5 Interesting “Fanons” in the Buffyverse Fanfic Community

I know I haven’t updated in over a month. School’s hard and stuff. After writing 10+ page lab reports a week on top of school and work, this site has not been my first priority. Bite me. That doesn’t mean I haven’t thought about posts I could make in the meantime. Here’s one of the shorter ones.

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I’ve been reading Buffy fanfiction for many years now, but incredibly periodically. One thing I do notice is that the fanfiction community has seemed to carve out its own reality in terms of the Buffyverse that mirrors but differs slightly from details in the show. These details may be small and insignificant, but what happens is its written into one story, which is read by many other ficcers, who unknowingly incorporate it into their fic and soon the entire community believes something happened in the show when it never really did. These are called “Fanon” (fan-canon). While reading this webpage that summarizes several canon vs. fanon, I thought the following common mistakes in fanfiction are worth note to all you fanficcers out there.

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5. “Blood tears. Jossverse vamps do not shed blood tears.”

Interesting because: In all of my fic adventures, I have never come across one fanfic that mentioned blood tears. This means to that there is a vast section of Buffy fic that I have not explored if this is a common enough occurrence to warrant “fanon” level. That, or the authors I read are at least smart enough to leave this obviously fabricated detail out of their story. We’ve seen vampires, especially Spike, cry multiple times, and nowhere in any of those episodes were there any blood tears. I’m sure if I had come across it in a story, I would have stopped reading the story immediately.

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4. “That vamps make a purring sound when having sex, when they are content, or when they are aroused.”

Interesting because: Ok, yes, I knew this one was made up by the authors, but I’ve come across it so often in fiction I just began to accept it as part of the alternate fic-verse. It’s funny that it became so common, though; I guess the thought that vampires sound like a cat when they’re banging is a real turn on for ficcers? I’d love to see someone trying to explain to their partners why they want them to purr the next time they have sex.

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3. “That Buffy’s first name is Elizabeth. It’s not; it’s Buffy.”

Interesting because: Wow. This is another one that is so simple and so accepted in the fic community, that I never thought it could possibly be wrong. I personally never said her name was Elizabeth, and I’ve never really liked any AU where her name is Elizabeth, but I had just gone along with the idea that her drivers license would have read Elizableth Anne Summers. Huh, I guess ficcers had an easier time accepting that this girl kicks vampire ass on a nightly basis than believing her name could really just be “Buffy.”

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2.”That Buffy smells like vanilla.”

Interesting because: It’s Hilarious!!! I literally laughed for a minute when I read this one. It’s amazing how such a tiny detail that is included in almost every fic I have ever read has never once been mentioned AT ALL on the show. It really makes me wonder what fiction was so widely read originally that this made-up tidbit permeated at least the entire Spuffy community, and who knows what else.

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1. “That Spike has ever called Xander or anyone else “whelp”"

Interesting because: Wooaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah. Seriously? I mean, in pretty much every fic…really? Spike never called him that? NEVER?! But, then why do I always know who he’s talking about when he says “the whelp?” This doesn’t make sense. My world is spinning. My mind is blown. This is by far the most interesting thing I’ve read about fanfiction in a long time.