"Knockoffs" in the Fantasy genre?

[@soren3569]

Neil Gaiman wrote "The Books of Magic", a series that featured a young, bespectacled British boy from an unhappy home life who is destined to become the most powerful sorcerer on Earth. He was later asked about JKR's Harry Potter, and if he thought she was writing a knockoff of his series. He responded something along the lines of, "To be honest, I thought we were both cribbing from Sword in the Stone". Neil's a class act.

[@tsifirakiehl4250]

You know what I hate? I hate when people accuse one story of copying another story that was actually written much later than it. I have seen a series that began in the 1990s get accused by multiple people of being a ripoff of a story that came out in the 2010s. Not only do these people not know the tropes, they apparently think the authors are freaking time travelers, because that’s the only way someone writing in the 90s could rip off something that wouldn’t be written for another 20 years.

[@Elisabeth_Wheatley]

The struggle is real 🥲

[@atlantic85]

I once had to hold back rage after someone called Earthsea a knockoff of Harry Potter

[@gogreen2496]

@@atlantic85 If you enjoy video essays at all, VerilyBitchie has a great one on how Earthsea influenced HP and began the whole "wizard school" trend. As pallet cleanser for that wild comment.

[@atlantic85]

@@gogreen2496 thanks, I’ll have to check that out!

[@BldElfPrince]

As a teenager I was really into this Chinese book series called 1/2 Prince (hence 13-year-old me's username). Everytime I'd explain it, people would say it's a ripoff of Sword Art Online; which they'd claim was super original. 1/2 Prince came out long before the other, and the trope itself was very common in Asia. However, because only one of the two hit the US for general audiences, it was considered the only one. Worse yet, people would show the dates for both series' comics as if it was evidence, but 1/2 Prince was a book series first! Drove me absolutely crazy!

[@callnight1441]

Basically any fantasy gets called "a knock-off of LOTR", especially by die-hard LOTR-fans. Its infuriating.

[@miss1of2]

But then again.... Tolkien was inspired by Norse mythology and Anglo-Saxon folktales... So... (But he did established many tropes and invented orcs and hobbits)

[@treeaboo]

@@miss1of2 He didn't entirely invent orcs either to be honest, but he did crystallise them into the predominantly used form since.

[@rebbeccahoneycutt7941]

As a die hard Tolkien fan myself I personally take umbridge. However, many many of my peer die-hards have actually said this to me.... So yeah I hear you.

[@Mokiefraggle]

@@rebbeccahoneycutt7941 While I definitely agree with you (holy cow, Tolkien fans can be pedantic and quick to act like he invented the entire fantasy genre...having those sorts of fans as peers can be exhausting), I have to say that your typo amuses me. I know you meant "umbrage", but it also brought to mind Dolores Umbridge from Harry Potter, to which I thought "Why would _anyone_ want to take her?" 🤣

[@rebbeccahoneycutt7941]

@@Mokiefraggle I didn't even notice! But sometimes my Potter Flag betrays me too! Now I can't fix it either this is too good!!

[@evanknight2475]

This is present in any media and it's so annoying. There are direct rip offs, but 99% of the time "rip offs" are just using the same tropes

[@tuvelat7302]

When you boil it down, all the stories have been written. The differences are in the details and voice of the writer.

[@JV-kn3yz]

I work with music, and that's exactly what we say about music. I'm very much at peace with that now, but hearing that it's like that with writing too makes me kind of sad... don't know if it should

[@christiangreff5764]

@@JV-kn3yz I'd argue it should inspire the opposite: joy. How sad would it be if each story were an island instead of part of an interwoven tapestry of influences, where authors take, tweak and adapt, inspired by those telling stories before and in turn inspiring those comming after?

[@Kimberly-u4k]

This. 100%!

[@cmm5542]

Exactly. My university literature professor told us on the first day of class: 'All authors are plagarists.' Works for me 😆

[@shadowwolfcat13]

I know it may sound silly, but to me, this is a very very serious issue. The thought that my work could get accussed of copy something I haven't even read lead me down a dark spiral of thought that ultimately stopped my pursuit of writing as a hobby. Years have passed and I feel better, but it will still take me time to sit down and write something without wondering if this has already been made somewhere.

[@BldElfPrince]

This! I've been struggling with it a lot lately. I love Harry Potter, but I just know anything I write remotely similar will be compared; even though I love that area of the genre, and have read many amazing books about kids with magical powers in school. I've even seen a book about teenaged elves with superpowers be compared simply because they are in a school. It defintely makes writing harder. Luckily, I come from a family of writers, so advice is easier to get. Best advice I've been given is to focus on writing like you and making what you want, and let everyone else worry about themselves. ^^ It's still hard, but it does make it a bit better!

[@shadowwolfcat13]

@@BldElfPrince Thank you for sharing your experience and advice! It's been and will continue to be a struggle, but knowing that others have gone and continue to go through the same experience lightens the burden a little bit.

[@DisplacedUnderDog]

​@@BldElfPrinceMy dude! Yes!! This! 100% struggle is real and yet, from the writers in my family, similar advice! ❤❤

[@christajennings3828]

I once wrote a tune, that I was super happy with. A few months later, I heard nearly the same tune. I honestly don't know if I had heard the other person's tune before I wrote mine, or not, so I never played it again.

[@blakey1014]

@@BldElfPrince Just curious are you referring to KOTLC? And that advice seems sound, it would do a lot of people good to see that

[@trollnystan]

I know someone who, as a teenager at least, didn't like certain books, films, or shows because they'd "seen those tropes before and it's so unoriginal", and the books/films/shows in question would've come out long before the ones they said they liked better. I just can't wrap my head around that argument. Besides, using tropes isn't inherently bad, it's HOW you use them.

[@tobybartels8426]

This is a meme: Guy reading X who's only read Y: Getting a lot of Y vibes from this.

[@o0BlackSand0o]

'If you believe anything is a knock off of throne of glass' the underlying shade is something I'm here for

[@kerwinbrown4180]

The 5 man band started with Scooby-Doo😁😁

[@JKL_YT]

i have heard this thing (paraphrasing) that "Every idea have been already thought out by everyone ever!" But i have add this - ...all what we can do if we want to tell a story - take those ideas that existed...and put different sauce on it...that you've made. I may have exaggerated, but that is how i see it...

[@KaunAngelfire]

I've heard it phrased as "There is no idea that is new under the sun." ☺

[@danielyeshe]

100 books a year is very impressive. I haven't managed 20!

[@katdriscoll3313]

If I refer to a book as a knockoff, I usually think of it as a “check-off” book. The writer (or AI?) looks at what is selling and then writes a book. It has no heart, but it has swords, dragons, elves; ✔️✔️✔️.

[@DisplacedUnderDog]

Ecclesiastes comes to mind in regards to this with the whole: "History merely repeats itself. It has all been done before. Sometimes people say, "Here is a new thing!" But actually it is old; nothing is ever truly new. We dont remember what happened in the past, and in future generations, no will remember what we sre doing now." So.... I mean... Like.... Yeah, sure fam. Just a rip off of a rip off of a rip off. Or is it? Or could it possibly be that the whole "sterotypes" and "tropes" exist for a reason and aren't exactly... Ya know, new, because: humans be humans be humans, ya know? Graffiti has been a thing since at LEAST the Ancient Romans, and yet, just ask someone 70+ years old and they'll tell you, "Back in my day, ypu wouldnt see such things! Hoodlums **followed by grumblings about young punks these days and how things are just terrible**" and YET, archeologists have found evidence that suggests that graffiti has been aroind since antiquity. And some of it was crude and vulgar stuff like dicks. Evidence of, "humans be humans and some things are just ever present and REALLY havent changed that much." I mean, just saying. I also 100% agree that these folks are either new to the genre and havent read enough. Or just got serious about reading where i mean, they started reading because they finally found something that mskes them enjoy reading for the sake of reading.... Even if they've read other genres... It is a thing. Not just in the fantasy genre, just, it feels as though fantasy gets ragged on more. Because... Homer Simpson yelling "NERD!" comes to mind for some. Odd. Reason. Can't seem to puzzle out why, though.... **flashbacks of late 1990's and early 2000's pop culture takes in movies, music (both audio AND visual aka: music videos), animation, tv shows on LARPing, Ren Faire folk, SCAers, cosplay, gamers, DnD or ANY TABLETOP strategy game like Warhammer 40K, "fantasy/sci-fi folk"... And how that pop culture opinion/depiction had real life impacts on what "average, everyday normal" folk's opinions of that "nerd" community was like and the individuals within/participated in those groups/community were like... INSTANTLY come to mind because: humans be humaning yo** yeah. Hard one to piece together as to why that Simpson reference comes SCREAMING to mind. Huh. One of many of life's great mysteries. Oh well. **Shrugs** agreed with what she was conveying in this video, honestly is the main point. 😊

[@timpeterjensen2364]

As someone who has read those 100 fantasy books, theres only one i ever felt was a bit of a “knockoff” and that was Eregon, but i also think that for such a young author he did quite well and in some parts even improved on some of those stories, and that to me is when it moves out of “knockoff” and becomes its own thing.

[@ML-cc7gj]

Shannara?! That series was way way too similar to LotR. ;) Also, for me (and I know a lot of people are against this view and/or take it further back to Lord of the Flies) it’s the Battle Royale- - - Hunger Games thing.

[@timpeterjensen2364]

@@ML-cc7gj well shannara did come out in a time period where every publisher said “be more like Tolkien or we wont publish” so i dont consider books from that period knock offs, i more consider them forced conformity. I loved Lord of the Flies, one of my favorites as a kid. But that book also followed a line of books like Robinson Crusoe, Treasure Island and Jules Verne’s Two Years' Vacation, which all inspired later works.

[@ArthurRex131]

I've heard comments from people who call the LOTR books the film's "Novelization." The Tolkien nerd in me always stirs at that.

[@AzraelThanatos]

To make things worse, there is also a "novelization" of them that was done as a kids version based on the movies. They did the same to the first two Jurassic Park movies where they had "junior novelizations" that are just the movie in book form, though The Lost World also included some deleted scenes in it

[@bellaionaire]

Jimmazing is my Fantasy. He's definitely my Husband, he just hasn't realized that yet. 😅. But really, good explanation. ❤

[@lordkalistos4124]

But Let's be real, everything fantasy is a knockoff of Lord of the Rings!! Lol I'm just kidding.

[@AB-zr8pu]

Similar themes, similar characters, similar tropes, similar settings - but all tales spun in fantastically unique patterns.

[@sophiawalker7463]

Funny story, Helen Keller was accused of stealing a story from an author she had never read and it actually ruined a friendship with the college professor that she wrote the story for… as a birthday present. It broke her heart because people thought she would do something so dishonest.

[@GregoryLynn]

I’m trying to imagine reading 100 WoT length books in a year and I just can’t.

[@d4r4butler74]

It is easy when one ignores absolutely every other aspect of life... In high school and just after I had a lot of commute time to work, school and home and I read all the time. Having Children finally curtailed my reading, and now that they are older I am finding a whole new crop of Authors to read. I read far more than 100 books a year (much closer to 350) but I did not cook, clean or do homework. There was no balance. I hope to have a tiny bit of balance eventually. I remember I found Eye of the World and The Great Hunt and hit the store 2 days later and actually paid for the trade paperback of The Dragon Reborn because I needed to continue the story... Looking at what I was making at the time... I spent 4 hours of work to buy the book.

[@danielfinley509]

Ok we're talking tropes because knockoffs do happen but not like that. The real rip offs are always like that one coming of age tragedy stealing it's name from an Island off the coast of Narnia.

[@gogreen2496]

?? how is taking a name from another piece of media ripping it off? I'm not familiar with this situation.

[@RandomPerson1313]

I love the will of time and someone told me that dune was what inspired wheel of Time. So I was so excited to start dune I don't even think I made it 100 pages in because I was so disappointed that it was nothing like the wheel of time

[@jenniferhanses]

There's really only 7 stories and we just keep telling them over and over again. ::shrug:: Readers should know this if they actually list their hobby as "reading." It was part of my basic elementary school education. Everything is just a variation on the 7. That's why it's so hard to prove copyright violations.

[@niharikamulye6422]

Thank you. I am thinking of writing but am worried of writing something that seems like a ripoff of something else, so this definitely helped.

[@mouktaralbert7062]

There’s a difference between Tolkien using folklore as inspiration to write his stories and someone using Tolkien’s work as inspiration for their own. Then there’s a difference between someone using the work of someone who was inspired by Tolkien to write a story and the people who they inspired etc. At some point one should go back to the source material.

[@wa4jd]

Nice shirt, but I don't think Thadred is Fonra's type. 😀

[@melodyclark1944]

I get what you're saying. It might be true sometimes, but critics do consume a lot. Like movie critics have a lot of movies they don't like and they watch so many movies.

[@Bookworm_Riss]

I agree with this, but you do have to admit that sometimes two books or series are very similar, just to name one that comes to mind, ACOTAR and these hollow vows (I used this example because I disliked these hollow vows). I understand that no two fantasy books are the same even though they may have similar content and tropes, (I don’t particularly care or even notice at times if two books are similar as long as I like the book, unless i really dont like one of two similar books and the one I don’t like has been published/written after the book that I liked, and usually the book I liked less has poor execution) usually each book has something “special” or a bit different, and what makes you want to read the book is usually the execution. Sorry this is really long 😅😅😅 Correct me if I’m wrong

[@ryanratchford2530]

True, but the Aielmen are just Freemen haha. Ginger white desert nomades who are also elite fighters which their chosen one prophecy & future vision rituals. That's not a archetype that's just funny.

[@embodyingmysticalmac]

Elisabeth has actually made a short about how they are indeed an archetype. It’s the one about if WoT is a ripoff of Dune.

[@TrentR42]

"Quake is just a knockoff of Doom"

[@hermionesvillage]

These people are probably gonna hate mythology then 😂

[@charmishing]

I’ve only read one true knockoff. The story beats, setting, and plot points were almost exactly the same as vampire academy. Even the character roles and conversations were similar

[@racheltheradiant4675]

How many retellings of Beauty and The Beast have we had? How many are actually fresh and unique? I think that's where the criticism stems from.

[@CarolinaJoubert]

Ooo what are you reading from the 1800s?

[@futurestoryteller]

I don't know why I genuinely thought this was going to be a reflection on the ironic lack of imagination in the fantasy genre. Because, I mean... yeah, you love the genre, you write in it, but you can't really tell me this isn't just a side effect of a genre that doesn't innovate particularly often. It'd be like if I got upset at somebody complaining that post apocalyptic zombie fiction was all the same, the difference being zombie fiction is considered a sub-genre of horror and fantasy is considered a whole genre. Therefore it's hard not be impressed/frustrated with the not too dissimilar, relative, homogeneity of the beast.

[@bleehh]

Yeah, same. This was just condescending for no reason. 100 books a year? Quantity over quality I guess. And saying people who accuse x of being a knock off of y just don't read enough is preposterous. You can tell if authors got their inspiration from other media. That doesn't mean their novel is a complete copy, but pointing it out also doesn't make you hateful or bitter. I just came across this channel and honestly, I've had a problem with every video I've watched so far. This person is not my cup of tea.

[@futurestoryteller]

@@bleehh I wouldn't agree with everything you said. Casual audiences especially really overestimate their intuitive senses, and media literacy. For one they always seem to think the most recent popular version of a thing is the "obvious" inspiration for the next thing that comes out, even if the popular thing was aping something that has been utterly ubiquitous since before they were even born. Authors with a niche interest finally get published on the *marketing* coattails of something that didn't exist when they started writing, and are forced to forever field questions about their "obvious inspiration" Going back to zombies for a second, I remember how funny it was hearing people say "I think the Walking Dead might be one of - if not - _the_ best post apocalyptic zombie tv show of all time!" (When, at the time it was, basically, the only one that had ever existed.) Yeah, it's not exactly the same thing, but it demonstrates combination of incompetence and overconfidence that I'm talking about, and I _think_ is being expressed in this video. I just felt it was dishonest not to acknowledge the failings of the genre too, under the circumstances, and wanted to inject some nuance into the discussion. Not swing wildly in the other direction.

[@Tortferngatr]

Could I recommend you A Practical Guide to Evil? That story does quite a bit of innovation despite being a blatant genre deconstruction of fantasy as a whole.

[@futurestoryteller]

@@Tortferngatr You can recommend whatever you want. I don't read very much anymore, but I'd like to get back to it, and when I do I'd certainly prefer if it was something interesting.

[@cmm5542]

​@@bleehhI like some of Elisabeth's points, but I agree that she is regularly condescending. I love people who are passionate about their views, but they need to be open to the idea that other people have different views, and their own may not be absolutely right all the time. She's not very open to people disagreeing with her.

[@Bluewater1976]

All is Tolkien Tolkien is all.

[@nardareyes8269]

Does this apply to the Avatar vs Pocahontas debate?

[@Tortferngatr]

Blue People Avatar is James Cameron getting every worldbuilder’s dream come true: an arbitrarily large budget and cutting-edge-for-the-time tech work to bring his world to life on the big screen. From what I’ve heard, the “sorry about colonialism” plot is mostly an excuse to show off how awesome Pandora and the tech work is. (Avatar: The Last Airbender is better regardless)

[@TheLastSane1]

Eh its more Avatar vs Dances with Wolves

[@KerKhent]

The only thing I find boring is when the same author writes the same story with different characters.

[@danielmiller3596]

I grok this. And use it as an insult sometimes.

[@G5rry]

I don't get why you can't tell the person that you have seen the same tropes in older books, instead of talking condescendingly to them and calling them "babe".

[@elizabethmcglothlin5406]

Or everything is a knockoff of Beagle, Tolkien, etc.

[@nevechristopher]

OK... but for realzies Iron Druid is, shall we say 'inspired by' Dresden Files and you cannot convince me otherwise

[@demonic_myst4503]

Of dune u,m dunes sci fi