A fanwank is an attempt by fans of a work of fiction to explain or justify plot holes or continuity errors, often through convoluted contrivances. The term is used both as a verb and a noun; the practice is sometimes known as fanwankery. It is disparaging, equating the activity with the ineffectual and solitary pleasure of masturbation ("wanking" in British slang). A great deal of fanwanking is based on the supposed premise that the original author of the work knew of the apparent plot hole and chose not to clarify or explain them. The fanwank is then a supposed "uncovering" of the hidden reasoning of the author. For the use of the word continuity in mathematics, see continuous function. ... A verb is a part of speech that usually denotes action (bring, read), occurrence (decompose, glitter), or a state of being (exist, stand). Depending on the language, a verb may vary in form according to many factors, possibly including its tense, aspect, mood and voice. ... A noun, or noun substantive, is a part of speech (a word or phrase) which can co-occur with (in)definite articles and attributive adjectives, and function as the head of a noun phrase. ... Masturbation is the manual excitation of the sexual organs, most often to the point of orgasm. ...

Related activities

Fanwanks are distinct from retcons in that they are not created by the original authors of the work, but rather by their audience. They are an example of fanon, but typically address themselves only to explaining apparent errors in a single work or shared universe, rather than more generally adding fan-created ideas to a fictional universe. However, when fans of a shared universe themselves come to write for it, they may include fanwanky or fanon explanations in their own contributions, thus making them canon: one notable example is the explanation provided in the fourth season of Star Trek: Enterprise for the difference in appearance between Klingons in the original Star Trek and subsequent spin-offs. Retroactive continuity – commonly contracted to the blend retcon – is the adding of new information to historical material, or deliberately changing previously established facts in a work of serial fiction. ... Fandom (from the noun fan and the affix -dom, as in kingdom, dukedom, etc. ... Fanon is a fact or ongoing situation (mostly in fan fiction stories) related to a television program, book, movie, or video game that has been used so much by fan writers or among the fandom that it has been more or less established as having happened in the fictional world... A Shared universe is a literary technique in which several different authors share settings and characters which appear in their respective works of fiction, often referring to events taking place in the other writers stories. ... The starship Enterprise (NX-01) Star Trek: Enterprise is a science fiction television series set in the Star Trek universe. ... Klingons (tlhIngan in the Klingon language) are a race of humanoids in the fictional Star Trek universe. ... The starship Enterprise as it appeared on Star Trek Star Trek is a culturally significant science fiction television series created by Gene Roddenberry in the 1960s. ...

Fanwanks are also distinct from krypto-revisionism, in that they do not generally try to deny that disliked events in canon ever occurred; on the contrary, fanwanks are often intended to reconcile all canonical elements in a work, despite their apparent incompatibility. Krypto-revisionism is a concept created and named by writers Steven Grant and Mark Evanier, and describes the rejection by the audience of a storyline, concept, plot, or idea in an ongoing series. ... In the context of fiction, the canon of a fictional universe comprises those novels, stories, films, etc. ...

Origin of fanwanking

The term has been attributed to writer Craig Hinton, the author of several Doctor Who novels and a reviewer for Doctor Who Magazine. According to Hinton, he began using the term in Autumn 1993 to describe series genre fiction that contained excessive references to past continuity. Craig Hinton (born 1964 in London) is an author most associated with his work for various spin-offs from the BBC Television series Doctor Who. ... Doctor Who is a long-running British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC about a mysterious time-travelling adventurer known only as The Doctor, who explores time and space with his companions, fighting evil. ... Doctor Who Weekly #1, cover dated October 17, 1979 Doctor Who Magazine (abbreviated as DWM) is a periodical devoted to the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. ...

Fanwanking first came to prominence in the mid-twentieth century with the advent of large fandoms of productions such as Star Trek, Doctor Who, and various comic books. Fanwanking has become especially prevalent in the age of the Internet. Newsgroups, web-based message boards, and other such forums have allowed for much greater communication among fans, often turning the previously solitary activity into a collaborative one. Fandom (from the noun fan and the affix -dom, as in kingdom, dukedom, etc. ... Star Trek collectively refers to a science-fiction franchise spanning six unique television series, 726 episodes and ten feature films in addition to hundreds of novels, computer and video games, fan stories and other works of fiction all set within the same fictional universe created by Gene Roddenberry in the... Doctor Who is a long-running British science fiction television programme produced by the BBC about a mysterious time-travelling adventurer known only as The Doctor, who explores time and space with his companions, fighting evil. ... A comic book is a magazine or book containing the art form of comics. ... Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ... This NeXTcube used by Berners-Lee at CERN became the first Web server. ...

See also

• Canon (fiction)
• Fandom
• Fanon (fiction)
• Fan service
• Krypto-revisionism
• Retcon