Viewpoint "This story/character is a lot like..."

[just_patches]

Here's a question: What do you do if you make a character or a story/setting and the reaction someone gets you is "This thing is a lot like (this other popular story)" or "This character's power would make a good (stand/quirk/scp)"
I'm sure it's a huge pet peeve for a lot of people like it is for me, but I'm curious what your reactions to it are.

 

[rae2nerdy]

I don’t mind really, chances are I am basing it on something so if anything it’s a fun point of reference for what kind of things my partner enjoys watching/reading. It also usually sparks a nicely nerdy discussion about the inspired source.

Further I am likely to tell you myself what I took inspiration from so it’s no big deal.

Not sure what the second question means, definately never got anything like that.

I think as long as the person isn’t accuse me of outright plagiarizing something I am gonna be fine

 

[Tulik]

There is no such thing as an original idea, no matter how absurd or unique you think you are. We all derive inspiration from some other form of media. If my character seems like someone you’ve seen before? Doesn’t really bother me. If my story idea sounds familiar? That’s because it probably is. I think it’s important to take inspiration where you find it. It doesn’t matter where it comes from as long as the idea you come up with is one you make your own. If you think your ideas are to similar to things you see around? Then change them. Tweak them. Nothing ever has to stay set in stone until you say it does. Flexibility is a core necessity for writers who are looking to have a compelling story. Never be rigid in your ideas. That’s my opinion, at least.

 

[Crayons]

I've only seen people bothered by that on deviantart where someone goes apeshit that a commenter mentions another character that theirs looks like. Seems pretty widespread over there but I've never understood why it irks people so much.

There's a difference between "hey that reminds me of X!" And "I am accusing you of plagiarising X." Comparisons aren't a bad thing in themselves.

 

[Crenando]

I think that's annoying if the similarities are really superficial.

 

[peritwinkle]

This reminds me of a time when I made an OC in the Harry Potter universe who had a hare as a patronus and someone told me I "flat out copied Luna Lovegood" as if every single wizard in the world has a different patronus???

 

[just_patches]

I will definitely agree a lot of my writing comes from stuff I like or characters I love, that is true
I think the key is not making a story that is beat for beat with another story
I mean, I wouldnt even be writing if it wasn't for stories I like

 

[AnimeGenork]

I once read a book (How to Read Literature Like a Professor) that said every work of literature is connected. In literary terms, this is called intertextuality, and so far as the literary world is concerned, something may seem unique, but no matter what, we are always nodding to other works we've encountered and read. I assume the same is true for just about everything else that started with an idea in this world, including video games, TV shows, big box office movies, etc. And I know the same is true for roleplaying.

As others said before, there is a difference between drawing inspiration from other media and plagiarizing them. If I tried to pass off a school for witchcraft and wizardry as my own idea, obviously everyone would say, "Bro, that's Hogwarts." And they'd be right.

However, if I worked really hard on an idea and the only reaction I get is, "Heh, this is a lot like X Idea," I'd be pretty peeved. There are always similar ideas out there - I don't think it's entirely possible that a certain idea has not crossed someone else's mind at one stage or another. (The only real world example I have is Darwin and whoever was going to bring up evolution before he beat them to it.) If I'm trying to get people to help me play out an idea, I'm looking for "Yes, I'm interested!" I wasn't looking for the underlying accusation that I copied someone else.

I do think, on another note, that it's all about how you say it. If, say, I took inspiration from a certain anime series, and someone says, "Ahhh this reminds me of Fairy Tail," I'd be pleased that someone else recognized it. I suppose it depends on your connection to the idea and what process you went through creating it. But again, there is no such thing as originality, at least not anymore, so there will be people who will take it too far and assume you're copying something. So long as you like your idea, and there are others who do, though, I don't think it'll matter in the long run. Just keep doing you.

 

[SP3CT3R]

One of my myriad disorders causes me to be obsessed with originality and panic whenever I find out that an idea that I have is remotely similar to something someone else has done, and I've felt compelled to scrap entire characters because of people drawing comparisons. So, no, I don't enjoy it.

And, in general, bringing up your fandom out of the blue is seriously annoying and the best way to make me hate it.

 

[rae2nerdy]

AnimeGenork

In fairness, the "school of witchcraft and wizardry" is not an idea that is specific to JK Rowling. Now if you said the school had four houses with animal mascots THAT would be blatantly ripping off Harry Potter. But just having a school for witchcraft and wizardry is kind of a bog standard fantasy trope.

Same thing with saying that any superhero who is super strong and can fly has to be a Superman rip off. 1. That's not all of Superman's powers. 2. Plenty of other heroes in his own universe have that power set.

Now granted Superman and Hogwarts are the most popular examples of their specific tropes so I can see someone saying that your idea reminds them of Superman/Hogwarts but to claim it's blatant plagiarism is going a bit too far.

 

[Grey]

I usually either say 'oh yeah, that was definitely an influence' or 'yup it's a pastiche of that setting' and rarely 'sounds like I should check that out, thanks!'

I tend to go for intentional intertextuality, as Genork mentioned.

 

[Crenando]

AnimeGenork
Same thing with saying that any superhero who is super strong and can fly has to be a Superman rip off. 1. That's not all of Superman's powers. 2. Plenty of other heroes in his own universe have that power set.

We need more supermanalogues.
It's a good platform to show why making one character like another isn't really a bad thing in itself.

 

[AnimeGenork]

AnimeGenork

In fairness, the "school of witchcraft and wizardry" is not an idea that is specific to JK Rowling. Now if you said the school had four houses with animal mascots THAT would be blatantly ripping off Harry Potter. But just having a school for witchcraft and wizardry is kind of a bog standard fantasy trope.

Same thing with saying that any superhero who is super strong and can fly has to be a Superman rip off. 1. That's not all of Superman's powers. 2. Plenty of other heroes in his own universe have that power set.

Now granted Superman and Hogwarts are the most popular examples of their specific tropes so I can see someone saying that your idea reminds them of Superman/Hogwarts but to claim it's blatant plagiarism is going a bit too far.

It was just an example, but yes, I'm aware of that ^^

 

[Crayons]

As others said before, there is a difference between drawing inspiration from other media and plagiarizing them. If I tried to pass off a school for witchcraft and wizardry as my own idea, obviously everyone would say, "Bro, that's Hogwarts." And they'd be right.

Worked for JK Rowling.

If someone says you stole the idea from her just pass them a copy of pretty much any children's fantasy books written before 1997 and say "no I stole it from The Worst Witch, actually."

Bringing up Harry Potter as an example in a thread about plagiarism is full of the lols.

The rest of your post made great points though.

 

[rae2nerdy]

Worked for JK Rowling.

If someone says you stole the idea from her just pass them a copy of pretty much any children's fantasy books written before 1997 and say "no I stole it from The Worst Witch, actually."

Bringing up Harry Potter as an example in a thread about plagiarism is full of the lols.

The rest of your post made great points though.

I don’t think she plagiarized anything. If memory serves the Worst Witch had a totally different magical system. I’m a hundred percent certain they didn’t have the houseS. And actually where boys allowed in the school?

I mean she has admitted to taking inspiration from Roland Dahl but I can’t think of anything she directly plagiarized.

As I mentioned myself “School of Witchcraft and Wizardry” is a bog standard fantasy trope. You can’t plagiarize it any more than you can “plagarize” a superhero with super strength and flight. There are so many characters with that power set that you can’t reasonably be expected to be plagiarizing them all.

Plagarisim is more like you are taking an exact copy of something. I don’t remember any previous magical school being exactly the same as Hogwarts. With the same magical system, same house system, same points system, etc. The house system alone I’m struggling to think of any other magical school that has it. Most of the ones I can remember just had dorms or broke kids up into species. Which Hogwarts obviously didn’t do.

 

[Crayons]

I don’t think she plagiarized anything. If memory serves the Worst Witch had a totally different magical system. I’m a hundred percent certain they didn’t have the houseS. And actually where boys allowed in the school?

I mean she has admitted to taking inspiration from Roland Dahl but I can’t think of anything she directly plagiarized.

As I mentioned myself “School of Witchcraft and Wizardry” is a bog standard fantasy trope. You can’t plagiarize it any more than you can “plagarize” a superhero with super strength and flight. There are so many characters with that power set that you can’t reasonably be expected to be plagiarizing them all.

Plagarisim is more like you are taking an exact copy of something. I don’t remember any previous magical school being exactly the same as Hogwarts. With the same magical system, same house system, same points system, etc. The house system alone I’m struggling to think of any other magical school that has it. Most of the ones I can remember just had dorms or broke kids up into species. Which Hogwarts obviously didn’t do.

The fact that it's a common trope is literally my point, coupled with the fact that you can go through HP and pick out where pretty much every premise has been used before. Even HP's design and owl was nicked off a DC character called Tim Hunter. And no I don't want to go into what all those individual things are but thanks for offering. School Houses have been used in basically every secondary school in the UK for about a hundred years. In mine, we didn't have animals or crests, but we did have House colours and House competitions throughout the year. The school JK attended most likely did too.

Like, if you wanted to give a good example of something obviously borrowed from something recognisably original, how about citing Wizard of Earthsea? Aside from the concept of "wizards" almost everything in that book was unique. (Except it also has a school for wizards in it lol)

 

[Grey]

Literally no one can compare to Le Guin and I will die on this hill.

 

[Crayons]

Literally no one can compare to Le Guin and I will die on this hill.

Preach, brother!

Also... those haters saying there's no original ideas (which is a trope as old as time in itself) should be forced to read every one of Ursula le Guin's books.

 

[Crenando]

The fact that it's a common trope is literally my point, coupled with the fact that you can go through HP and pick out where pretty much every premise has been used before. Even HP's design and owl was nicked off a DC character called Tim Hunter. And no I don't want to go into what all those individual things are but thanks for offering. School Houses have been used in basically every secondary school in the UK for about a hundred years. In mine, we didn't have animals or crests, but we did have House colours and House competitions throughout the year. The school JK attended most likely did too.

Like, if you wanted to give a good example of something obviously borrowed from something recognisably original, how about citing Wizard of Earthsea? Aside from the concept of "wizards" almost everything in that book was unique. (Except it also has a school for wizards in it lol)

When Gaiman was confronted about the similarities between Book of Magic and Harry Potter, didn't he say that he thought they were taking from the same source? I believe it was T.H. White.

 

[Crayons]

When Gaiman was confronted about the similarities between Book of Magic and Harry Potter, didn't he say that he thought they were taking from the same source? I believe it was T.H. White.

Oh is that so? I didn't know that!

Gaiman should be confronted about stealing ideas from Diana Wynne Jones, although he claims it was OK because they were friends. XD

 

[AnimeGenork]

Worked for JK Rowling.

If someone says you stole the idea from her just pass them a copy of pretty much any children's fantasy books written before 1997 and say "no I stole it from The Worst Witch, actually."

Bringing up Harry Potter as an example in a thread about plagiarism is full of the lols.

The rest of your post made great points though.

Considering I was born in 2000, I wouldn't know much about that. It was just an example of what people would say if I did that ^^ if something, like Hogwarts, has enough recognition, that's what people think of first, and that was what I meant.

I didn't mean for my example to be taken so literally

 

[Crayons]

Considering I was born in 2000, I wouldn't know much about that. It was just an example of what people would say if I did that ^^ if something, like Hogwarts, has enough recognition, that's what people think of first, and that was what I meant.

I didn't mean for my example to be taken so literally

Yeah my bad, didn't mean it to come across like getting at you.

 

[Moomba]

I find this pretty funny, since I take inspiration for my ideas from lots of different works, but they tend to be too obscure for anyone to notice.

 

[Crenando]

I find this pretty funny, since I take inspiration for my ideas from lots of different works, but they tend to be too obscure for anyone to notice.

I feel this on a personal level. Obscure stuff is my thing.
Sometimes I feel like it kind of defines what I do on the site so I've tried to branch out a little.

 

[Moomba]

I feel this on a personal level. Obscure stuff is my thing.
Sometimes I feel like it kind of defines what I do on the site so I've tried to branch out a little.

I mean, if it's good stuff that makes for good ideas, than I wouldn't stop doing it.
It's not always media either, like I try to follow Sanderson's Laws of Magic whenever I do worldbuilding, since they definitely make for good stories.