| It's a powerful compulsion, this need to create your own stories using the characters from anime series. Each anime convention is an opportunity for this fan fiction brotherhood, linked by E-mail, Usenet and web sites, to gather and talk about their composing techniques. At AnimeIowa were (left to right) Greg Sandborn, who writes Ranma stories and the Fox Squadron Robotech stories; Jamie Bateman, the "Zen" who also writes Ranma fiction; Jeanne Hedge, whose specialty is the original Bubble Gum Crisis situations; and Tina Shawn, known as "RavynFyre," who creates Gundam Wing stories. Kris Overstreet and Bryan Neef arrived a little later in the program... |  |
| ...and Neef (right) said that that fan fiction has to show some common sense to go along with the drama and humor. At the same time, he feels the fan stories match the spirit of the original. "If I apply real world psychiatry to Ranma's relationships, there would be no story," he said. Shaw (left, in the cap) said "Don't just throw something out there just to throw something out there, because you'll get nailed," referring to the often-tough cadre of online critics who read fanfic through Usenet and the Web. "The wrong details throw purist readers, and I'm one of them - I look more for errors than at the story." |  |
| Sandborn thinks the best anime fan fiction stories start and stay in Japan, because that's the place where the original situations were born. "To take them out of that environment. you lose a lot of what those stories are about," he said. For a Westerner to stage a story in Japan takes attention to detail, he said, and that means research to get the details right - and avoid embarrassment. "The Japanese are convinced there is absolutely no way Americans will ever understand their culture. You have to make an effort to understand," he said. A good place to start that understanding is "The Anime Companion" by Gilles Poitras, a book recommended by Sandborn and the rest of the panelists. |  |
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