Recently Newsarama did an article about how comic book fans will get mad when companies don't write characters the way they want them to, basically because in a way fans have a "sense of ownership" towards these characters. And it got me thinking this happens alot in modern media in general, ecspecially in anime & manga.
So what do u think, do you think modern comic & animation fans take their perceptions of charcters to seriously, are too many modern fans opposed to drastic changes, or is it just another case of the internet making fanbases seem more whiny then they actually are.
Personally I think it depends on the fanbase, some sadly are as bad as they sound, others thankfully only suffer from having a small group of loud overly negative & noisy fans making people think their all bad.
But I will agree modern fans let their perceptions of how they think a charcter should act or how a series should go damper their enjoyment. I would agree to many modern toon/anime & comic/manga fans are far to easily angred by shake ups, what do you think?
anywho heres the article, its a pretty fun read if anyone's itnerested.
http://www.newsarama.com/comics/inside-comic-fans-ownership-111102.html
Personally, I feel like a character's behavior and personality are an integral part of a character's identity. I know that characters can vary from author to author, but they almost always retained their core identity. If you write Superman as a murderous vigilante who melts the bad guys' faces off with heat vision, is it really Superman anymore?
Honestly, after seeing all the so-called comic book movies over the years I can totally understand how the fans feel. And did you see what they did to Starfire?!
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I agree; for example the first Spiderman movie was the only one that lived up to the original version. In the second film Doc Oc was apparently "controlled" by his mechanical arms, and ended up being a hero in the end. WTF?
And while I don't agree that fans own these characters, I can say that as the consumers of what they initially bought, they have every right to criticize anything that was significantly changed.
This is how i see it, if a character has a certain theme to hi like for instants batman. he is a guy that doesn't kill his villains and he is always in black aka the Cap crusader the dark knight they call him, sometimes is called detective which he originally was pretty much when he was made. Then out of no where some writers, not even the original writer at that decides on day. "what the hell lets make batman wear read and purple and he kills his villains and drives a dun buggy with Vulcan cannons on it from now on. I'm sure every batman fan would be pissed the hell off.
They might not take it to that extreme, but changing a character is changing a character. It doesn't matter, yes we might not like it, but it's opinion that it rely's on. Look's are not really a issue to me (Unless you change their whole outfit like color and everything then theres a problem) i doesn't change the character, but changing their demeanor or changing that characters attitude just out of the blue, that not okay. Do they have a reason, probably, is it okay to change the character just like that without no cause for him to do so. No, Keep the fan's happy that's how you make your money so don't piss off your money bags because they just might just stop producing money for you. All in all this is my opinion peoples are different so hey nothing i or the fan can do because the people behind them is going to do whatever they feel like doing unless they feel like their not making money anymore then they will go back.
They need to make the mistake of messing up. I hope they don't keep doing it though because it pisses a lot of people off even though they might not do what the others do.
Hey frodo don't think you can get away that easy with that damn ring.
Personally I think that the characters belong more to the creator, artist or writer that originally thought of them then they do the fans. I mean its not the fans that make them they just buy the merchandise so if a creator wants to partially change up their character a bit then thats their right to do so becasue it was their idea.I mean its almost a given that a character has to change a little as the story goes on if they dont then things get kinda borig in the story, for me at least. But they also have to be aware that too many changes or too drastic a change will have a negative effect with the fans that liked the character as they started out in the begining. Then if that happens theres no income and then the whole thing goes down the drain. But I do think that some of the fanbase has an overglorified sense of ownership, just becasue you buy something doesnt mean that you can call every single shot and do things the exact way you would want them done. I see it sometimes when I shop in the bookstore and theres at least one person who starts a series then goes onto complain that some character changed too muich and they should be cut form the series, just becasue they dont like that character anymore it often has nothing to do with the story.
Theres a fine line between insanity and visionary unfortunatley you have to be a visionary to see it.
Fantasy is not a crime, go find your Castle in the Sky.