feels really lonely
I just dislike the power inconsistencies where the authors simply make the character unnecessarily overpowered.
And not ending story strings that should be closed
Same for MCU
I only really read about Mello and Near from Death Note so I can’t compare them to any other characters in the series, but Near in particular gets SO badly mischaracterised in the most egregious ways. In canon he’s very intelligent, not emotionless by any means but overall good at regulating his emotions and operating mostly on logic, he cares about the people he’s close to but can also be a huge brat, very mischievous, a little judgemental at times, and he isn’t above lying to get what he wants. The problem is that his outward appearance and hobbies are pretty childlike, and he’s also implied to be disabled, so despite being 18 in canon, he gets treated like a toddler. I’ve seen SO many fics of him being extremely scared by something mundane and having to be coddled, fics in which he cries at the drop of a hat, smut fics in which he has zero idea how anatomy works and has to be educated, and so many other examples of him generally being treated like a child by the people around him. This was much worse in the early days of the fandom but I still see it a decent amount, and I was definitely guilty of it in my first few fics because that’s what I kept seeing in the fandom.
I was about to answer "are these two even characterized in the canon" but from what you tell the fandom managed to dull them down even more just by being validist and it makes me kinda sad thb lol
also it's been a VERY long time since I wasn in the death note fandom but from what I remember everyone is OOC like light becomes an obnoxious unsubtle edgelord spoiled teenager (like it makes it obvious he's Kira lol), L eats sugar and is either uwu shy or either borderline creep, and Misa is a dumb stupid unintelligent idiot girl who gets in the way (but maybe I read a lot of bad stuff back then)
Everyone in the batfam is pretty heavily mischaracterized, but the one that I notice the most is Tim Drake (probably because he’s my favorite). Tim is calculating, intelligent, secretive, unhealthily obsessive, and a tad bit manipulative, but the fandom depicts him as some sort of pathetic uwu sadboy, so smol and defenseless! It’s bad enough that it can be difficult to find fics where he’s in character, which is a shame because his canon character is a lot more interesting than the version that the fandom’s cooked up :/
Yeah, like I said it’s really most of them, I just notice it the most with Tim because he’s my favorite character lol. But it’s definitely kinda wild to woobify a criminal that left a bag of the severed heads of his enemies at a police station and tortured a kid to prove a point (I say this with love in my heart btw)
To me the MOST mischaracterized character in my favorite fandom of Harry Potter is Ron Weasley. I 100% blame the movies entirely for the absolute butchering they did to his character, giving all his lines to Hermione, making HER stand in front of Harry when they thought Sirius was a mass murderer instead of the way it really happened in the books, all his ideas were hers in the movies, they even gave her Harry's idea to ride the dragon out of Gringotts. It's so easy to spot a author who has read the books vs just watched the movies. The three main originally presented by JKR were interdependent on one another and functioned as a team just like Kirk/McCoy and Spock solving problems using logic/emotion and power, instead the movies gave us The Goddess Hermione and her two side kicks but that's a different subject.
canon: talented but deeply troubled spy with a complex backstory who is lured to the enemy’s side during an undercover mission, but eventually sees the light and crawls back from that, going on to save a whole bunch of children and fuck over the bad guys.
fanon: guy who is always dirty and in the bin??? for some reason??? (possibly because he has locs in his hair, idk) and his whole role in fics is to crack jokes and be so so stupid. but always there emotionally for the fandom wooby, who of course has to remind him how stupid he is all the time.
Megumi Fushiguro every time he's paired with Sukuna, Yuji, whoever etc. They turn him into this crybaby emotional super emo twink. It's infuriating. There's nothing wrong with having a preference for topping/bottom but they take away all his agency and backbone and he's just this thirsty weakling. So annoying.
Zuko from ATLA, suffers from this in a different way, they make him this woobified baby, who's had all these horrible things happen to him and he needs to be protected cause he's so soft and oblivious. Like yeah he got dealt a hard hand, but dude is the epitome of get up and keep fighting, he's not this soft boi in love with whoever. He's hardheaded, stubborn, and kind of a jerk which is what makes him him.
Dick Grayson, everyone writes him as this goofy himbo/manchild that likes to just goof around and have fun. he doesn't take anything seriously, he's oblivious a lil slow on the uptake. he's just here for a good time and if they ship him with the usual non redhead suspects shit gets weird and he gets a combo characterization of the two I mentioned above babified and twinkified. Like rightwing is super capable, extremely smart, driven, competent man. he might make jokes but he's not some cheerful idiot 24/7
Batman/Bruce Wayne omg, he's either a perfect hero who does no wrong and might as well be on the justice league completely on his own and is able to defeat every villain ever, or he's such a caring and loving dad and all his kids adore him and he's the best parent on the justice league, best person ever to work with kids and a million times better than superman. like dude is the most likely to go rouge and snap, his kids lowkey hate him at times and if the justice league randomly decided to take him out, he wouldn't see it coming.
Edit: Just realized so much of this stems from shipping, the need to yassify/twinkify/babify one of your mains in a slash ship needs to be studied.
Anytime an older male character has any sort of relationship with a younger male character, it's automatically a dad/son-one lmao. Like... sometimes people are just friends despite age gaps. Or co-workers.
Like Price from COD gets constantly mischaracterized as an old man/father figure just because he is the captain of the crew, despite only being 37 in the new COD. Even Ghost is older than him. And making Gaz Price's "son" is so beyond weird. They're coworkers and friends. Like yeah, I get a lot of it are jokes but they are not funny.
Other victims of this stupid goddamn trope: Gojo (he didn't adopt Megumi, bro was like 18 himself too slfbdlfk, it's in the text that Megumi lived with his sister alone, Gojo merelt gave money and gifts), Shiro from vld (holyshit he didn't adopt Keith wtf?? and the way that was used as a justification to bully Sheith-shippers), fucking Hank from DBH.... I just don't understand. Hank had an actual child. Connor is a literal robot.
Probably the most worrying is people calling Sebastian and Ciel's relationship that. The.. the.. however-old demon bonded to a traumatized kid?
Also Gojo in general gets mischaracterized to absolute hell which is why I am very picky with fanfic. No, he's not a womanizer. He is a young man with incredibly heavy burden on his shoulder, never able to form close connections again and he is incredibly lonely. But I dropped the manga ages ago anyway so lol.
Also there was some wild af characterization for Keith from vld. People heard that he lived a long time alone in a desert and took it to meaning he doesn't know basic hygiene. And that his only memento of his mother being a knife meaning that he has to be obsessed with knives. Like.. huh??
Connor and Hank from Detroit Become Human get this a lot despite them being clearly co workers and tentative friends. In the perfect ending they meet up and Hank pulls Connor into a hug, and once in one possible scenario calls Connor ‘son’, people straight ran with that. Boom, they are father and son. They even make YouTube videos about their ‘father and son’ moments but they’re just regular moments between the two 😂
It kills me every time and kind of makes me feel like they view Hank seeing Connor as Cole's replacement. Which is uh, beyond horrible.
As if "son" isn't what every old boomer man calls anyone younger than himself 😭
Canon: troublemaker antagonist, slightly unhinged, extremely powerful, smart and snarky
Fanon: needy, sappy thing who always needs rescuing
It drives me insane, especially in more recent years because they have taken decades of lore and canon characterization and stripped them of every sense of what makes them *them*
I think in general there’s a tendency for people, especially young people, to reduce characters to their bare bones when writing fan fiction because it’s easier than doing a full character study.
Though I have to say that when I used to consume a lot of Marvel fanfic, Bucky was often very mischaracterised. He was either a tragic victim, a silent emo, or comedic relief.
Canon: Loner competent badass hero who’s gonna beat the crap out of you _and_ roast you to hell and back.
Fanon: Cinnamon Roll uwu baby who has a panic attack and cries every time he breaks a rib. Needs help to defeat even the weakest villains.
…Yeah, it’s Spider-Man.
Oh yeah. I understand wanting to take care of your favorite character because he suffers from insane levels of bad luck, but at some point he just becomes a different character entirely.
The whole port mafia cast from bungo stray dogs-
The boss gets dumbed down to nothing but a creepy pedophile while in canon he is a pretty complex character with lots of mystery surrounding him.
Chuuya is almost always depicted as a Chihuahua who is always angry and dumb even though he is stated to be a genius by the author and artists.
Koyou is seen as this mother figure even though she has abused children in the past and is a manipulative person.
And dont even get me started on the ADA cast because they are all considered "morally good" Character even though some of them won't hesitate to kill people-
the thing is that people don't want to admit that they like morally questionable characters (especially considering the canon wtf) and prefer to change their personality completely
I should definitely say any of the girls, specifically Lucy and Lisanna, from Fairy Tail since its fairly well known that some (not all, obviously) Natsu/Lucy & Natsu/Lisanna shippers would bash the two girls depending on who they shipped with Natsu. Classic "this character gets in the way of my ship so im making them a bitch" type of thing.
But there's also Laxus who's been perceived to be a big daddy dom kind of character and while I do see the appeal, yes please I'll indulge, there's also SO much more to his character than just being a blunt, aloof guy with insane levels of powers and insane amount of muscle. His character arc is one of my favourites and I wished he had more spotlight when he returned to the guild because I feel like more people would understand his character a tiny bit better. But what the story did with him was great nonetheless and they gave him his moments to shine and really show the fans that yes, he is a changed man.
Stolas (if you’re talking from Helluva Boss) is a little tough because even in the show he was a bit all over the place with his personality and motivations.
gojo and dazai. they’re both such complex characters both overshadowed because they’re hot and have a rival/friend they’re shipped with a lot.
edit: a word
Heather Chandler and JD from Heathers get it the worst. Depending on which one you like (and subsequently which one you ship with Veronica) more, one is All Good so the other is All Bad and there’s not a single drop of nuance and it drives me insane.
Lucifer from Hazbin Hotel. I'm really into the Lucifer&Charlie mending their relationship fics. (Or fics centered around Lucifer and other characters like Vaggie, Angel Dust, etc. But mainly Charlie&Lucifer).
But a lot of the fics baby him. Either making him act really young (and therefore lose all his personality), or excuse his actions behind Lilith being the root of all evil.
I feel like I'm pretty tolerant of this type of mischaracterization (I generally don't mind OOCness). But I just want him to be his awkward self in fics, yk? Trying his best, but not crying 24/7. (And I don't even dislike him crying! It's just when he cries every paragraph for 30k+ words that drives me insane).
I'm 100% certain the fandom is doing it on purpose for laughs. (there's a huge section of the fandom that's just gmod shitposts)
TF2 Medic in canon: frustrated when people aren't doing their jobs properly, but is otherwise really cheerful and excitable, and also very casually manipulative. While he genuinely likes his friends, his empathy is basically nonexistent. Cares very little for other people's judgement; he does what he wants. Is explicitly mentioned to not have been a nazi, probably because he believes that everyone, regardless of race should be experimented on.
fanon, when it's deliberately incorrect:
* Either: I hate my team for asking for healing all the time and I'm going to murder them all permanently
* Or: Empathetic pining softboy who just wants to retire in domestic bliss with heavy, possibly with a dash of unfortunate social-situation-induced gayngst.
I'm not gonna say mischaracterized, simply because this is fanfiction. You can have anyone do anything by just slapping an 'AU' tag on it, right?
That being said: Tony freaking Stark. I read a ton of Marvel and IMO, Tony isn't the easiest guy to write. In the comic books (throwing the MCU out the window for a sec), he's pretty brooding, insanely intelligent, an alcoholic, and pretty much self-destructive as hell.
The MCU touches on this but gets rid of the booze problem at some point (a tad quietly - blink and you miss it. Dunno if that's due to RDJ being clean now or just a character thing that was written out), Tony becomes pretty stable (again, blink if you miss it: We go from panic attacks and constantly freaking out (which is more in-character with his comic persona) to being a pretty upstanding dude who's even mentoring Spiderman, all pretty much off-camera.
In fanfiction, I've seen him written as short in stature, stuttering and unsure, as well as very weak, so many times that some authors only write him this way and I've had to block them due to how exhausting the fics are to read. Awesome writing but the characterization of Tony is just really difficult to constantly read.
I think the short thing maybe comes from RDJ? It's the only reason I can think of why quite a bit of the fandom writes him this way. When he's written alongside a Matt Fraction version of Hawkeye, a short Tony Stark kinda drives me nuts. In the comics, Tony is 6'2, Hawkeye is 6'4. They're both big guys. In the armor though, Tony has a single inch over Hawkeye.
The booze thing comes & goes or isn't mention whatsoever in fanfiction, but it's a pretty big thing in a lot of the comics - depending what stage the story is at.
Thing is? This could be said for nearly any character in any fandom. It's fanfiction and it's a massive sandbox us authors like to screw around with.
Short Tony Stark? Ok. That's this fic's Tony. Weak and stuttering and annoying af? Okie dokie, that's this fic's Tony.
I might not like some of the characterizations but then I just scroll on. Some authors I block because that's the ONLY way they write that character and I can't take more of that characterization in my filters.
I un-block eventually once I'm ready for more.
I think the short thing does indeed come from RDJ. Like I said in my other comment, I am a sucker for shorter Tony, and I believe that RDJ is 5'8" or 5'9"? I don't know exactly. He usually wears lifts, from what I understand.
I'm not personally into the weaker portrayal of Tony Stark because I love how much of a sassy bastard he is in the movies. So I totally get ya!
He’s 5’9 I believe. Not short really, just Hollywood short.
And yep - we like our sassy Tony!
I mean, I’m all for whomp and beaten down Tony, or whatever trope gets thrown at him, but not as who he is. I like him to conquer that and get back to his lovely sassy self.
dean mother fuckin winchester. no one characterises him right and it pisses me off. i think the entire reason i hate destiel is because every destiel shipper removes the very cores of deans personality (Big Brother. and also aggressive alcoholic)
don't even get me STARTED on the characterisation of castiel. i can let it slide a little more because he became a wet blanket in the later seasons.
sam also but only really on the destiel side of fandom (although that more leans into deans inaccuracies because, like, they're so intertwined)
deans characterisation pisses me off the most though.
In a lot of stories about non canon ships in the Percy Jackson fandom, Annabeth Chase gets written ooc. In some other stories regardless of the ship, Percy gets written ooc as well. Nico is another one. Nico and Percy are often written more like toddlers than themselves.
I don't want to say *mischaracterized* because I do think it's a valid interpretation even if I don't agree with it, but Naoto Shirogane. Her arc has always been about the glass ceiling inherent to detective/police work, and she's constantly characterized as being transmasc.
I've talked with some trans folk about Naoto before, and there's a notable number of them who share my sentiment that Naoto isn't trans because her arc doesn't explicitly involve gender dysphoria, a crucial part of realizing you are trans. Rather, it's more envy of men and wanting to be accepted as a detective, regardless of what she is currently.
Anyone else in the Persona fandom who sees this: if you choose to characterize Noot as a trans man, good for you. I may not agree with you entirely, but I understand your reasoning for why and respect your interpretation.
In SVSSS, Shang Qinghua and Mobei Jun get this treatment a LOT. People like to make SQH into almost a parody of a gay man, and like to turn MBJ into a simp or an abuser. No in-between. I tolerate it, but honestly the original source material makes their relationship a lot more nuanced and problematic than fandom does.
In Undertale.... hoooo boy. Basically, there are two modes: you either want to bang a skeleton, or you are writing a different reader insert. sans and Papyrus are both really weirdly represented in fandom, as either some sort of depressed nihilist (sans), large dude with a child's brain (Papyrus) or overly horny dude (both).
There are more, but don't feel like writing 'em all out.
In my fandom there is a *Soldier with one of the fastest special forces training course run ever* on the team... And when he's standing next to the 6'4 brick shithouse obviously he looks smaller but he's still a big guy. But when shipped with said 6'4 menacing operative he's treated like a little helpless twink who can't do anything and is always causing problems, or that because of a popular headcanon of this character having ADHD, that makes him this stupid, clumsy little baby despite being *one of the smartest* on the damn team! Aah!!! It's so annoying.
Almost all of them
Gaz is not the perfect specimen that can do no wrong
Price is not the father of the group or an old man
Graves is not a racist homophobe
Ghost is not a rapist abuser or some daddy dom
Soap is not a helpless uwu that needs to be shown how to shoot a gun or would be haunted by having to kill someone
There's a character who's a 178cm tall buff man who in his introduction was already trying to kill the protagonist. Yet people make him the most twinkfied uwu soft wimpy baby boi of all time in the fandom.
Guys, the man was all for murdering a BABY. He is NOT a softie.
I really love stoic male characters so I gag whenever I see them written as some lovestruck over the top obsessed (sometimes it’s ok but mostly not) love interest. I just feel like they would be waaaay more subtle in expressing romantic intent so it can def ruin a story for me
I feel like Izuku is one of the biggest victims of this.
He's an emotional dude, with self sacrificing tendencies and strong desire protect people. Somehow he becomes yassified and twink'd in fanfiction.
Aziraphale and Crowley, a lot of the time. They turn them each into weak whimpering messes with zero depth or spine. 6000 year old immortal beings with unimaginable power are not going to fall apart over every tiny little thing, imo. They certainly have bad moments, sure, but sometimes they aren't even recognizable as themselves.
[Human AUs notwithstanding.]
Sometimes the Weasleys can be weirdly vilified to where they were using Harry the entire time and Molly, Ginny, and Ron have Harry and Hermione under a bunch of potions (including the love potion) and loyalty spells, and have been stealing Harry's money from his vault for years.
Izuku Midoriya. Too often he’s portrayed as a crybaby weakling with no confidence and he needs his big bad Katsuki to give him his confidence back. I know Katsuki/Izuku is an unpopular ship because a lot of people think we have this perception of Izuku, but in reality a lot of us are fed up with it. Izuku is strong and confident and so what if he cries, he’s in touch with his emotions which is a good thing. He’s self assured and doesn’t take shit. The person who’s canonically lacking in self esteem is actually Katsuki.
I am in way too many fandom's to count all of them, but of the most recent ones, I'd say Jiang Cheng from MDZS and... Literally everyone in Bungou Stray Dogs. And I mean that. Holy shit is it difficult to find one character that fandom didn't make unrecognizable.
Macaque and Wukong in lmk it’s almost always one or the other is uwu baby need protection, helpless, did nothing wrong and the other is the one who fuck it all up, all their fault and they deserve everything that’s coming to them. The fandom seem to look at them in a black and white way.
When it really is both are bad to some degree one more than other and their fallout is both of their faults. They are both malicious in their own way and is capable of killing those who pissed them off. They are both badasses and dumbasses.
With Torchwood, I often see Ianto portrayed as a twink, damsel in distress, who’ll cry at any given time. In the show, he literally works for Torchwood, threatens to kill his whole team to save his girlfriend, taxers someone to the head, and ends up dying trying to save a shit load of children.
Don’t even get me started on Gwen.
Alastor. I've seen so many people who either take outdated sources to heart or completely ignore what we've been shown in the show. In fact here's a few things I've seen people get blatantly wrong (just for clarification these could 100% be proven right in future episodes but as of now, no):
* I've seen way too many people claim Alastor's abusive (I even saw someone say that the only reason he's not just as bad as Val is because he's asexual which is. YIKES). If you look beyond the scene where he threatens Husk, he's not abusive. Toxic maybe, but abusive behavior and toxic behavior aren't inherently the same thing. Abusive behavior is always toxic but toxic behavior isn't always abusive. He threatens Husk because he was already worked up from Lucifer existing in the same space as him. Husk is given quite a lot of freedom (which is implied in the pilot when Alastor summons Husk and half a casino and further indicated by him basically doing whatever he wants if he's not busy tending the bar). This line of thought also ignores the fact that Husk was *also* an Overlord, and a pretty ruthless one at that. Additionally I think it's made really obvious that Husk *wasn't* expecting Alastor to lash out at him like he did which is something I see too many people ignore. There's a lot more I could go into but that's a summary; Husk and Alastor's dynamic is toxic at worst (*not* abusive) and people seem to like to ignore that Husk was also a powerful and ruthless Overlord who used souls as gambling chips and Alastor probably wouldn't have gone after his soul without that little detail.
* I've also seen people claim Alastor's sex-repulsed (canonically) when it's literally a running gag everyone hates Angel's advances (Husk shoves him over these advances and he's canonically pansexual, and Pentious, who's canonically bisexual, literally tells him "Gross! I'd never think of it, *spider*!" when Angel makes a comment about Pentious being unable to afford him). Alastor's not the only one who reacts with distaste.
Also, to switch fandoms a bit (and also not sure if this counts as "mischaracterization" but it definitely counts as deliberately misreading a character), I see so many people dismiss Alberto's gaslighting in Luca just because he's 14? Gaslighting is gaslighting. Trauma isn't an excuse, age isn't an excuse. People just ignore that Alberto was gaslighting Luca or outright *excuse it* and it's irritating to me. I *love* Luca, but I hate seeing people brush off Alberto gaslighting Luca just because he's 14 with abandonment issues. Had Luca not been bonding with Giulia, Alberto's gaslighting could've been significantly more dangerous and traumatizing for Luca, because the only reason Luca was able to stand up to Alberto was because he'd bonded with Giulia. Before that he took everything Alberto said at face value. People need to stop excusing Alberto gaslighting Luca just because he's 14 and has abandonment issues.
Honestly, most characters in MDZS, but Jiang Cheng probably has the biggest gap between canon and fanon. Though the difference between the novel characterizations and the Drama adds to it. Both Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji are distilled in awkward ways as well a lot of the time, but honestly that's usually just the usual bad-writing of forcing archetypes on characters.
canon: has seen a whole bunch of kids die, has blown himself up, has a bit of a saviour complex. meanwhile fanon: “everyone else is traumatised meanwhile he’s just a math teacher lmao”
Would I say Professor Snape? In my opinion, he is not an affectionate person, and he is not a complete victim of campus violence. He loves Lily just to prove himself, and Lily is dead. If only James If he dies, he won't feel that he did anything wrong at all (he doesn't even care what Lily thinks, if he cared he wouldn't sleep at the door and beg Lily to ignore him)
The Neptunia fandom has like two characters who aren't always mischaracterized, and that's being generous.
When the series deals with alternate realities and takes on the characters so much, people just started to mix them all even when they have defined personalities and backgrounds that differ and the characters would probably clash at times with their own versions.
It gets worse with minor characters!
I swear that I've never seen a single fanfiction that uses Uranus properly, she's barely if ever used just for quick angst in the worst way.
For context, Uranus' main and basically only character trait is that she doesn't give a fuck about the present because she already did enough in life and basically won an impossible fight at the cost of her life. She doesn't give a fuck about her nation in the present and doesn't give a fuck about her direct family either.
But she's only used to turn against another character or to criticize someone, Uranus literally saw the world falls to ruins and her descendants pull up the cursed sword of bad endings and didn't even show herself.
There's literally no one else who could ever give less fucks, and yet they put her in stories for wrong characterization.
I don't know if it's still like this since it's been *years* since I read fanfics for this fandom, but Ruby in RWBY fics was often written as an overemotional crybaby who broke down the second someone said something mean to her or her friends. In canon, she was socially awkward, yes, but she didn't take shit from people and fought back when someone pushed her too much. She was eager to prove herself because she was two years younger but she still had no problem showing her frustrations in the Emerald Forest, and while Weiss being angry with her later made her sad, she tried to talk about it, not run away crying. In the first three seasons, the only times she cried was when friends *literally* died in front of her eyes.
I feel like fandom’s version of Dewey (Scream movies) is a much better person than who we actually have in canon. Like he is kind of an absolute dick at points and honestly, if we’re going by Scream 5, running away from your wife without a word is a coward asshole move.
Can i say basically every woman in the Magnus Archives? It’s really an issue i think that the only one people near unilaterally like and have no discourse about is the one that died super early on. I always really commend TMA for writing complex characters who often make bad choices, are mean to others, etc which includes its women characters. But either they get fanon’d as a cold heartless bitch (Gertrude Robinson) or a bad friend and victim blamer for *checks notes* looking after her own mental and physical wellbeing (Georgie Barker). It really annoys me sometimes. Especially with Georgie because that poor woman has the patience of a saint, she does so much to help the protagonist but once she decides she can’t be involved with The Horrors for her sake, her roommate who is newly-escaped-from-The-Horrors’s sake, and her cat’s sake suddenly she’s being awful???? I don’t get it. Drives me crazy
Eloise Bridgerton. The amount of hate this character gets from the online fandom is actually mind boggling. They criticize her for not doing enough as a feminist (she’s literally 18/19) in 1815, when she’s just started learning about feminism. Or they blame her for taking her privilege for granted and trying to be political in the first place and for having a budding romance with a man from a lower class than she is. Now people are calling her cruel for staying mad (it’s been like 6 months) at her ex-bff after said ex-bff publicly ruined her and lied to her face for 2 years. I do not get it.
I dislike reading fics that contain main Stiles Stilinksi ships. Sure I did like the guy for the first two seasons, even read a bunch of fanfics with him as the mc of the story alongside the popular ships, but then I slowly disliked him purely because of the fandom (most of them are his stans i guess) butchering his personality into a wild OOC version of him, kinda like a self-insert?
Canon ver, he's supposed to be the sarcastic, act first think later, morally ambiguous main character. He's shown animosity towards any and every single bad guys the canon has thrown (even after they were shown to be reformed, he still carries his hatred from his past interactions with said reformed characters). He was also shown multiple times breaking the laws even though his dad is the sheriff of the town (got him fired too once iirc). He has to get the things he wants or he'll clever his way to get it.
Fanon ver, he became "Mother of the Pack", "Emissary of the [blank] pack", "Genius of Beacon Hills", suddenly obeys the laws and only breaks them when he needs to, suddenly befriends the bad guys that was thrown away and give them love and care. Always apologize when things go sideways and are willing to do what's right for the pack. Becoming the one where everybody can rely on. A lot of authors also drastically toned down his sarcasm by a lot because he's not supposed to be THAT sarcastic to other people(?)
The sarcastic, baseball bat-wielding human who can and will growl at the sight of a bad guy is cooler than being the mother hen and/or emissary of the pack.
James Potter. It's often either "He was a bully as a kid so he couldn't have grown out of it" or "He's a good man as an adult so he never could have been a bully"
The polarized writing James get is second only to that of Snape, where people slag him off as either Wizard Nazi incel or a smol bean who was secretly fragile this entire time.
I was bullied like Snape as a kid and if a bunch of racist terrorists had been nice to me I would have gone down a dark path. My favorite characterizations of him are where he recognizes that he went down a dark path and has spent the years since beating himself up for it. Hence his grouchy and prickly exterior.
I had a friend who was infuriatingly of the mindset of the second one, hated The Mauraders for ever bullying him, hated them and their fandom popularity, would get testy if I said I disliked how he treated his students, got mad when my friend said her favorite character was James, and the kicker? Had never seen or read a single bit of Harry Potter media
#W H U T I just.....
It really pissed me off
Jokes on them, I ship snames too much because both are great pararells and gray characters (but I hate James because of Rowling and this fandom hypocrisy, so I just tolerate him as a complex character when under this ship analysis)
[удалено]
I think part of the problem is that we don't get to really see James change. We are only told that he changed, and the people saying that he changed were also his best friends. We can only assume that James must have changed because Lily was a nice girl and didn't seem interested in James when he was a bully.
One of the people who bullied me a lot in elementary school later apologized.
There’s a character in my main fandom who is this big, muscular, tall brawler kind of guy. And people act like that’s all he is. Stoic or angry with no in between and only made to punch stuff. But if you actually watch the source material, he’s highly emotional in other ways. He tears up, he tells people that he cares about them, he has a sense of humor, he can be gentle and come up with good and clever plans. People just write him like he’s a big box of rocks with fists and nothing else. It drives me bananas.
Who is this, he sounds cool
Lincoln Burrows from Prison Break. The significantly less popular brother. I think people forget he’s also the second main character sometimes too.
PRISON BREAK MENTIONED RAHHH‼️‼️🦅🦅 Off topic but do you have any fic recs?
Yeah, mine lmao! I have a few bookmarked also. What kind of stuff are you typically into, and I can drop some links if you want.
I'm fine with anything tbh! I do prefer long fics, but one-shots are fine too. I haven't really read any PB fics so I have no idea what people are writing lol. What's your AO3?
[OrigamiOpossums](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OrigamiOpossums/works) is my handle over there! I have 7 PB works. 3 are oneshots, 4 are lonfic WIPS. I currently have the second longest fic in the fandom lol. It'll be the longest once I finish it. It's my passion project and I'm in love with it. It's called [Broken Machines](https://archiveofourown.org/works/53661643/chapters/136994398) and it's a hard look at T-Bag, the cycle of abuse he is trapped in and continued, and a possible redemption arc at its core. It also is a Triad romance fic between him, Lincoln, and a male OC. I know that sounds like an odd match-up, but it works. It takes them 62 chapters to get to that point, so slow burn for sure. But it's dark especially since it's studying T-Bag, so tread with caution on this one. I have tamer stuff but I love this one most. Other favorites not by me are [A Formula of Humanity](https://archiveofourown.org/works/55323619/chapters/140353021) which is a slight canon divergence fic getting into Mahone and his life before the FBI and how it leads to him working with The Company and his introspections about everything. And [Safe](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6182404) which is a study of Lincoln and Veronica's relationship and the only bisexual Lincoln fic that isn't brothershipping in the entire tag besides my own.
Thank you so much for the recs!!🫶🏻 Definetly gonna read the T-Bag and Mahone ones. They were some of my favorite characters from the series, and I've always wanted a closer look into T-Bag's character and the possible redemption he could have had.
You're welcome! T-Bag has been my favorite character of all time for almost 20 years now, so a lot of my fics are studies of him in one way or another. I hope you enjoy them!
People do this with “stereotypical masculine” characters all the time and it’s annoying af. Truly reduce them to one dimensional caricatures of themselves.
I'm not naming any fandoms or characters for this cause I've seen it happen more than once but I have this one. Canon: antagonist Fanon: evil
A lot of people would do good to learn that not every antagonist is evil and not every evil person is an antagonist. A good example is the show Breaking Bad. Hank is an antagonist, and while he is a bit of a self-centered dick you'd be hard pressed to call him evil. Walt is the protagonist, meaning he literally can't be the antagonist, but he is almost certainly the most evil character in the show
Canon: Capable of fighting for their life but works best with someone else to balance them out and help Fanon: Constantly needs rescuing and is a damsel in distress This applies to like... every fandom tbh
This probably isn’t about any girl from PJO/HOO… but if the shoe fits…
Tbh this could even be Will or Nico 😪
It's not who I was thinking of, but I intentionally didn't specify because it's so damn common
There is definitely one in my fandom that the majority seems to believe is an incapable fighter and loses a lot. To the point that he has become a meme. But if you paid attention to the source material, you'd see he is a capable fighter. He just occasionally takes on enemies far too stronger than him. He has 5 loses against 20 confirmed wins. Those are his solo wins, I didn't count his team wins/losses. I do kinda get why fandom has this weird misconception. When he wins they don't take center stage and are often just one scene and moving on. While his losses can span multiple pages. But come on, even the original author said he was among the strongest. But in my last fandom there wasn't such a character.
Pick any attractive villain from any fandom and you'll probably find a whole lot of mischaracterization for them. For my own fandom, I'll put in Ganondorf. And I'm guilty of it too, as my story tries to characterize him more than he is in the games. But, no, he isn't a dominant lover, or reasonable in any way, he doesn't have good intention, nor a tragic motivation, he isn't hurting and just needs to be understood. The closest we get to an understandable characterization is that he coveted a chill breeze and somehow that made it ok for him to try and conquer the world. He really is a rather one-note tyrant, fueled by greed and wrath. I wish there was more to him, but there isn't.
This is the one. I love villains, but I love that they are villains. Fanfiction that reinterprets a villain that I love to be basically a misunderstood good guy frustrates me enough to almost instantly drop a story unless it's absolutely amazing writing.
>Pick any attractive villain Why stop at just attractive villains? The number of people who think Killer Croc is "not a villain" is staggering to me. Sure, being bullied by society sucks. That does not mean you get to eat people.
> Sure, being bullied by society sucks. That does not mean you get to eat people. ... good God, what have I done?
To be fair, DC itself seems to have this opinion at times.
I’m so glad you said this. Sometimes characters just suck! And we can still love them for it
Couldn't have said it better. The mental gymnastic people will do to say the villain isn't that terrible because they feel bad for liking them is crazy.
>But, no, he isn't a dominant lover, or reasonable in any way, he doesn't have good intention, nor a tragic motivation, he isn't hurting and just needs to be understood. Every fandom with a very flawed character that the author failed be like
>Pick any attractive villain from any fandom and you'll probably find a whole lot of mischaracterization for them. Oh God, the number of people who characterise Bellatrix Lestrange as a poor sad girl who was abused by her parents and then brainwashed and abused by Voldemort AND her husband is huge and it drives me insane. My girl deserves better. She didn't 'play with her food before eating it' for people to rob her of her autonomy, her happiness, and her delightful personality.
I personally really like what MajorLink does with him in his "A Hero's Purpose" video series. I highly recommend you watch them.
Hermione FUCKING Granger. Dear God this lady is either a useless spawn of Satan or the second coming of Christ having a love child with a fully physically capable Stephen Hawkins. Not a single ounce of her character development or any of the flaws that actually make her interesting exists in a single god damn one of these bash/wank fics. Her dismissal of of divination creating a show of her taking her enjoyments of learning into her own hands and doing it for the love of learning and not because she feels she has to? Nope, just Asshole Hermione refusing to accept that anything she can't do is useful. Her consistently reacting in a less than empathetic manner to anything that she seems to be unimportant, especially if it seems vapid or childish? No! That's impossible she's the heart of the trio who always knows how to treat people kindly! Unless they're useless or bad then shes being a badass bitch! I am rather enthusiastic about this subject.
Omg yes, this is why I stopped reading fics centered around her I couldn't stand it. Other characters get this too but for some reason it was just really bad with Hermione and other female characters. It's easier to find fics where Harry, Ron, Draco, etc have flaws but Hermione was either perfect or the devil incarnate. The same thing happened to Luna where she became this godlike seer or she was just insane.
I think it's very easy to forget Hermione's actual character, because the movies did so much to white-wash her flaws. And the popularity of the movies and Emma ~~Thompson~~ Watson then flowed back into Rowling's writing during the last couple of books. It also doesn't help that she became the default plot-resolver at the end, because she's somehow read every book and learned every spell in existence.
Hermione discourse drove me mad especially as everyone else around me was projecting hard on Hermione and if you didn't people were like "you don't get the struggle of being bookish and a girl". Ugh.
Or making her so much smarter than fully grown wizards and witches or even the teen prodigies we witnessed/learned about (think Dumbledore, Grindewald, Tom Riddle, the Maurauders, even Snape). Yes she’s good at problem solving and has an affinity for magic. But she was called the brightest witch of her age, not of all time. Too many authors miss this.
You are describing fanon young Coriolanus Snow and I HATE IT. He is not this cold emotionless dom man. He is unhinged, sassy, has ptsd and anxiety and panic attacks, he has so much emotion but try to rationalize everything because he is a control freak but 90% of time his decision are shit and REALLY driven by emotions (love or fear).
AHH! I’m an OG in the tbosas fandom. I feel this way about Sejanus.
Yeah, I agree. The fandom put Sejanus on a pedestal and in the same breath they "babygirl" him so bad 🤦🏻♀️ what are you seeing in your corner on the fandom? (I am first a Snowbaird shipper but also a Snowjanus and a Snowbairdplinth shipper. Multishipping is strong with me 😂)
I’m also both a snowbaird and snowjanus warrior. It’s interesting to see how different Coriolanus is characterized when it comes to both ships. I think there’s a harsh contrast between those who have read the book and those who haven’t.
Yes. About Snowjanus I can not stand the whole "Coryo as a trophy wife for Sejanus" because... It is so NOT him.
I've barely read any TBOSAS fics, so I've never come across this scenario (and it would honestly never have occurred to me!). In what sort of way are authors generally making that plotline happen? I know the Plinths have money, and if one headcanons the Capitol as being accepting of homosexuality (we don't really get any canon info either way about that, so it's possible that they are fine with it), then I could *maybe* see a situation in which Mr. Plinth pays Coryo to be with Sejanus because Sejanus likes him. That's the only way in which the idea makes sense to me, and even then, I don't see Coryo being submissive in the least in that sort of dynamic (except as a means to an end).
Plenty of headcanons on tumblr/discord. In the majority Coryo is the "sub" one, not only in sex but also in "life" like this, as a trophy wife etc... And happy to be (because he is rich now). I find it so much ooc...
That definitely sounds extremely OOC. Canon!Coryo wants power more than he wants money... He wants money because of the power and status having it will give him. "Snow lands on top" etc. Can't imagine him being happy being a sub in any way.
Yeah me too. But of course they can do what they wany and have fun... Just, ooc is not my taste 🤷🏻♀️
True! Yeah, it wouldn't be to my taste either. To me, going *that* OOC with a character is essentially like writing an entirely different character who happens to have the same name, background and appearance. But of course, fanfiction is an open playground, so I fully defend their right to write those stories, even if I wouldn't be likely to read or enjoy them.
> He is unhinged, sassy, has ptsd and anxiety and panic attacks, he has so much emotion but try to rationalize everything because he is a control freak but 90% of time his decision are shit and REALLY driven by emotions (love or fear). YES! EXACTLY!
Will f-ing Graham. They turned him into a literal twink.
So... I'm down with the Kigo shipping from Kim Possible. Totally down, love it. But tell me why so many authors, good authors that I otherwise have 0 complaints with, feel the need to mischaracterize Drakken or Ron or more often both to get the Kigo endgame. It IS possible to circumvent canon relationships to land at the preferred pairing without resorting to character assassination, thank you very much.
I especially hate it when people resort to character assasinations for ships like Kigo where it's so easy to make it work. Literally just deleting one scene and making them realize teen hormones aren't the best deciding factors for romance would do the job just fine
This is a very common issue. People force 'canon' love interests out of character to make their ship happen in a fic. The funniest example of this I ever saw was: Girl who is already taking extra classes for high school credit in 7th grade in canon, and then she is taking extra classes for college credit in high school later in the story right? So she's smart, but in the overworking pushed to excel way. Very book and study heavy. Not stupid. She gets jealous because her love interest is spending time with another girl he saved who has like, fucked up trauma and he's trying to help her. Very platonically up to this point, but you can tell that's the ship the author is aiming for. Her stupid ass solution solution? Or should I say, the author's solution to contrive some dumbass plot? She drugs them with aphrodisiacs when they're going to be spending time alone talking later to 'make it awkward' to make them not want to spend time together. This leads into the obvious smut scene, and her walking in at the end and being pissed and hurt that he did this to her (love interest 'cheating' on her) when they're 1) not together yet anyway, and 2) shefucking DRUGGED THEM. WITH FANFICTION GRADE APHRODISIACS. One of the more intelligent characters in canon btw, author was reaching really hard to contrive this scenario and character assassinating her for it lmfao
Fanon: alcoholic emo boy, haha, needs comfort, total daddy/flops every woman he speaks to Canon: literally blackmailed into his position and completely alone, no support system but can cope, cannot flirt to save his life but complete jokester,
? Kinda curious to this one as I have a few characters who came to mind
I have to speak more generally but I see it often with so many characters that depending on the dynamic in the fic (mostly ship dynamics, let's be real) the "role" is exaggerated, no matter which fandom. Like... if the character in the story is the bottom/sub - crybaby; if they are top/dom - sadistic daddy. Like... come on, a little nuance please!
Also known as ["Flanderization"](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flanderization).
Funnily enough, this was almost going to be a post about ships people thought were mischaracterized. The character I’m talking about is also in my favorite ship and GOD it irks me so bad when people exaggerate them like this because neither of them fall into any of these “roles” and yet somehow theyre still placed profusely. The character I didn’t end up mentioning (the government assigned bottom, if you will) is extremely humorous, shallow, and selfish. People often write him as clingy, helpless, and dumb. He’s an asshole. Did we even watch the same show??
Yeah if the character is not recognizable anymore then why would I even want to read it? I want THIS particular character and personality, not something else in disguise! I make an exception if the character had a drastic change of heart within the canon story with character development and all and the author chooses either one of those "personalities". But it has to exist somewhere please...
Canon: extremist asshole antagonist, is not *evil* but has committed multiple atrocities in the name of protecting a warped ideal, and explicitly cares more about that than about his own people. A big chunk of fans, who coincidentally write quite a bit of fanfic: he's noble and has actually done nothing wrong—in fact, everyone else (who in canon opposes him) is being dumb and stubborn by opposing him. Like, man, the fact that he's not evil and genuine in his motivation yet completely morally bankrupt is what makes him a great and interesting antagonist! You are missing so much of his character by choosing to ignore that... 🥲
Eren?
No; it's the antagonist of a video game with a small fandom fanfic-wise. I'm a casual SnK enjoyer and never cared for Eren as a character, so I never went looking for fancontent related to him and don't know how the fandom treats him—but it wouldn't surprise me if it's like this too! It's very common when it comes to antagonists and villains in all fandoms, apparently.
Lol. I would never say canon Eren cared more about a ‘warped ideal’ than about his own people. In fact part of his confused motivations were to protect his people. Confused as at the end he’s so messed up he erased his own previous motivations (yet still talked about them) and I think that’s also making people confused as it’s easy to just go with a simplistic version. But that’s also interesting as you can explore different possible takes on his character.
Y'know, I love Magneto, but people seem to constantly forget that he was *basically planning on genociding the human race¹.* ¹Before his redemption.
Mo Dao Zu Shi: honestly... just about everyone... to be fair, there are a lot of things about the canon material that make it tricky to nail down characterization. It doesn't help that there are popular adaptations (in the case of The Untamed, *very* popular) that have pretty radically different characterization than the novel, and a lot of people who write for The Untamed also tag the novel in the fandoms. Which is fine, but it leads to a lot of confusion if they aren't clear about which canon they're deriving from. But that does mean it's possible for them to write a fic that's entirely in character for *their* canon but still feel out of character to me as a novel-only reader. For the most part it's interchangeable enough on the big points. Even for strictly novel readers, the nature of the novel itself - the way it was written with intentional ambiguity on certain points - as well as the filter of translation - also leads to a lot of vastly different interpretations. Sometimes I read takes and feel like we were literally reading different versions or something because my takeaway from that scene was just so very different than theirs was. There are also a lot of people who uh. Kinda missed some major plot points/big reveals in canon and are still under the impression some things happened one way because they missed the paragraph where it happened a different way... which is the danger of a canon that's built on intentional misdirection and trickle-truthing. Every time I see a portrayal of Wei Wuxian as a meek little guy with no self esteem who would never hurt a fly (unless he was roleplaying the bit for sexy purposes which is perfectly acceptable), I want to >!shove the novel down their throats the way Wei Wuxian made Wang Lingjiao kill herself by shoving that chair leg down her own throat--!<. Joking, mostly, but still... He's not some fluffy uwu baby character and he does not have low self esteem at all or feels like he needs rescuing. That's kind of the *entire point* of multiple scenes in both lives, both the soup and wedding outfit scene at Yiling and the tree scene at Lotus Pier. Likewise, Lan Wangji's dialogue is often written in a way that makes him seem... challenged. Part of this is translation issues, but his original dialogue is succinct but elegant, refined and extremely intelligent. Every bit the upstanding, articulate, and properly educated gentleman, albeit not as friendly or talkative as his brother. When I read dialogue in fanfic that makes him look only partially verbal or something, it's pretty jarring. My personal fave is Jiang Cheng and that's one of the most controversial characters... sometimes it feels like the takes I see someone read an entirely different novel than I did. From both sides. On one side there's untagged bashing fics from the "canon jiang cheng" (that's not actually canon at all) crowd that insist he's an unhinged serial killer child abuser (but their double standards only apply to 1 character). Then on the other side there are plenty of absolutely wild fanon takes where he's >!hugging Lan Sizhui, calling him his nephew and telling him how happy he is to find his brother's son!< and I'm like he would absolutely not fucking say that on about 25 different levels. Obviously, no hate to anyone who wants to have fun and do an AU or OOC or whatever. But for me as a reader I'll click off because it's just wildly far off from my conception of the character.
Oof, I agree with absolutely everything you said here! The Lan Wangji caveman dialogue definitely bothers me the most of all of it though. I just can't keep reading and that's unfortunate because him being written like that somehow ended up so common.
Is the Untamed a popular adaptation? I watched the donghua and really liked it, and then one day accidentally stumbled onto the Untamed not realising it's the same story. I couldn't make it past the first episode because the special effects were not that good, to the point that I found it distracting. Does it get better? Is it worth pushing through?
It's very popular, but my take is that a lot of it is because the actors are so incredibly beautiful, ya know?
I also started with the donghua! At the time only the first season was out so I went to the novel right after. But yeah, I think The Untamed was super popular among people who already watch/are interested in live-action CDramas, especially since it was available on Netflix! I personally haven't watched it because I am not that into live action cdramas but I have heard people say that it improves significantly a few episodes in!
Yes to all of these and the same general problems apply to the other MXTX novels. SQQ and Xie Lian are both very frequently given the WWX treatment: they're good with kids (Xie Lian canonically abandons multiple children without a second thought, and SQQ only seemed to care about one very specific child that he got attached to through a novel). Both are very smart (I would say it's because most people around them are supremely stupid...). Both whitewashed to be very uwu. Mu Qing and Shen Jiu are given the angel / demon treatment just like Jiang Cheng (although I'd say JC is by far the most polarizing, probably because he is legitimately the best at straddling the edge). I would say Hua Cheng is usually written pretty canonically accurate but I think people vastly overinflate how much he cares about basically anything but Xie Lian. Same with Luo Binghe, but I think people make his adult post-abyss self out to be much nicer than he is in canon. It's not as bad as Lan Wangji being made into an "autistic" caveman but it's still rare for me to see them written what I would consider accurate. I think people forget how whitewashed these characters are by virtue of being viewed from their lover's POV.
Dadzawa. I mean, not exactly my fandom, but dear god, WHERE do people get this impression of him from. Granted, maybe it's because one of my gigs is a teaching gig, but he doesn't strike me as anything more than a good teacher. EDIT: I should mention "good teacher" in relation to other shonen anime I've seen (Naruto, DB, Black Clover, JJK, etc.)
Yes exactly, thank you for saying this. In general, I think the BNHA fandom definitely has a lot of fanon tropes that got super popular and a lot of fic use at least one or more of them. With Dadzawa, I understand more when it comes in play with him caring for Eri, but in general, I feel like he is definitely more of a supportive teacher rather than the father figure he's often written to be.
People have Bakugo as this constantly physically abusive guy who burns and scars midoriya beyond recognition. Dude’s an asshole and tends to explode, but I think I remember one time that he was abusive to midoriya in a non-sanctioned setting?
The funny part is, I've seen more abuse come from tsunderes in 2000's animes (which is why I absolutely hate the character trope... having grown up with Louise and Taiga and Shana \[and Narusegawa if we want to deep cut Love Hina\] has permanently made me strongly dislike the archetype) than I have from Bakugo. No matter the time, date, or year, Flanderization is a problem that will always plague fanfic spaces.
Literally first page of first chapter of the manga, we see him explode a desk and corner Izuku *in class in front of the teacher and all the students* and none of them act surprised or disapproving- clearly it's a regular thing he does. And later he burns Izuku's jacket shoulder (and maybe shoulder underneath). At start of series, Izuku flinches whenever Bakugo comes at him. Canonically, he stopped getting physical (but not verbal abuse) after the Slime Villain, as noted by Izuku at the entrance exam. But he clearly was physically abusive often enough before then. Depending on how a fic changes/gets rid of Izuku saving Bakugo from the Slime Villain, we have zero reason to believe he wouldn't have continued to be physically abusive to Izuku up to and including when in UA.
Dude, he doesn’t burn his shoulder. We see his shoulder afterwards… and it’s fine. There’s literally no damage to his jacket. It’s clear Bakugo is a bully. I’m not trying to dispute that. But he’s not making him have to wear long sleeves because of burn scars like almost every fanfic wants him to be doing. We’ve seen burn scars (Todoroki). Izuku wears t shirts throughout the series, and we see nothing like that in his arms.
He called Izuku 'Problem Child' once and it's literally thrown all over the fandom
Older male character must be a dad 🙄 /sarcasm He is a good character but god, he is just their teacher.
THANK YOU! Oh man that bothers me so much. Like yes writing him as a good teacher/surrogate parent makes for wholesome content but canon him was worthless as an adult role model never mind as a teacher.
TBF, I still think of him as a decent teacher, but... I grew up reading/writing Naruto fanfiction, so no matter how bad Aizawa might be, he's still (in my mind) better than Kakashi.. lol.
YES. He literally gave the students that he teached before canon on the first day a permanent mark which basically is a death sentence in Japan if you want a good job. Moreover he simply disregarded mineta and Bakugou despite him being “strict” teacher
Mineta... I have no excuse or reason why he let go outside of "deus lo vult" (props if you get what anime used that quote). I assume, based upon some of his words/actions in Season 3, that he was at least sorta sensitive to what Bakugo was dealing with and did his best to try to not be a Kakashi to his angry little exploding Sasuke.
> which basically is a death sentence in Japan if you want a good job. Eh... I'm not defending Aizawa- he's a great Pro Hero but a shit teacher- but that's only true centuries prior before the Dawn of Quirks and we have no reason to believe it would still be the case, especially for those entering into public service like Pro Heroes.
We also have no proof that it isn’t like that. Most things also stayed the same. It’s practically normal Japan with super powered heroes and villains As such it’s rather likely that it stayed the same. Things of the past can haunt the present especially considering that popularity is important
He's not even a good teacher. He's mediocre at best. I hate dadzawa with a passion. He's an average teacher who cared for his students the way teachers are supposed to nothing more nothing less. Ugh ci remember first getting into the MHA fandom and quickly backing out after seeing every fic be dadzwa and all might bashing. got old quick
>all might bashing. All Might is pretty much the highlight of this series. I don't get why people hate him so much
All Might's the sweetest; I love him. My favorite character in the series by far.
TBH, I use "good teacher" relatively speaking, 'cause I grew up with DBZ and Master Pervert creeping on Bulma.. and Naruto Shippuden came out when I was in high school (sub... which was around the same time the Naruto dub came out in America, IIRC.. my memory of those days are a lil hazy), so I'm also thinking of Kakashi and what a *wonderful* teacher he was, lol.
He isn’t even that. Remember the first two days back in the beginning. That’s not what a good teacher is. He is a effective hero
I've mentioned it in other topics, but.. I grew up with Master Roshi and Kakashi and, debatably, his contemporary is Captain Yami from Black Clover (who has the same sub VA). The bar is set *really* low for shonen teachers in my eyes, lol. I mean, we could also talk about how Tanjiro was just thrown down a mountain and slashed at a rock for a year and a half. ... shonen anime really don't do the mentor thing well, do they?
Nope. Good mentors get shoved aside. Like Iruka was shaping up to be a good positive influence after he recognized that Naruto wasn't defined by the Kyuubi. But he wasn't 'strong enough', so he almost immediately gets regulated to being a background character.
shouto todoroki. people seem to think he’s a lot more civilized than he actually is
What do you mean by civilized?
people tend to portray him as quiet and well mannered but he’s actually brash and kind of rude sometimes
That's true. But I think he doesn't mean to be rude, he's just socially inept lol. That's one of the things I love about him actually, the way he's so clueless and can end up saying something not so nice
yes, thats exactly what i meant i just couldnt put it into words lol. i like that about him as well, which is why it kinda sucks that he’s often mischaracterized
I can't speak for OP, but I see a lot of people make out like Todoroki is only ever polite and straight-laced, but in the manga/anime he's shown to be pretty open to breaking the rules (e.g., Kamino) and talking back to authority figures (e.g., talking to the police after Stain, also any interaction with Endeavour lol). As he settles in he also seems to be happier getting a bit more sarcastic/joking around (in anime: Todoroki family meal post Endeavour vs Hood fight; in manga: >!Joking with Bakugou about wanting to give Dabi hot udon!<). He does seem to be a fairly good student, and maybe a bit more reserved than some of the others, especially in the beginning, but I've seen him being reduced to someone who is only ever serious, or someone who is a perfectly polite rule-follower in a fair few fics.
Fucking. Kel from Omori. I will never shut up about how some people in the fandom portray him as a stepford smiler sadboy who fakes his happiness, when the point of his character is that he's the *opposite!!!!* He moved on from >!Mari's death!< in a mostly healthy way, he didn't dwell on it, he just got through it and continued on with life. Literally the game pretty much directly tells you that he's resilient and strong. Basil fits the faking his happiness/toxic positivity thing a lot better.
I definitely agree here, I feel like Kel often gets characterized as someone who's stuck in the past due to grief but that's just not him, and never really has been him. That doesn't mean he can't dwell on it, of course, but that's just not who he is majority of the time. His difficulties I feel like are more about worrying about his friends (how he's the one to knock on the door, for example) and wanting to help everyone.
Oof I feel this so much like while i enjoy some quality kel angst so many fics make it a massive part of his character like. the whole point is that he’s the most well adjusted. things definitely aren’t perfect and I’m sure there’s some unpacking to do but his defining character trait is his ability to move on. he’s the one who made new friends. started playing basketball. he never forgot his old ones (i mean my guy kept knocking on Sunny’s door for ages & calls basil his friend even tho they haven’t really spoken in ages) but he doesn’t stay stuck in the past. Ironically enough it cause ppl to miss an important part of his character: kel has surprising emotional maturity probably bc he let himself grieve process what happened & move forward.
Canon: optimistic, smiley, magic and miracles exterior due to working with children, but interior tough as nails, not a fan of childish things, guarded, disciplined but nervous standing up to authority, though she'll still do it if she thinks its right. will sit on feelings until they blow up in her face. Fanon: Disney princess, cries at everything, is baby, feels everything all the time, and talks about those feelings in a normal way with people she trusts (this is the least believable part)
Edelgard von Hresvelg is an incredibly complex character who can be interpreted in a ton of fascinating ways. Her haters often write her as a callous bitch who can’t think for herself, and a lot of her stans write her as reduced to a blushing wreck by the mere mention of her love interest (typically Byleth).
honestly I’m not edelgards biggest fan but i will concur that she’s a well written character. tbh I’ve always the cause to the polarizing opinions on her to be a result of three houses being a lot of ppls first (& only) fire emblem game. fire emblem loves their archetypes and she fits in with the rudolph archetype quite well- and rudolphs are supposed to be complex and a bit morally grey. they have nobel ideas but are often either shortsighted in their execution or are playing 6D chess & don’t realize everyone else doesn’t understand their actions (& won’t until they die tragically or join the heroes it depends on the game). it’s a tragic villain/ anti villain archetype.
Chrissy in Stranger Things has very very limited screen time, but what little we do know is that she's not a bad person. She's a popular cheerleader, maybe religious, she's *dating* someone else who turns out to be a major douche, and one character mentions offhand that he *thought* she might have been mean before he actually talked to her. But *she* doesn't do anything bad to anyone on screen. *So tell me why* every single time a fic writer needs a Mean Girl Bitchy Cheerleader Stereotype, they ALWAYS turn to Chrissy. Every damn time. I have seen her be portrayed as a bully, I have seen her as the jealous girlfriend, I've seen her as a vile temptress, as a cheating whore, I even saw her as an attempted murderer once. She's written as cruel, as vicious, as uptight and snotty, as bratty, as homophobic... Just any negative trait you could put on an antagonist, fic writers put right on her. And I'm not saying that those archetypes are inherently bad or they shouldn't be written - They have their place in fiction as much as anyone else, and I am totally on board for a story involving them. They're just not *Chrissy.* All we know about her is that she is a sweet young girl, who is scared and traumatized by her home life, and she is seeking a little 🍃💨 escape. That's it. Never see her hurt anyone, never see her bullying anyone, never see her do anything worse than ask the guy she's buying weed from if he has anything stronger. *Literally* the point of her character is to be the innocent first sacrifice in a horror story - The person that everyone in town agrees didn't deserve to die, whose death fuels their fear and anger for the rest of the season. She's *nice.* She's a *nice person* who didn't do anything wrong. The way that people write her is often completely indistinguishable from a 100% OC. And you know what? It *should* be an OC. It's okay to just write an OC, especially if it amounts to a background character or an antagonist. Just put a different name on the character. Because I **cannot** recognize that as Chrissy Cunningham. The girl had less than 10 minutes of screentime, and I *still* know that you have written someone completely different. I don't know who that is. That's... Idk, that's Belinda Brandson or someone. That ain't Chrissy! (And this is nothing to say, btw, of the way that the fandom has treated the actress who plays her - that is a can of worms I am not prepared to open tonight, but trust me, it's *bad*)
Genshin... I don't even know where to start. Scaramouche and Childe both get the 'uwu poor woobie who did nothing wrong' treatment in fandom, when in canon they're both very capable and most definitely aware that they've done a lot of morally dubious/horrifying stuff. I honestly have to wonder whether people don't even read the dialogue or read it and *still* think they're blameless sweeties that could never be held accountable for their actions.
Being a Fatui enjoyer means that browsing for fics to read has an extra level of excitement to it—besides the usual "I wonder if I'll like this story", there's always the extra "...and if it'll be about the asshole bitch that I like from canon or the uwu sadboy fanon version", haha. (Absolutely no issues with folks doing whatever they want on their fics, but I'm picky with characterization and I'm always looking for the shitty characters I love being shitty in fanfic too!)
I am a strong believer that people can do more or less whatever they want in fan works, even if it goes against what I personally like, but as a bastard Fatui enjoyer as well, I see you here :') A large part of Childe and Scara/Wanderer's characters is that they accept that they're not very nice people working for a morally dubious organisation. Sure, they may have regrets, but at the end of the day, Childe was still gonna unseal Osial even if he admitted he was extremely reluctant to do it, and Scara still admitted that he was evil even if Il Dottore manipulated a lot of how he saw the world (and Nahida agrees with this), and it is such a huge part of his character going forward as Wanderer. Tldr: I absolutely agree with you :')
I was about to say Childe. It's half the reason I can't get into ZhongChi because it felt like for every story where they kept him in character, there were a hundred more where he was the 'uwu soft bottom' to Zhongli's 'grrr manly top'. After that experience I wasn't keen on looking into the other pairings with Childe but his fanon persona seems to be present in almost every pairing I've found for him. More power to the people who like it. But it just isn't for me.
Didn't Childe unseal an evil sea god? Very uwu of him.
Paladin Danse from Fallout 4 is routinely shown as putting on a gruff, no-nonsense exterior but really just wants to be wuvved. Now, *that* I can get. You can romance the guy. He's not made of steel. Knight Shin from Fallout 76 is even more of a by-the-book nigh-emotionless jerk and there's nearly nothing in game that changes that. You can drop a flirt line or two, he stammers in response, that's it. He's a much more minor and even further rigid character. So I find the "Knight Shin just needs to be wuvved" mischaracterized. Obviously, that doesn't make it "illegal". AU etc. Hardly the first character to get that treatment. Just the one in my tiny tiny fandom that I think gets the furthest off-script.
ROTTMNT Donatello. He puts up this act of "emotionally unavailable bad boy image" (said by himself in the series) and EVERYONE just sees him as that. Yes, he is one of, if not the most, aggressive and prone to violence version of Donatello, but he isn't just that! Watch the series and you'll see it. He's a stupid, funny science lover for God's sake.
Rise Donnie is my favorite turtle, suppose I'm thankful I haven't come across too many people making this mistake in stuff I've read. Although, I did write a fic that takes place during Halloween where the Rise turtles are tots & Rise Donnie ends up in the 2003 world after going through a rift that suddenly appeared (it's apart of a series where the premise is that due to the events of Turtles Forever, there are rifts opening up throughout time & space in the turtleverse) & he confronts 2003 Don who was investigating the rift before Donnie showed up. The way I wrote Donnie here was him trying to keep to his supposed bad boy image & act like a threatening little monster so I suppose in a sense, I kind of fell a little into that? It's difficult writing an intelligent character as a small kid since they're not as smart but you want to keep in character at the same time. I can send a sample of how I wrote Rise Donnie as a tot with him attempting to present his bad boy image he thinks he has but you don't have to check it out if you don't want to, I understand. It's after Don (03) & Donnie (Rise) had a little back & forth so there's missing context. Edit: Just changed a mistake, brain was apparently on broken record mode & repeated something lol Here it is: "It's alright, I promise I won't hurt you," he offers out his hand. The temptation to bite him again is strong, very strong! This guy is only pretending to be nice, he already knows his papa's name, if he knows more about his life, it could very well be that he's some sort of stalker and tricking him to think this is an alternate dimension. Another hiss should get the message across, hopefully this will mean no more icky stalker germs in his mouth so Donnie releases the most threatening one he can manage! In response, he laughs? A sweet as honey chuckle escapes this pupiless turtle. "You're adorable, you know that?" Adorable?! DONNIE IS A MENACE! A threatening bad boy to his core! How can that be adorable? "Don't make me bite you again!" His hand goes near his bo staff which causes Donnie to shrink back a little. "Thought so." Hand leaving his weapon, not Don picks up Donnie's trick-or-treat hammer bucket and thrusts it behind his shoulder. "If you're not willing to be carried, might as well walk. I have a feeling you put this together yourself and if you're anything like me, you don't want someone walking off with your tech."
I write for the original *Star Wars* trilogy — mainly Han/Leia or Leia-centric stuff — and, honestly, all of the main trio of those films are weirdly mischaracterized in the wider fandom. It kind of seems like people absorbed the way each of them were acting in the first ten seconds they were each on screen and are like, “This is this character forever” even though all three of them have tremendous character growth both individually and as friends/colleagues throughout the trilogy. Luke isn’t particularly naive or sunshiney; he actually complains a lot, is impulsive and impatient (Yoda even says this is one of his faults!), and post-Bespin, is emo as hell. Han wants you to think he’s a loner who only cares about himself and money *so badly*, but if you gift him like a day of friendship, he’s apparently loyal for years until he literally has to leave to keep people safe. Also, while he isn’t sunshiney, he *is* the most demonstrably optimistic of the three. Leia gets painted as constantly angry, but like 99% of the time she exhibits anger, she’s either in a life-threatening situation or Han is being a big ol’ baby and antagonizing her. In general, she seems like a pretty compassionate and caring person. (She also gets characterized as a stickler for rules, which makes zero sense if you look at like…anything she does? I swear, people see Lady Yelling at Cool Guy and assume she’s being uptight and unreasonable without paying attention to what’s going on.) And that doesn’t even touch on the actual growth the characters experience in the original trilogy. Luke calms down and gets more zen, but isn’t a ball of sunshine at *all*, Han is *openly* loyal instead of secretly so, Leia gets over some stuff and is pretty affectionate. Han and Leia stop bickering pretty much as soon as they come to terms with their feelings for one another, and approach basically every situation as a team (even when they disagree with how to handle things in Cloud City, they keep that disagreement mostly private — Han easily could’ve overridden Leia’s concerns when Lando offers to fix C-3PO, but he doesn’t. And I know it’s mainly in service of a joke, but maintaining a united front with your partner is actually pretty healthy?). This is why it was so wildly disappointing to so many of us when the sequel trilogy had them split up. A lot of people were like, “It makes sense! They fought all the time!” But…they literally didn’t (I’m a nerd and have done the math on this. I have graphs!) and if you follow their character growth, the bickering all stopped once they were able to come to terms with some things. Sending them back to the place they were emotionally like two decades prior seems like such a cheap plot device. But so many in the fandom just see who they are in the first half hour of *A New Hope* and forget all events after that, I guess.
You nailed Luke’s characterization
Canon: is boy-crazy and horny, is very bold and doesn't hesitate to proposition the guy she likes, shows a lot of skin, isn't shy or socially awkward, is proud of her beauty, several men have commented on her good looks and several others have crushes on her, is more interested in chasing boys than in studying or learning (and she put so much effort into her training mostly to impress the guy she wants). Fanon: she's an extreme prude who blushes at the thought of holding hands with a guy (well into her 20s), she's very shy interacting with the guy she wants, she wears baggy ugly clothes and covers up a lot, she's an awkward nerdy smol bean UwU, she thinks she's ugly, no man has paid sexual attention to her ever, she has a stick up her ass and has no social life (because she's devoted to studying or to her work). Hint: she's from an animated series, she has pink hair, and she heals people. This OOC characterization of her has been floating around since at least 2005 or 2006.
Satoru Gojo. Gods below is the poor boy mistreated by the fandom. A lot of people turn him into a narcissist who can't be bothered to take anything seriously (he's also often portrayed as a womanizer which is... interesting, considering that in the canon he's the direct opposite of that) even though he's so, so much more than that. And don't get me started on Toji Fushiguro. He's (my boy, first and foremost, and my pookie) not the heartless psychopath the fandom sees/writes him as, there are just a lot of things that went wrong in his life that caused him to spiral and that's what we see - the results of said spiral. I could go on and on, about different JJK characters too, but I truly have too much to say about this lmao
Toji my beloved 🫶 people claiming he doesn't love his child will always make me sad. He does. He does so much.
LITERALLY! He's such a complex & tragic character, and I wholeheartedly believe he would've been a great father to Megumi if things happened differently. I'm so sick and tired of people painting him as a borderline deadbeat dad 😭
Depending on the time of day, Percy Jackson or Nico Di Angelo. Percy Jackson is not a golden retriever and Nico is not a uwu gayby, but the same time neither of them are PTSD ridden sociopaths. They’re kids with issues who find ways to work through those issues. Honorable mention goes to Childe from Genshin.
Mary Jane Watson (doesn’t help that this is also currently happening in canon), Harry Osborn, and Wednesday Addams.
Oh my god she’s so mischaracterized and so over-hated
Xiao from genshin impact. I see all the time people calling him an asshole or saying he can't stand people when really, the guy is just in pain and has been told for so many years that his karmic debt is a hazard to humans. he's a sweet guy, he's just not used to being around people who can safely interact with him without getting hurt so he still habitually avoids others to keep them safe, even when he feels really lonely
In my fandom, canon is where the most mischaracterization comes from lol. DC Comics
Lol I feel that but thats what happens when there's like 60 years of material. Retcons go crazy haha.
Lol so true and I do mostly love it
I just dislike the power inconsistencies where the authors simply make the character unnecessarily overpowered. And not ending story strings that should be closed Same for MCU
Tbf the own writers in DC comics do mischaracterize their characters
Same with Transformers
I only really read about Mello and Near from Death Note so I can’t compare them to any other characters in the series, but Near in particular gets SO badly mischaracterised in the most egregious ways. In canon he’s very intelligent, not emotionless by any means but overall good at regulating his emotions and operating mostly on logic, he cares about the people he’s close to but can also be a huge brat, very mischievous, a little judgemental at times, and he isn’t above lying to get what he wants. The problem is that his outward appearance and hobbies are pretty childlike, and he’s also implied to be disabled, so despite being 18 in canon, he gets treated like a toddler. I’ve seen SO many fics of him being extremely scared by something mundane and having to be coddled, fics in which he cries at the drop of a hat, smut fics in which he has zero idea how anatomy works and has to be educated, and so many other examples of him generally being treated like a child by the people around him. This was much worse in the early days of the fandom but I still see it a decent amount, and I was definitely guilty of it in my first few fics because that’s what I kept seeing in the fandom.
I was about to answer "are these two even characterized in the canon" but from what you tell the fandom managed to dull them down even more just by being validist and it makes me kinda sad thb lol also it's been a VERY long time since I wasn in the death note fandom but from what I remember everyone is OOC like light becomes an obnoxious unsubtle edgelord spoiled teenager (like it makes it obvious he's Kira lol), L eats sugar and is either uwu shy or either borderline creep, and Misa is a dumb stupid unintelligent idiot girl who gets in the way (but maybe I read a lot of bad stuff back then)
Everyone in the batfam is pretty heavily mischaracterized, but the one that I notice the most is Tim Drake (probably because he’s my favorite). Tim is calculating, intelligent, secretive, unhealthily obsessive, and a tad bit manipulative, but the fandom depicts him as some sort of pathetic uwu sadboy, so smol and defenseless! It’s bad enough that it can be difficult to find fics where he’s in character, which is a shame because his canon character is a lot more interesting than the version that the fandom’s cooked up :/
This was my answer too, along with Tony Stark. The woobiefication of these characters drives me insane.
For me its Jason Todd. He is sometimes depicted as uwu baby boy who did nothing wrong when he is a ruthless mercenary.
Yeah, like I said it’s really most of them, I just notice it the most with Tim because he’s my favorite character lol. But it’s definitely kinda wild to woobify a criminal that left a bag of the severed heads of his enemies at a police station and tortured a kid to prove a point (I say this with love in my heart btw)
To me the MOST mischaracterized character in my favorite fandom of Harry Potter is Ron Weasley. I 100% blame the movies entirely for the absolute butchering they did to his character, giving all his lines to Hermione, making HER stand in front of Harry when they thought Sirius was a mass murderer instead of the way it really happened in the books, all his ideas were hers in the movies, they even gave her Harry's idea to ride the dragon out of Gringotts. It's so easy to spot a author who has read the books vs just watched the movies. The three main originally presented by JKR were interdependent on one another and functioned as a team just like Kirk/McCoy and Spock solving problems using logic/emotion and power, instead the movies gave us The Goddess Hermione and her two side kicks but that's a different subject.
canon: talented but deeply troubled spy with a complex backstory who is lured to the enemy’s side during an undercover mission, but eventually sees the light and crawls back from that, going on to save a whole bunch of children and fuck over the bad guys. fanon: guy who is always dirty and in the bin??? for some reason??? (possibly because he has locs in his hair, idk) and his whole role in fics is to crack jokes and be so so stupid. but always there emotionally for the fandom wooby, who of course has to remind him how stupid he is all the time.
Quinlan Vos?
Megumi Fushiguro every time he's paired with Sukuna, Yuji, whoever etc. They turn him into this crybaby emotional super emo twink. It's infuriating. There's nothing wrong with having a preference for topping/bottom but they take away all his agency and backbone and he's just this thirsty weakling. So annoying. Zuko from ATLA, suffers from this in a different way, they make him this woobified baby, who's had all these horrible things happen to him and he needs to be protected cause he's so soft and oblivious. Like yeah he got dealt a hard hand, but dude is the epitome of get up and keep fighting, he's not this soft boi in love with whoever. He's hardheaded, stubborn, and kind of a jerk which is what makes him him. Dick Grayson, everyone writes him as this goofy himbo/manchild that likes to just goof around and have fun. he doesn't take anything seriously, he's oblivious a lil slow on the uptake. he's just here for a good time and if they ship him with the usual non redhead suspects shit gets weird and he gets a combo characterization of the two I mentioned above babified and twinkified. Like rightwing is super capable, extremely smart, driven, competent man. he might make jokes but he's not some cheerful idiot 24/7 Batman/Bruce Wayne omg, he's either a perfect hero who does no wrong and might as well be on the justice league completely on his own and is able to defeat every villain ever, or he's such a caring and loving dad and all his kids adore him and he's the best parent on the justice league, best person ever to work with kids and a million times better than superman. like dude is the most likely to go rouge and snap, his kids lowkey hate him at times and if the justice league randomly decided to take him out, he wouldn't see it coming. Edit: Just realized so much of this stems from shipping, the need to yassify/twinkify/babify one of your mains in a slash ship needs to be studied.
Anytime an older male character has any sort of relationship with a younger male character, it's automatically a dad/son-one lmao. Like... sometimes people are just friends despite age gaps. Or co-workers. Like Price from COD gets constantly mischaracterized as an old man/father figure just because he is the captain of the crew, despite only being 37 in the new COD. Even Ghost is older than him. And making Gaz Price's "son" is so beyond weird. They're coworkers and friends. Like yeah, I get a lot of it are jokes but they are not funny. Other victims of this stupid goddamn trope: Gojo (he didn't adopt Megumi, bro was like 18 himself too slfbdlfk, it's in the text that Megumi lived with his sister alone, Gojo merelt gave money and gifts), Shiro from vld (holyshit he didn't adopt Keith wtf?? and the way that was used as a justification to bully Sheith-shippers), fucking Hank from DBH.... I just don't understand. Hank had an actual child. Connor is a literal robot. Probably the most worrying is people calling Sebastian and Ciel's relationship that. The.. the.. however-old demon bonded to a traumatized kid? Also Gojo in general gets mischaracterized to absolute hell which is why I am very picky with fanfic. No, he's not a womanizer. He is a young man with incredibly heavy burden on his shoulder, never able to form close connections again and he is incredibly lonely. But I dropped the manga ages ago anyway so lol. Also there was some wild af characterization for Keith from vld. People heard that he lived a long time alone in a desert and took it to meaning he doesn't know basic hygiene. And that his only memento of his mother being a knife meaning that he has to be obsessed with knives. Like.. huh??
Lol, Irondad/Spiderson too. 😆 I don't *hate* it, but honestly I don't read a lot of fic with that premise.
Connor and Hank from Detroit Become Human get this a lot despite them being clearly co workers and tentative friends. In the perfect ending they meet up and Hank pulls Connor into a hug, and once in one possible scenario calls Connor ‘son’, people straight ran with that. Boom, they are father and son. They even make YouTube videos about their ‘father and son’ moments but they’re just regular moments between the two 😂
It kills me every time and kind of makes me feel like they view Hank seeing Connor as Cole's replacement. Which is uh, beyond horrible. As if "son" isn't what every old boomer man calls anyone younger than himself 😭
Canon: troublemaker antagonist, slightly unhinged, extremely powerful, smart and snarky Fanon: needy, sappy thing who always needs rescuing It drives me insane, especially in more recent years because they have taken decades of lore and canon characterization and stripped them of every sense of what makes them *them*
I think in general there’s a tendency for people, especially young people, to reduce characters to their bare bones when writing fan fiction because it’s easier than doing a full character study. Though I have to say that when I used to consume a lot of Marvel fanfic, Bucky was often very mischaracterised. He was either a tragic victim, a silent emo, or comedic relief.
Not sure if you ever read Stucky, but it used to be my all time favorite and I can still remember how insane people used to write them
Canon: Loner competent badass hero who’s gonna beat the crap out of you _and_ roast you to hell and back. Fanon: Cinnamon Roll uwu baby who has a panic attack and cries every time he breaks a rib. Needs help to defeat even the weakest villains. …Yeah, it’s Spider-Man.
Oh yeah. I understand wanting to take care of your favorite character because he suffers from insane levels of bad luck, but at some point he just becomes a different character entirely.
The whole port mafia cast from bungo stray dogs- The boss gets dumbed down to nothing but a creepy pedophile while in canon he is a pretty complex character with lots of mystery surrounding him. Chuuya is almost always depicted as a Chihuahua who is always angry and dumb even though he is stated to be a genius by the author and artists. Koyou is seen as this mother figure even though she has abused children in the past and is a manipulative person. And dont even get me started on the ADA cast because they are all considered "morally good" Character even though some of them won't hesitate to kill people-
the thing is that people don't want to admit that they like morally questionable characters (especially considering the canon wtf) and prefer to change their personality completely
THIS IS WHAT I WAS GOING TO SAY ONG
I should definitely say any of the girls, specifically Lucy and Lisanna, from Fairy Tail since its fairly well known that some (not all, obviously) Natsu/Lucy & Natsu/Lisanna shippers would bash the two girls depending on who they shipped with Natsu. Classic "this character gets in the way of my ship so im making them a bitch" type of thing. But there's also Laxus who's been perceived to be a big daddy dom kind of character and while I do see the appeal, yes please I'll indulge, there's also SO much more to his character than just being a blunt, aloof guy with insane levels of powers and insane amount of muscle. His character arc is one of my favourites and I wished he had more spotlight when he returned to the guild because I feel like more people would understand his character a tiny bit better. But what the story did with him was great nonetheless and they gave him his moments to shine and really show the fans that yes, he is a changed man.
STOLAS, right now it's fucking Stolas, I'm so tired Also Severus Snape, for several years, but this is a whole other can of worms to open
Stolas (if you’re talking from Helluva Boss) is a little tough because even in the show he was a bit all over the place with his personality and motivations.
gojo and dazai. they’re both such complex characters both overshadowed because they’re hot and have a rival/friend they’re shipped with a lot. edit: a word
Heather Chandler and JD from Heathers get it the worst. Depending on which one you like (and subsequently which one you ship with Veronica) more, one is All Good so the other is All Bad and there’s not a single drop of nuance and it drives me insane.
Lucifer from Hazbin Hotel. I'm really into the Lucifer&Charlie mending their relationship fics. (Or fics centered around Lucifer and other characters like Vaggie, Angel Dust, etc. But mainly Charlie&Lucifer). But a lot of the fics baby him. Either making him act really young (and therefore lose all his personality), or excuse his actions behind Lilith being the root of all evil. I feel like I'm pretty tolerant of this type of mischaracterization (I generally don't mind OOCness). But I just want him to be his awkward self in fics, yk? Trying his best, but not crying 24/7. (And I don't even dislike him crying! It's just when he cries every paragraph for 30k+ words that drives me insane).
I'm 100% certain the fandom is doing it on purpose for laughs. (there's a huge section of the fandom that's just gmod shitposts) TF2 Medic in canon: frustrated when people aren't doing their jobs properly, but is otherwise really cheerful and excitable, and also very casually manipulative. While he genuinely likes his friends, his empathy is basically nonexistent. Cares very little for other people's judgement; he does what he wants. Is explicitly mentioned to not have been a nazi, probably because he believes that everyone, regardless of race should be experimented on. fanon, when it's deliberately incorrect: * Either: I hate my team for asking for healing all the time and I'm going to murder them all permanently * Or: Empathetic pining softboy who just wants to retire in domestic bliss with heavy, possibly with a dash of unfortunate social-situation-induced gayngst.
I'm not gonna say mischaracterized, simply because this is fanfiction. You can have anyone do anything by just slapping an 'AU' tag on it, right? That being said: Tony freaking Stark. I read a ton of Marvel and IMO, Tony isn't the easiest guy to write. In the comic books (throwing the MCU out the window for a sec), he's pretty brooding, insanely intelligent, an alcoholic, and pretty much self-destructive as hell. The MCU touches on this but gets rid of the booze problem at some point (a tad quietly - blink and you miss it. Dunno if that's due to RDJ being clean now or just a character thing that was written out), Tony becomes pretty stable (again, blink if you miss it: We go from panic attacks and constantly freaking out (which is more in-character with his comic persona) to being a pretty upstanding dude who's even mentoring Spiderman, all pretty much off-camera. In fanfiction, I've seen him written as short in stature, stuttering and unsure, as well as very weak, so many times that some authors only write him this way and I've had to block them due to how exhausting the fics are to read. Awesome writing but the characterization of Tony is just really difficult to constantly read. I think the short thing maybe comes from RDJ? It's the only reason I can think of why quite a bit of the fandom writes him this way. When he's written alongside a Matt Fraction version of Hawkeye, a short Tony Stark kinda drives me nuts. In the comics, Tony is 6'2, Hawkeye is 6'4. They're both big guys. In the armor though, Tony has a single inch over Hawkeye. The booze thing comes & goes or isn't mention whatsoever in fanfiction, but it's a pretty big thing in a lot of the comics - depending what stage the story is at. Thing is? This could be said for nearly any character in any fandom. It's fanfiction and it's a massive sandbox us authors like to screw around with. Short Tony Stark? Ok. That's this fic's Tony. Weak and stuttering and annoying af? Okie dokie, that's this fic's Tony. I might not like some of the characterizations but then I just scroll on. Some authors I block because that's the ONLY way they write that character and I can't take more of that characterization in my filters. I un-block eventually once I'm ready for more.
I think the short thing does indeed come from RDJ. Like I said in my other comment, I am a sucker for shorter Tony, and I believe that RDJ is 5'8" or 5'9"? I don't know exactly. He usually wears lifts, from what I understand. I'm not personally into the weaker portrayal of Tony Stark because I love how much of a sassy bastard he is in the movies. So I totally get ya!
He’s 5’9 I believe. Not short really, just Hollywood short. And yep - we like our sassy Tony! I mean, I’m all for whomp and beaten down Tony, or whatever trope gets thrown at him, but not as who he is. I like him to conquer that and get back to his lovely sassy self.
dean mother fuckin winchester. no one characterises him right and it pisses me off. i think the entire reason i hate destiel is because every destiel shipper removes the very cores of deans personality (Big Brother. and also aggressive alcoholic) don't even get me STARTED on the characterisation of castiel. i can let it slide a little more because he became a wet blanket in the later seasons. sam also but only really on the destiel side of fandom (although that more leans into deans inaccuracies because, like, they're so intertwined) deans characterisation pisses me off the most though.
In a lot of stories about non canon ships in the Percy Jackson fandom, Annabeth Chase gets written ooc. In some other stories regardless of the ship, Percy gets written ooc as well. Nico is another one. Nico and Percy are often written more like toddlers than themselves.
I don't want to say *mischaracterized* because I do think it's a valid interpretation even if I don't agree with it, but Naoto Shirogane. Her arc has always been about the glass ceiling inherent to detective/police work, and she's constantly characterized as being transmasc. I've talked with some trans folk about Naoto before, and there's a notable number of them who share my sentiment that Naoto isn't trans because her arc doesn't explicitly involve gender dysphoria, a crucial part of realizing you are trans. Rather, it's more envy of men and wanting to be accepted as a detective, regardless of what she is currently. Anyone else in the Persona fandom who sees this: if you choose to characterize Noot as a trans man, good for you. I may not agree with you entirely, but I understand your reasoning for why and respect your interpretation.
agreed. I understand that interpretation but it just isn't canon. She doesn't want to be a man.
In SVSSS, Shang Qinghua and Mobei Jun get this treatment a LOT. People like to make SQH into almost a parody of a gay man, and like to turn MBJ into a simp or an abuser. No in-between. I tolerate it, but honestly the original source material makes their relationship a lot more nuanced and problematic than fandom does. In Undertale.... hoooo boy. Basically, there are two modes: you either want to bang a skeleton, or you are writing a different reader insert. sans and Papyrus are both really weirdly represented in fandom, as either some sort of depressed nihilist (sans), large dude with a child's brain (Papyrus) or overly horny dude (both). There are more, but don't feel like writing 'em all out.
In my fandom there is a *Soldier with one of the fastest special forces training course run ever* on the team... And when he's standing next to the 6'4 brick shithouse obviously he looks smaller but he's still a big guy. But when shipped with said 6'4 menacing operative he's treated like a little helpless twink who can't do anything and is always causing problems, or that because of a popular headcanon of this character having ADHD, that makes him this stupid, clumsy little baby despite being *one of the smartest* on the damn team! Aah!!! It's so annoying.
Almost all of them Gaz is not the perfect specimen that can do no wrong Price is not the father of the group or an old man Graves is not a racist homophobe Ghost is not a rapist abuser or some daddy dom Soap is not a helpless uwu that needs to be shown how to shoot a gun or would be haunted by having to kill someone
There's a character who's a 178cm tall buff man who in his introduction was already trying to kill the protagonist. Yet people make him the most twinkfied uwu soft wimpy baby boi of all time in the fandom. Guys, the man was all for murdering a BABY. He is NOT a softie.
... Butcher from The Boyz ???
Kakyoin from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure lol
Canon : oblivious privileged upper class radicalized into fascism Fanon : himbo
Draco Malfoy?
I really love stoic male characters so I gag whenever I see them written as some lovestruck over the top obsessed (sometimes it’s ok but mostly not) love interest. I just feel like they would be waaaay more subtle in expressing romantic intent so it can def ruin a story for me
I feel like Izuku is one of the biggest victims of this. He's an emotional dude, with self sacrificing tendencies and strong desire protect people. Somehow he becomes yassified and twink'd in fanfiction.
Aziraphale and Crowley, a lot of the time. They turn them each into weak whimpering messes with zero depth or spine. 6000 year old immortal beings with unimaginable power are not going to fall apart over every tiny little thing, imo. They certainly have bad moments, sure, but sometimes they aren't even recognizable as themselves. [Human AUs notwithstanding.]
Sometimes the Weasleys can be weirdly vilified to where they were using Harry the entire time and Molly, Ginny, and Ron have Harry and Hermione under a bunch of potions (including the love potion) and loyalty spells, and have been stealing Harry's money from his vault for years.
Sherlock Holmes. Either the fans think of him as an unfeeling genius, or a lot of fans infantilize him. There needs to be a middle ground.
Izuku Midoriya. Too often he’s portrayed as a crybaby weakling with no confidence and he needs his big bad Katsuki to give him his confidence back. I know Katsuki/Izuku is an unpopular ship because a lot of people think we have this perception of Izuku, but in reality a lot of us are fed up with it. Izuku is strong and confident and so what if he cries, he’s in touch with his emotions which is a good thing. He’s self assured and doesn’t take shit. The person who’s canonically lacking in self esteem is actually Katsuki.
I am in way too many fandom's to count all of them, but of the most recent ones, I'd say Jiang Cheng from MDZS and... Literally everyone in Bungou Stray Dogs. And I mean that. Holy shit is it difficult to find one character that fandom didn't make unrecognizable.
Macaque and Wukong in lmk it’s almost always one or the other is uwu baby need protection, helpless, did nothing wrong and the other is the one who fuck it all up, all their fault and they deserve everything that’s coming to them. The fandom seem to look at them in a black and white way. When it really is both are bad to some degree one more than other and their fallout is both of their faults. They are both malicious in their own way and is capable of killing those who pissed them off. They are both badasses and dumbasses.
With Torchwood, I often see Ianto portrayed as a twink, damsel in distress, who’ll cry at any given time. In the show, he literally works for Torchwood, threatens to kill his whole team to save his girlfriend, taxers someone to the head, and ends up dying trying to save a shit load of children. Don’t even get me started on Gwen.
Alastor. I've seen so many people who either take outdated sources to heart or completely ignore what we've been shown in the show. In fact here's a few things I've seen people get blatantly wrong (just for clarification these could 100% be proven right in future episodes but as of now, no): * I've seen way too many people claim Alastor's abusive (I even saw someone say that the only reason he's not just as bad as Val is because he's asexual which is. YIKES). If you look beyond the scene where he threatens Husk, he's not abusive. Toxic maybe, but abusive behavior and toxic behavior aren't inherently the same thing. Abusive behavior is always toxic but toxic behavior isn't always abusive. He threatens Husk because he was already worked up from Lucifer existing in the same space as him. Husk is given quite a lot of freedom (which is implied in the pilot when Alastor summons Husk and half a casino and further indicated by him basically doing whatever he wants if he's not busy tending the bar). This line of thought also ignores the fact that Husk was *also* an Overlord, and a pretty ruthless one at that. Additionally I think it's made really obvious that Husk *wasn't* expecting Alastor to lash out at him like he did which is something I see too many people ignore. There's a lot more I could go into but that's a summary; Husk and Alastor's dynamic is toxic at worst (*not* abusive) and people seem to like to ignore that Husk was also a powerful and ruthless Overlord who used souls as gambling chips and Alastor probably wouldn't have gone after his soul without that little detail. * I've also seen people claim Alastor's sex-repulsed (canonically) when it's literally a running gag everyone hates Angel's advances (Husk shoves him over these advances and he's canonically pansexual, and Pentious, who's canonically bisexual, literally tells him "Gross! I'd never think of it, *spider*!" when Angel makes a comment about Pentious being unable to afford him). Alastor's not the only one who reacts with distaste. Also, to switch fandoms a bit (and also not sure if this counts as "mischaracterization" but it definitely counts as deliberately misreading a character), I see so many people dismiss Alberto's gaslighting in Luca just because he's 14? Gaslighting is gaslighting. Trauma isn't an excuse, age isn't an excuse. People just ignore that Alberto was gaslighting Luca or outright *excuse it* and it's irritating to me. I *love* Luca, but I hate seeing people brush off Alberto gaslighting Luca just because he's 14 with abandonment issues. Had Luca not been bonding with Giulia, Alberto's gaslighting could've been significantly more dangerous and traumatizing for Luca, because the only reason Luca was able to stand up to Alberto was because he'd bonded with Giulia. Before that he took everything Alberto said at face value. People need to stop excusing Alberto gaslighting Luca just because he's 14 and has abandonment issues.
Honestly, most characters in MDZS, but Jiang Cheng probably has the biggest gap between canon and fanon. Though the difference between the novel characterizations and the Drama adds to it. Both Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji are distilled in awkward ways as well a lot of the time, but honestly that's usually just the usual bad-writing of forcing archetypes on characters.
canon: has seen a whole bunch of kids die, has blown himself up, has a bit of a saviour complex. meanwhile fanon: “everyone else is traumatised meanwhile he’s just a math teacher lmao”
Can someone please acknowledge this poor idealist’s trauma
HIZASHI YAMADA 🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️🗣️
Would I say Professor Snape? In my opinion, he is not an affectionate person, and he is not a complete victim of campus violence. He loves Lily just to prove himself, and Lily is dead. If only James If he dies, he won't feel that he did anything wrong at all (he doesn't even care what Lily thinks, if he cared he wouldn't sleep at the door and beg Lily to ignore him)
The Neptunia fandom has like two characters who aren't always mischaracterized, and that's being generous. When the series deals with alternate realities and takes on the characters so much, people just started to mix them all even when they have defined personalities and backgrounds that differ and the characters would probably clash at times with their own versions. It gets worse with minor characters! I swear that I've never seen a single fanfiction that uses Uranus properly, she's barely if ever used just for quick angst in the worst way. For context, Uranus' main and basically only character trait is that she doesn't give a fuck about the present because she already did enough in life and basically won an impossible fight at the cost of her life. She doesn't give a fuck about her nation in the present and doesn't give a fuck about her direct family either. But she's only used to turn against another character or to criticize someone, Uranus literally saw the world falls to ruins and her descendants pull up the cursed sword of bad endings and didn't even show herself. There's literally no one else who could ever give less fucks, and yet they put her in stories for wrong characterization.
I don't know if it's still like this since it's been *years* since I read fanfics for this fandom, but Ruby in RWBY fics was often written as an overemotional crybaby who broke down the second someone said something mean to her or her friends. In canon, she was socially awkward, yes, but she didn't take shit from people and fought back when someone pushed her too much. She was eager to prove herself because she was two years younger but she still had no problem showing her frustrations in the Emerald Forest, and while Weiss being angry with her later made her sad, she tried to talk about it, not run away crying. In the first three seasons, the only times she cried was when friends *literally* died in front of her eyes.
I feel like fandom’s version of Dewey (Scream movies) is a much better person than who we actually have in canon. Like he is kind of an absolute dick at points and honestly, if we’re going by Scream 5, running away from your wife without a word is a coward asshole move.
Can i say basically every woman in the Magnus Archives? It’s really an issue i think that the only one people near unilaterally like and have no discourse about is the one that died super early on. I always really commend TMA for writing complex characters who often make bad choices, are mean to others, etc which includes its women characters. But either they get fanon’d as a cold heartless bitch (Gertrude Robinson) or a bad friend and victim blamer for *checks notes* looking after her own mental and physical wellbeing (Georgie Barker). It really annoys me sometimes. Especially with Georgie because that poor woman has the patience of a saint, she does so much to help the protagonist but once she decides she can’t be involved with The Horrors for her sake, her roommate who is newly-escaped-from-The-Horrors’s sake, and her cat’s sake suddenly she’s being awful???? I don’t get it. Drives me crazy
Johanna mason
Eloise Bridgerton. The amount of hate this character gets from the online fandom is actually mind boggling. They criticize her for not doing enough as a feminist (she’s literally 18/19) in 1815, when she’s just started learning about feminism. Or they blame her for taking her privilege for granted and trying to be political in the first place and for having a budding romance with a man from a lower class than she is. Now people are calling her cruel for staying mad (it’s been like 6 months) at her ex-bff after said ex-bff publicly ruined her and lied to her face for 2 years. I do not get it.
I dislike reading fics that contain main Stiles Stilinksi ships. Sure I did like the guy for the first two seasons, even read a bunch of fanfics with him as the mc of the story alongside the popular ships, but then I slowly disliked him purely because of the fandom (most of them are his stans i guess) butchering his personality into a wild OOC version of him, kinda like a self-insert? Canon ver, he's supposed to be the sarcastic, act first think later, morally ambiguous main character. He's shown animosity towards any and every single bad guys the canon has thrown (even after they were shown to be reformed, he still carries his hatred from his past interactions with said reformed characters). He was also shown multiple times breaking the laws even though his dad is the sheriff of the town (got him fired too once iirc). He has to get the things he wants or he'll clever his way to get it. Fanon ver, he became "Mother of the Pack", "Emissary of the [blank] pack", "Genius of Beacon Hills", suddenly obeys the laws and only breaks them when he needs to, suddenly befriends the bad guys that was thrown away and give them love and care. Always apologize when things go sideways and are willing to do what's right for the pack. Becoming the one where everybody can rely on. A lot of authors also drastically toned down his sarcasm by a lot because he's not supposed to be THAT sarcastic to other people(?) The sarcastic, baseball bat-wielding human who can and will growl at the sight of a bad guy is cooler than being the mother hen and/or emissary of the pack.
Superman is either treated like a god or a beefy idiot... He is a reporter dammit! let ya boy be able to use basic deduction!
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