| abstract | - The other reason you should use protection when reading Fanfic. Fanfic comes in many varieties, but many stories fall into the major categories of "more of the Same" (also called "Original Flavour"), which attempts to tell a new story using the setup and style of its source material, and "Mythos Building", which tries to cement the writer's personal theories into the pseudocanon of the source (and usually getting a Sue laid in the process). The latter tend to be more memorable, but at a price. Many of the fan theories which make their way into Fanfic seek to "fix" something the writer believes to be wrong with the source. The fans usually put a lot more thought into this than the show's writers ever did (though show writers have gotten a lot more attentive in recent years, primarily because of the growth of this kind of fan activity). They often come up with answers to questions that either make not a whit of difference in the end, or are more fun without an answer than with. Naturally, these theories often venture way out into fantasyland. When the theory makes you say, "Oh come on!", the fanfic author has stepped over the line into Fan Wank. When the show itself canonizes such a theory, it's a Retcon or a Revision or one of the two varieties of Continuity Porn. When a fan does, it's Fan Wank. Note, however, that Retcon is a value-neutral word, while fanwank definitely carries a connotation of crap. On the other hand, theories that get popular can become Fanon. The etymology of 'wank' shows that it means 'indulgence', particularly any kind of major self-indulgence. Not surprisingly, this leads to it being British slang for masturbation, though it's mostly just their own egos that such writers are stroking. Mostly. The term was coined by Doctor Who fan and Doctor Who Expanded Universe writer Craig Hinton, who was no stranger to it himself, and applied it to his own work. Particular common triggers for fanwank include:
* Linking stories to justify an unexplained Retool.
* What various bits of Techno Babble really mean
* What exactly happened after the Too Good to Last show ended (see Firefly and My So-Called Life).
* In Merchandise-Driven fandoms, singling out anything that never got a turn in the official fictions as something that needs to be featured.
* Characters who were left out of a new reboot or adaptation.
* Crossover versus arguments between two or more major sci-fi franchises. Good gravy, the fanwank.
* The romantic and sexual relationships between various characters, especially those for whom there is little to no evidence in the Canon, and the resolution of Love Triangles (or Love Dodecahedrons) in a way other than the canon provides. This often goes as far as rewriting canon relationships to make preferred pairings more plausible. eg. Two characters shown in love in series canon portrayed as hating each other in the story, or two confirmed heterosexual characters suddenly being gay for each other.
* Justifying Hollywood Tactics or anything done for Rule Of X as being appropriate in-universe. Compare with Epileptic Trees, Continuity Porn (the Canon variety of this), and of course, the TV Tropes Wild Mass Guessing. Shrug of God and (even more so) Sure Why Not will, at least in theory, validate Fan Wank theories. See also Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny, an entire trope driven by Fan Wank. Examples of Fan Wank include:
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