fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #6563 ]

[ SECRET POST #6563 ]

⌈ Secret Post #6563 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 24 secrets from Secret Submission Post #938.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

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07. https://i.imgur.com/GZaS5TQ.png

Worst Witch is better hands down.

JKR ruins everything, it is known.

If an author thinks their witches, monsters, necromancers, etc. have to spend at least a decade being forced to attend classes, replete with dull school melodrama, and we're supposed to be interested in following along ... I probably don't want to touch their setting with a ten foot pole. Or read their books.

Harry Potter seems no worse for me than the rest of a deeply mundane, uninteresting genre, and if people start asking themselves "what else could I write?" on account of suspecting that maybe the premise is played-out, that could be a really good thing.

Yeah, I read this secret thinking - Did I want this genre before HP? Would I want it now? Answered no to both questions.

Okay but just because you don't want it doesn't mean that no one does? School settings are very appealing to children and teenagers, hence the books written for children and teenagers are often set in schools, it's not rocket science. If you don't like it then perhaps consider that it's not *for* you?

That's a rather flimsy argument, considering the last thing I wanted to read about as a child, or a teenager, was school.

Then the genre's not for you, once again. But plenty of kids *do.* Heck, there's a reason high school AUs are super common in fanfic, and tend to be written by teenagers.

I'd assume there's an audience for the many books already in the genre. But it's shifty to deflect the conversation to teenagers writing free fanfic, when the only people worrying about using this setting "because JK Rowling did" are adult authors.

(no subject)

(Anonymous) - 2024-12-25 09:47 (UTC) - Expand

NAYRT - Agreed.

AYRT

What about my comment made you think I considered my preference universal?

Your comment certainly gave off the feeling that the genre as a whole is clearly inferior to whatever it is you like, so I was just pointing out that for plenty of people it is something interesting. I'm not even a huge fan of school settings myself, I just find the whole pretentious 'well *I* would never read something as *dull* as a magic school setting' attitude to be tiresome. Maybe I wouldn't like your favorite setting, it doesn't make whatever I like inherently superior to whatever you like.

(no subject)

(Anonymous) - 2024-12-25 01:55 (UTC) - Expand

Witches and wizards are fictional and extremely varied in interpretation to begin with, so speculating what would or would not have to be a part of their school experience is pretty silly. Even adventure stories with kids who aren't wizards and go to normal school aren't all logs of them going through the their day at school because yeah, that would be boring. The setting doesn't have to lock in what the story will be unless you're severely lacking in imagination.

If their "school experience" involves

-having to go (or not being able to get on with their lives unless they go)
-adults deciding what they should be thinking and doing with themselves
-other kids feeling disrespected and stressed and being dicks to them
-their school obligations following them out of the classroom in the form of homework
-most people being mediocre at whatever it is they're supposed to be getting good at
-being graded, tested, and treated like their worth as human beings can be measured

... no amount of other embellishments are going to make me want to read it. All my fantasies about supernatural creatures and humans with supernatural powers involve them learning to work with themselves and exploring the world without interference. They involve freedom and danger and self-knowledge and risk and making their way where no path was made for them.

You sound boring.

If insults are all you've got, your opinion of me means exactly nothing to me.

Scholomance is recent and pretty popular. It might be more of a deconstruction of the magic school genre, though.

I enjoy that the series can do this without taking a massive shit on HP. It doesn't seem to exist in that universe, and the whole concept is "what if we take this concept to the darkest fucking extreme". It has its charms.

Personally i feel like people who want to see non harry potter magic school stories should just write them and challenge the assumption!

And if enough of us do it we can break that assumption and break JKR's assumed hold on the magic school genre. Especially if you want to see queer friendly takes

Honestly i think its a great way to stick it to her in a way that's productive and positive

This. A friend of mine wrote her Harry Potter magic school with blackjack and hookers and made it set in our country's myth and places. Is not like JK Rowling will claim is plagiarism because there are tons of difference between UK and our country.

Ooh that sounds GREAT

What country if you feel comfy sharing? If not that's okay

I started my own (that I still need to write again) that has a hugely nuerodiverse cast and is set in North America (technically between the USA and Canada). But I have more ideas... to write eventually. TBH I have one involving an American in the UK with wildly different magic.

AYRT: One of LatAm, but we have our myths depending the region and all. Of course she didn't use the First Nations myth to avoid "cultural appropriation" back then (which now is ironic because someone released a comic about a First nation hero and not many gave a damn).

Oooh cool!

I'd love to see it.

Nevermoor is pretty good.

Luckily I love magic colleges so I'm safe /s

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