Every fandom has a canon.  Canon is most easily defined as "what happened in the source material."  The source material is whatever one is fannish about, the book, the movie, the television series, or for the RPF folks, the things recorded in some manner that happened in the person's life.  (For most of this essay, I'll be ignoring the RPF crowd for the sake of ease.  Try not to feel to left out.)  "Harry Potter" fans have two similar canons: the books and the movies.  "Lord of the Rings" fans have the same.  Fans of various television programs such as Supernatural have the episodes as broadcast.  Fans of other shows such as Farscape and Firefly have episodes as well as a movie that takes place after the show's timeline.  Fans of Doctor Who and Star Trek have all sorts of places that incorporate pieces of canon.  Fans of Buffy, Angel and Gargoyles have canonical comic continuations.  Fans of comics have my sympathies.

Canon is what happened.  Sometimes that's hard to determine.  In the case of changed media from a series to a movie or a comic, some fans will assume that canon continues and others will say it ended with the show.  Both sets of fans are right.  In some series, canon says one thing and then goes back and retcons (lit. "retroactive continuity) new canon overtop the old.  For example, in the Star Trek: The Next Generation timeline, the Federation was canonically finishing up a bloody war with the Cardassians at the same time first season was running.  Except they didn't decide that until season five.  Both sets of canon are true; trying to fit them together is possible, though nosebleed-inducing.  As for retconning films, there's a reason why the cry of the Wild Fanboy has been "Han Shot First!" for ten years now.

Some series air abroad before they air in the States and lose scenes due to time constraints.  A good rule to follow is to include the cut scenes as canon.  Whether the same should be true for films is up to individual fans.  With the advent of DVDs, cut scenes are much easier to include, and "Director's Cut" is nearly a standard release format of anything successful enough to warrant a re-release.

This leads us to "personal canon."  Personal canon is "What happened, as far as I'm concerned."  Back in the day, I knew a lot of Buffy fans who thought the show jumped the shark after season two.  I know more who thought it jumped after the end of season five.  I know a lot of people who are saying right now that they're ignoring all "Harry Potter" books after The Order of the Phoenix.  This happens a lot.  Shows change hands and casts, quality diminishes (according to some), and whether or not fans continue to watch, they choose not to acknowledge what happens in canon.  Season three of Beauty and the Beast?  Season Three of Gargoyles?  "Didn't really happen." (In the case of the latter, the comic is serving as alternate canon continuity.)

Most fans have some kind of personal canon.  Personal canon also includes things that didn't happen on the screen, but one feels they happened off-screen.  Personal canon tends to incorporate 'shipping desires, backstories, aftermaths, and anything else that might be found in fanfiction.  If something didn't happen in canon, but you believe in your heart of hearts that it did happen, that is your personal canon.

Fanon is any personal canon held in common by two or more people.  Lt. Commander Uhura has no first name in canon.  One of her early fanon names was Penda.  The most common fanon first name for her today is Nyota but since her name has never appeared in a canonical source, it remains fanon.  Captain Sulu's first name Hikaru was fanon until George Takei asked to incorporate it into a film.

When one's group of fellow 'shippers look at two characters together and think that after the scene ended, the two of them began screwing like bunnies, that's fanon.  When a character is not given a name in canon and more than one fan begins using a made-up name for the character, that's fanon.  When fanfic writers share a universe, that's fanon too.  Fanon is fun.

Author intent is the personal canon of the person (or people) who wrote the source.  When J.K. Rowling said that Harry and Ron became Aurors as adults, that is author intent.

Author intent is not canon.

Let me repeat, because it's going to be important: author intent is not canon.

Most authors know what happens next to their characters, who they marry, how many kids they have, that the grandkids are called Vera, Chuck and Dave.  Their favorite breakfast cereal.  How they're going to die.  Some authors end up giving out all this information, either via writing it in the text or including it as an appendix in the back ala J.R.R. Tolkien.  Some writers can't, because the medium (TV, film) won't allow it, but that doesn't stop them from knowing what they want to do.  In this day and age, message boards allow them to share with fans what they intended to do, had they time.  It's lovely and helpful for fans who want to know more.  It is not, however, canon.

The same thing can be said for authorial interpretation of the source material.  Canon is what is in the source material.  Reader/viewer interpretation is up to the individual, although the author may have intended something else entirely.  For example, Ray Bradbury recently claimed that Fahrenheit 451 was not about censorship, but instead warned against the perils of too much television.  In an episode of Torchwood, a character utilizes the alien equivalent of Rohypnol in order to get lucky.  Showrunner Russell T. Davies was called on the carpet for this by some female fans, who said these actiosn made the character a rapist; Davies said it was "just a joke" and did not.  Authors don't always intend to show what appears in the text, but the text is the canon.

Authorial intent tends to lead to fanon.  After someone high-up involved with a series says "X is true," many if not most fans will follow in that direction.  The problem comes in when authors change their minds, or projects change hands.  In Batman Beyond, Terry McGinnis was Bruce Wayne's clone, as engineered by Catwoman.  At least, that was the original idea.  Creator Bruce Timm was going to use that storyline for a project codenamed "Catwoman Pitch Black."  As fans of Justice League Unlimited know, what actually aired was a story where Terry was revealed to be Bruce's biological son via some SF technology handwaving.  Authors change their minds.  J.K. Rowling said in a chat at The Leaky Cauldron that Luna "ended up marrying (rather later than Harry & co) a fellow naturalist and grandson of the great Newt Scamander (Rolf)!"  However, in an interview with Today, she said she was "feeling a pull" between Luna and Neville.  Authors change their minds, or events happen that change things for them.  Until it's written, until it's broadcast, until it out there somehow, it didn't happen, at least not in canon.

Canon is hard.  Sometimes it contradicts itself.  Sometimes it makes no sense.  Sometimes it upsets what the fans thought was true for years.  Sometimes we ignore it, for those reasons and more, to see what we can find on our own inside the world we've discovered.  Many times canon says things that the author never intended, and many times, we sit with our books or in the theatres or in front of our TVs and we swear at what's presented.  But there's always something in it that draws us back again.

For generations, characters in comics were so bland – virtually everyone were white anglo-saxons with identical body builds.  Through the years, comics have thankfully adapted (albeit a good bit behind other means of media) and integrated diversity in their titles (e.g. Kyle Rayner’s Green Lantern, the new Blue Beetle, Jubilee, Skin, Storm, Black Panther, Luke Cage).  But it isn’t just diversity for the sake of diversity.  Having a myriad of characters with different social and ethnic backgrounds makes the stories themselves so much more accessible.  But it is so much more than just making sure every story has a character or two that any given person can relate too.  Comics are always trying to resemble the real world more and more, and this is one way to help bring a sense of reality into fantasy stories; making them more interesting.  Today in America, how many of us hang out with only people of one specific ethnicity and background?  Chances are, not many.  And why would we?  That’d be boring.  The beauty of our society today is the manner in which different cultures intermix and how we learn from each other and are affected by others.  We see this on college campuses and especially in the country’s focal points of pop culture (Los Angeles, Miami, and New York City).  Comic creators have taken note of this lately, particularly at DC, and begun integrating perhaps the last social factor to be included – the gay community.

Last year, the media was in an uproar over DC Comics’ announcement about one of its newest characters, Batwoman.  (See Newsweek and Fox News 5/31/06, CNN 6/2/06) The fact that she was going to be drawn as a typical voluptuous heroin and be a lesbian seemed to boggle the minds of critics.  They criticized DC for somehow trying to market a new kind of sex appeal, as if the company was trying to appeal to the typical jock fantasy of girl-on-girl sex or something.  Fans on message boards even criticized DC for somehow advocating “gay lifestyles” and pointing to it as a sign of “the steady decline of society”.

However, DC presented the new character in a very tasteful manner and subsequent use of the character has proved to be an appropriate defense for the media attacks.  So far, she’s been intentionally kept under the radar (as part of the rules of characters appearing in the 52 series) and worked well in her supporting role in the DC Universe.  DC in general has been very tasteful in the manner that they have employed their other leading lesbian ladies, Renee Montoya, Knockout, and Scandal Savage.  There isn’t some marquee flashing “GAY!!!” in the background of stories or gratuitous “gay” covers (i.e. some sort of girl love scene) trying to sell a few extra issues.  Rather, unless you actually followed that character through their title, you would probably be oblivious to the fact that a character was in fact gay, with the exception of sporadic jokes or lines in the dialogue.  The added dynamic it gives these characters is really interesting, and I think readers following these characters are enthralled as they interact with the rest of the DCU.  In 52, the exchange between Nightwing and Batwoman as he subtly hits on her is absolutely hilarious as she blows him off.  It’s a very simple but cleverly written scene.  I have lost track of the times I’ve had a female friend make similar passes at me and much to their chagrin I have to inform them that I bat for the “home team”. 

The series 52 touted that it would focus on a few tier-2 heroes and ignore heavy hitters like Superman or Batman.  One of the series’ main characters, Renee Montoya, a Gotham City detective that had been around a long time but had never seemed to be of much interest was an odd choice for one of the main characters.  Now I can say that her storyline in the series is one of my favorites.  She’d lost her job and family because of her coming out and subsequently fell into alcoholism and developed a charming sort of dark whit; giving the character an edge she’s never had before.  This is what really made the character, the bi-products of her sexuality, not just the fact that she’s a lesbian.  And while she and the Question are involved in their plot, you have intertwining points with Montoya interacting with her ex, Kathy Kane, who is also Batwoman.  The complexities of all this are impossible to describe in just one article, but trust me when I say that it makes for some of the best human drama I’ve read in comics in a long time.

Another great example is Knockout and Scandal Savage in Secret Six.  Here, you have two characters in a loving relationship, having the same emotions as a straight couple would as they try to survive their danger-prone lives as superheroes.  You think being gay in America today is tough sometimes?  Try sharing a team with uber-macho assassins or having villain Vandal Savage for a father.  The stresses they endure are logical and deepen their characters, saving them from the monotony of type-cast females in a male-dominated team (the a-typical damsel in distress sort of heroine). 

There has been some precedent for this.  Wildstorm’s The Authority featured a gay couple, and Marvel’s limited series Rawhide Kid featured a gay lead as well (although it was more of a satire and didn’t receive much attention since it was through Marvel’s adult line “MAX” and The Authority isn’t one of the major titles).   All of these have been situations that DC has developed in its titles over the last year or so.  To my knowledge there has yet to be such an undertaking at Marvel, aside from a couple minor characters that have since been forgotten.  I would like to congratulate DC for taking a bold step and introducing these dynamics to mainstream titles and encourage Marvel to perhaps be just as bold, if not bolder.  By no means is it over though.  I would like to see some gay male characters introduced as well (how cool would that be to have him/them fighting alongside Batman and Superman!).  Ok, so Obsidian is already “outted”, but he’s like fallen of the face of the planet.  Give me someone like Roy (Red Arrow), Green Arrow’s former sidekick and current member of the Justice League!  He’d be a cute one.

I hope DC realizes what it is doing and continue with this.  I can only imagine what my adolescence would have been like if I was able to read comics with gay main characters.  Even beyond the good it will do for gay teens is how it could potentially take straight teens and expose them to ideas and other people and help promote a level of tolerance and understanding that is hard to find in pop culture.  Maybe if little Johnny sees how Superman respects and fights alongside characters like Batwoman, then little Johnny will be more likely to show that same respect to his gay peers.  In a world that has criticized comics for the influence it has on teens, this would be a positive side-effect.

But I am most definitely not asking for some special “social awareness” issue of Superman.  I’ve never been a fan of something like Brokeback Mountain that is all about their homosexuality.  I think it loses its effectiveness then.  Rather, I’d like to see it handled more like how other Hollywood productions have.  Think Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang, where Val Kilmer is a riot as “Gay Perry”.  Think Little Miss Sunshine, with Steve Carrell’s character’s homosexuality kind of leading him into the situation where he has to be with the family at all times.  Or Robert Downey Jr.’s quirky character in Wonder Boys.  You don’t have to focus the story on someone’s homosexuality for it to be effective or even entertaining.  Comics have always used Hollywood to model how it evolves story-telling, here’s another example of how comics could grow.  And I think that’s the message that DC has gotten.  There is of course room to expand. It’s a good start and I look forward to what DC does with all this in the future. 

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Really.

But this isn't about what kinds of details should be considered "spoilers," or whether spoilers are good or bad. This is about what effect spoilers have on the viewer. How does knowing what's going to happen in advance change how we respond to a story?

A large part of storytelling is suspense, the not knowing what's going to happen next. But it's ridiculously easy right now to know a whole lot about what's going to happen next. Just for starters, there are websites such as http://www.spoilerfix.com (hey, don't blame me if you click through!), with tidbits on upcoming arcs on a number of TV series. Movie trailers seem to give away some of the best one-liners and major plot points, in addition to showing off many of a film's big money-shot visuals. For comic books, there are previews, scans of the cover or select pages. The final installment in a certain popular series of books which shall not be named has rumors flying from end of the internet to the other.

Being in the know about what's going to happen next is widespread, although it seems there are equal numbers who manage to avoid any advance details. Judging by how people react to finally seeing or reading that installment, however, the enjoyment is no less for those who knew the big twist. The only difference is personal preference. For some, knowing the twist ahead of time doesn't do anything to diminish the adrenaline rush of surprise. For others, knowing in advance creates problems.

Knowing what's going to happen increases the enjoyment for some people, as much as being completely shocked does for others. If a plot twist is unpleasant, or involves a character acting in a way fans won't be happy about, being spoiled ahead of time can help soften the blow and maybe those who knew won't be as unhappy as those who were unprepared. Knowing in advance, while it creates more room for anticipation, can also create more room for worry. The viewer makes decisions about the story before actually seeing it play out.

Being spoiled brings with it the slow build-up of anticipation, having time to relish and think about an upcoming moment, imagine how it might go. While it seems as if being completely unprepared would be most likely lead to the jolt of surprise, that jolt can happen even if the viewer does know what's going to happen. Why else would we buy our favorite series on DVD to rewatch them? Why do we still jump at the scariest parts of a favorite horror movie? It's like the brain goes into story mode and we forget that we've seen it before or knew what was coming, caught up in the emotion and suspense of that moment.

Maybe it's like mental muscle-memory, an echo of the emotion we felt the first time we learned the big reveal. If so, that doesn't explain how those who are spoiled, or who have already watched, still momentarily worry for the characters' fates, even if they know the heroes will be just fine in the end. A root of story lies in suspense, in not knowing what's going to happen next. Yet stories continue to thrive in this age of spoilers and inside information.

Color scheme

Maybe bright neon colors on black backgrounds were cool 10 years ago, but the industry has moved on.  I can’t remember the last time I picked up some glow-in-the-dark cover.  Making it as eye-catching as possible is cool.  Think Apple iTunes… Nintendo Wii… nice sleek design, white/light metallic, kinda Start Trek-ish look, with simple font.  Less is more.  All those black backgrounds and yellow text in articles just makes readers go blind.  Uniform looks are in.  You don’t have to create a new comic-strip like border for every article in it.  This is the biggest distraction as far as the magazine goes.  Terribly outdated.

Dude, where’s my comic?

One of the cool features of Wizard has been the comics price guide it comes equipped with so fans can watch how their stockpile has risen and fallen.  But in efforts to conserve space and include more titles, Wizard limited the price guide to special issues.  It’s pretty much hit or miss whether or not the issue you wanna look up is included.  When only half of your issues are included, the price guide pretty much looses all of its functionality.

Also, the magazine used to be complete with cool reviews of comics, interesting history pieces and funny parodies of various comic characters and issues.  Now it's just one big preview magazine.  All it consists of updates of projects over and over again.  After the first preview of Marvel’s Civil War a year ago, and every subsequent update since then has reiterated what was said originally.  Bring back original and creative articles.  Bring back the historical pieces that taught me the history of this medium.  Show some diversity.

Keep it simple, stupid

Quit trying to encompass every means of communication in your magazine.  When I pick up your magazine, it's because I want to know what Marvel and DC is doing, not an update about the new Lost season.  Quit loading down the magazine with projects that have so little to do with comics.  I don’t care about Brad Meltzer’s new legal thriller.  Make mention of it, but you don’t have to do a complete article about it just because he writes comics.  You’re reporting about a medium that’s been around for over 70 years, surely there is something you haven’t covered yet.  I don’t care about a review of Aqua Teen Hunger Force.  This is a comics magazine.  Over the last year or so, Wizard has been trying to become some all-encompassing pop culture authority.  There are many other magazines that have a head start on you.  Stick to what you know, give the people what they want.  And even trim down your Indie section.  You have your Wizard: Edge for that.  Last issue had a whole huge section I had to flip past to get to the next article.  Chances are, readers of Wizard are going to be more interested in mainstream Marvel and DC, not some remote Indie title.  Leave that for Edge.

Would you like some impartiality with that bias?

Ok, so I’m all for helping the medium along and getting it as much media exposure as possible, but do you think you could seem somewhat less propaganda-like?  It seems no matter what is coming out; it’s always touted as the biggest thing to come along since sliced bread.  Whenever a preview article about a new company event comes out and has the line “it’ll change everything”, I taste a little vomit in the back of my mouth.  Yes comics are the best they’ve been in years.  But not everything is a winner.  Some of it just flat out sucks.  And its ok to admit it.  In fact, it makes the magazine seem more honest and reliable for it.  Beyond that, think you could be a little more critical of Marvel?  All through Infinite Crisis, you busted DC’s balls about some aspects of the project.  But with as much as fans balked at how terrible Marvel’s Civil War was, all we got was month-by-month updates on the project glorifying the cop-out event. 

In short, Wizard has spiraled down into an outdated, out-of-style, monotonous preview of magazine that is just flat out boring.  If its editors are smart, it’ll revamp itself soon or it’ll quickly go the way of the dingo.

Batman Begins

This is a clear example of a franchise that deserved a complete revival.  After Joel Schumacher completely ruined the Batman franchise with in his installments, it would take a new start to undo the damage done.  And this wasn’t even a simple remake of the 1989 hit.  Director Christopher Nolan went into the full origin of Batman, something that had only been hinted at previously, and really developed how a man could get to the point of running around in a costume at night.  While the film tried to stay relatively realistic, it did still maintain the dark and mysterious feel that made the Tim Burton installments hits. 

Exorcist: The Beginning

Horror movies picked up on prequels a couple years ago.  Most are total bust and pointless, but this one wasn’t.  After growing up with CGI, the original Exorcist wasn’t that impressive to me.  As a rule, I’m not much for horror movies in general.  But even for those that don’t get scared easily, this provides an interesting story of spiritual warfare and the like.  It resurrected Father Merrin’s character in a reasonable manner (i.e. decades before the original).  Plus the director knew what it had on its hands and delayed the inevitable, constantly putting off the obvious appearance of a spirit or the Devil, playing on the audience’s knowledge of the explanation for what is going on. 

Casino Royale

Perhaps the perfect prequel.  Again, you have another series plagued by various director’s visions diluting the original idea.  Corny dialogue, hokey villains, and idiotic gadgets were about all that was left of the James Bond series.  Many were skeptical of Daniel Craig’s abilities for the main role.  But his cold piercing stare and extreme dry sense of humor was exactly what was needed.  Striping away all the excess, the filmmakers managed to resurrect everything that made the series popular when Sean Connery was 007.  Also, the film added a new level of depth to the once two-dimensional character of Bond that had never been seen before.  It still stayed true to its history with music, quips, and feel.  The film didn’t set to completely undo everything about Bond (much as Batman Begins did), but worked well as an origin story that had never even been hinted at before as well as give the series a fresh, modern look for a new generation.

Dumb and Dumberer

Ok, so this is a clear case of desperation.  Apparently the filmmakers wanted to make a sequel of some sort but couldn’t get Jim Carrey for the role.  Casting anyone else in Carrey’s role would be complete disaster.  So where do you go? To the beginning.  Fairly simple.  The actors did a fairly good job of mimicking Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels, but the original magic was lost.

Hannibal Rising

Another blatant attempt at squeezing out any money possible.  After the original trilogy, it would seem as if either they couldn’t get Anthony Hopkins to reprise his famous role or they decided just continuing the story forward would be monotonous.  Hannibal Lector is an interesting character, so maybe they felt investigating his origins would be worthwhile.  Except they got him wrong.  The movie instead made him out into a tragic hero and glorified him as a hero.  Hopkins’ Hannibal is a villain.  A wickedly cool one, but a villain nonetheless.  This movie completely undid the previous held notions of what Hannibal was – a vastly intelligent person who killed for pleasure.  They even go the acting wrong.  This younger version of Hannibal had a thick East European accent very different from the playful British accent sported by Hopkins.  All in all, this is perhaps the worst attempt at a prequel.