Canon by cliosmuse

GENERAL DISCUSSIONS

Canon

POSTED BY: CLIOSMUSE
UPDATED: Monday, May 11, 2009 22:10
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Saturday, May 9, 2009 1:40 PM

Simple question, but particularly interesting for me as someone who writes fanfic and is more than a little obsessed with maintaining canon: what do you take to be canon? Obviously the episodes and the BDM. What about the comics? Deleted scenes? Do you consider deleted scenes to have happened? Scripted scenes from original scripts that weren't shot? And speaking of scripts, what about Dead or Alive? Did it happen in your FF 'Verse? What about spoilers revealed by cast and/or Joss? What about an episode like OiS, in which a slightly different version of the episode was aired than was packaged on the DVD? Which of those M/I scenes are canon? Does it matter?

Anyway, I was just interested in getting your probably very varied opinions on the subject. Enjoy your Saturday.

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Saturday, May 9, 2009 2:30 PM

RALLEM

I think a deleted scene would be canon as long as the scene was deleted because it took too long to tell the story, or if it were deleted because the point was already made elsewhere. If Joss says the comics are canon, then I have to agree there, but as far as anything you have to say is in your 'verse that would not be canon. An example is if you say Wash never really died because the entire BDM was a dream sequence of River, then that is not canon. jmho

http://www.swyzzlestyx.com/index.html

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Saturday, May 9, 2009 3:04 PM

BYTEMITE

I'd agree with Rallem. There's a difference between scenes that simply did not work in the context of the characters or stories (like the commentary on the "incest" scene from OMR talks about), and scenes or lines that were cut because of time constraints or ornery Fox executives.

I even include some of the unfilmed scenes that have been cut that are in the shooting script, for the same reason. For example, in War Stories, there's a scene where Inara goes to see her client after their engagement to ask for help against Niska. The client surmises that Mal must be very important to Inara, and also says that she thought the guild doesn't allow outside relationships. Inara confirms it, in a far more definite manner than her "it's complicated" explanation to Kaylee. The information from this unfilmed scene is also supported by the Blue Ray disc extras.

The comics are definitely canon.

and even though most people doesn't consider the RPG manuals canon, there's enough in them later confirmed since they were written that I like them as a source. There's a lot of fun details in them.

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Saturday, May 9, 2009 4:11 PM

CLIOSMUSE

Okay, so in general, anything Joss-approved would seem to constitute canon.

But as a discussion question, then – and this is what I'm really more interested in – I wonder, when you imagine the world of Firefly, are those things – the comics, deleted scenes, the unfilmed script – a vibrant part of your imaginings? Or do you accept them because you feel obliged to? I guess I'm kind of thinking of FF as a mental world, and I'm wondering what that looks like for different folks...

For me, though some details from the comics are interesting, I kind of struggle to incorporate them as a whole (probably because I don't really like graphic novels but also because a lot of the action – Dobson, the red robots – was so over the top). On the other hand, I've actually edited in that deleted M/I scene from Serenity into my digital copy, though I kind of view it as a guilty pleasure, since it's not *supposed* to be there.

I don't know – maybe the question doesn't make sense, but it was just a curiosity I had.

So, yeah: what you take and what you leave behind

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Sunday, May 10, 2009 11:51 PM

JEWELSTAITEFAN

I conjure that asking 6 Browncoats about canon might get you a half dozen answers.
Consider the lines in BDM from Operative to Dr. Mathias "Eight months ago River escaped." This line did not make it to film. This same time frame is given from Mal to Simon. The Mal line makes the Operative line redundant, so only one is used. This makes some Browncoats assume that the Operative's scripted line was invalid, untrue, far from canon.

I conjure what made in onto screen is canon. Other scenes that DO NOT CONFLICT inherently are also canon. Stuff that conflicts heavily I consider less or non-canon. Because the series was cancelled, much of what did not get onscreen may have been what Joss & Co were thinking, and therefore may be what might come up in future works, so for that reason the canon potential should be discounted at your own risk.

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Monday, May 11, 2009 6:57 AM

YELLOWJACKET

Quote:
Originally posted by jewelstaitefan:
I conjure that asking 6 Browncoats about canon might get you a half dozen answers.

Yes...canon is a very tricky thing, or more to the point, it is ignored or appreciated on different levels by different people. Take the Independents' Patch for example.

Shawna Trpcic (the lead designer for Firefly) designed the Independents or 'Browncoat' patch to be worn triangle point down and star point up. This design was approved prior to shooting, but due to a wardrobe mistake the patch on the coat worn by Nathan Fillion is upside down. Now it should be pointed out that the 'canon' is to wear it as Shawna designed it, after all, she is essentially the Betsy Ross of the Browncoats and every other uniform in the series shows this. She designed the uniforms and created the canon for them. Furthermore, Gareth Davies, Tim Minear and Joss himself approved those designs, making them as canon as you could ever want them to be.

Despite this, people still wear them in concordance with a single wardrobe mistake. Upside down. People assign all sorts of meanings to Mal's decision to wear it this way, but the character Mal didn't choose to wear it differently anymore than the actor Nathan Fillion chose to wear it that way. A seamstress sewed it on wrong.

This shows that fans will define canon without deference to the creators themselves. Mistake or no mistake.

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Monday, May 11, 2009 10:10 PM

JEWELSTAITEFAN

Agree with yellowjacket.

If interested, there was some discussion about use and treatment of various levels of canon in the Timeline threads in Episode forum. There was an attempt to moderate canon references so there was no conflicts.

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