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One argument that comes up over and over when talking about original characters in fanfiction is that people want to read about the series characters, not original characters set in the universe.
But that isn't true.
Maybe you (generic) want to read about the characters in the series in new stories, but not everyone does. And the amount of love/positive feedback that a lot of OC fic gets (espeically over at fanfiction.net) shows that. There is an audience for fics set in a universe that tell the stories of other characters.
For example:
I wrote a fic in the Firefly verse about other people who were taken and experimented on, like River. I used the crew to bounce into that story (and, yes, it was a romance fic with a canon character) but I liked exploring what would happen if you get a bunch of kids like River together in one place. And, despite someone declaring that "no one wanted to read about other kids being experimented on", guess what? I had a whole bunch of readers. It's not my best fic (not by a loooong shot) but there is an audience.
We all have our own preferences when reading fic. So, disregarding that many times "Mary Sue" fics are poorly written, why is the idea that there's an audience for fics set in a universe where other characters are explored so often dismissed out of hand?
But that isn't true.
Maybe you (generic) want to read about the characters in the series in new stories, but not everyone does. And the amount of love/positive feedback that a lot of OC fic gets (espeically over at fanfiction.net) shows that. There is an audience for fics set in a universe that tell the stories of other characters.
For example:
I wrote a fic in the Firefly verse about other people who were taken and experimented on, like River. I used the crew to bounce into that story (and, yes, it was a romance fic with a canon character) but I liked exploring what would happen if you get a bunch of kids like River together in one place. And, despite someone declaring that "no one wanted to read about other kids being experimented on", guess what? I had a whole bunch of readers. It's not my best fic (not by a loooong shot) but there is an audience.
We all have our own preferences when reading fic. So, disregarding that many times "Mary Sue" fics are poorly written, why is the idea that there's an audience for fics set in a universe where other characters are explored so often dismissed out of hand?
