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(Redirected from Retcon)
'Retroactive continuity' or 'retcon' is the deliberate changing of previously established facts in a work of serial fiction. The change itself is referred to as a "retcon", and the act of writing and publishing a retcon is called "retconning".
Retcons are common in comic books, especially those of large publishing houses such as Marvel Comics and DC Comics, because of the lengthy history of many series and the number of independent authors contributing to their development; this is the context in which the term was coined. Retconning also occurs in soap operas, movie sequels, professional wrestling, video games, radio series, series of novels, and can be done in any other type of episodic fiction. It is also used in roleplaying, when the game master feels it is needed to maintain consistency in the story or to fix significant mistakes that were missed during play.
The first printed instance of the phrase "retroactive continuity" is in All-Star Squadron #18 (cover-dated February 1983). The series is set on DC's Earth-2, an alternative universe in which Golden-Aged comics proceeded in real time, thus Superman is in his 60s and Batman is dead, for example, whereas on Earth-1, DC's primary universe, they are always perpetually in their late-20s/early-30s, depending who writes them. All-Star Squadron is also set in the 1940s, so it is in the past of an alternate universe, thus all its events had repercussions in the contemporary continuity of the DC multiverse. It literally changed the history of the fictional world in which it was set.
In the letters column, a reader remarks that the comic "must make you [the creators] feel at times as if you're painting yourself into a corner," and that "Your matching of Golden-Age comics history with new plotlines [sic] has been an artistic (and I hope financial!) success." Roy Thomas responds, "we like to think that an enthusiastic ALL-STAR [sic] booster at one of Adam Malin's Creation Conventions in San Diego came up with the best name for it, a few months back: 'Retroactive Continuity.' Has kind of a ring to it, don't you think?" The term, possibly in limited use before All-Star Squadron #18, then took firm root in the consciousness of fans of American superhero comics.
"Retroactive continuity" was shortened to "retcon", reportedly by Damian Cugley in 1988 on USENET. This historical detail is noted in several on-line sources, such as Comic Vine, Webster's Dictionary On-Line and Answers.com, but all of these sources either quote or paraphrase Wikipedia itself. Hard evidence of Cugley's abbreviation have yet to surface. Cugley used the newly-shortened word to describe a development in the comic book Saga of the Swamp Thing, which reinterprets the events of the title character's origin by revealing facts that, up to that point, are not part of the narrative. In this case, the revelation is that the titular character's memories are false and he is not who he thinks he is. Alan Moore's retcons often involve false memories, for example Marvelman (aka Miracleman in America), and .
The term eventually crossed over into other science-fiction and fantasy sub-cultures and even into the fictional worlds themselves. In the BBC's Doctor Who spin-off series Torchwood, "retcon" is the name of a drug used to erase people's memories, thus changing how they perceive the history of their own lives, which is much like one of Alan Moore's memory retcons.
The term "retcon" was also used by the Birmingham University Treasure Trap society as early as 1987.
Although there is considerable ambiguity and overlap between different kinds of retcon, there are some distinctions that fans have made between them, depending on whether the retcon in question adds to, alters, or removes material from the narrative's continuity. These distinctions often evoke different reactions from fans of the material.
Some retcons do not directly contradict previously established facts, but "fill in" missing background details, usually to support current plot points. This was the sense in which Thomas used "retroactive continuity", as a purely additive process that did not "undo" any previous work, a common theme in his work on ''All-Star Squadron''. Kurt Busiek took a similar approach with ''Untold Tales of Spider-Man'', a series which told stories that specifically fit between issues of the original ''Amazing Spider-Man'' series, sometimes explaining discontinuities between those earlier stories. Yet another retroactive continuity book was ''.
Related to this is the concept of shadow history or secret history, in which the events of a story occur within the bounds of already-established events (especially real-world historical events), revealing a different interpretation of (or motivation for) the events. Some of Tim Powers novels are examples of this, such as ''Last Call'', which suggests that Bugsy Siegel's actions were due to his being a modern-day Fisher King. Alan Moore's additional information about the Swamp Thing's origins didn't contradict or change any of the events depicted in the character's previous appearances, but changed the underlying interpretation of them. This verges on making alterations to past continuity. Such additions and reinterpretations are very common in Doctor Who novels, though they are not usually referred to as retcons by Doctor Who fans. The Star Trek books, ''The Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh (Volumes 1 & 2)'', by Greg Cox, detail the fictional Eugenics Wars, giving alternate explanations for real world events such as the Indian nuclear test of 1974.
Additions are among the better-received types of retcons, because nothing is actually undone, and because people generally appreciate the explanation of [previously] ambiguous and/or mysterious events.
This kind of retcon often adds information that effectively states "what you saw isn't what really happened" and then introduces a different version. This is usually interpreted by the audience as an overt change rather than a mere addition. The most common form this takes is when a character shown to have died (sometimes explicitly) is later revealed to have survived somehow. This is well known in horror films, which may end with the death of the monster, but when the film becomes successful, the studio plans a sequel, revealing that the monster survived after all. The technique has been used so frequently in superhero comics that the term ''comic book death'' has been coined for it. The first famous example in popular culture is the return of Sherlock Holmes: writer Arthur Conan Doyle killed off the popular character in an encounter with his foe Professor Moriarty, only to bring Holmes back, due in large part to audience response.[1] On the other hand, many of these situations offer plausible explanations for how the character survived, by building on what we thought we saw, in which case they can be considered additions. Fans may invent unofficial explanations for inconsistencies, the challenge itself becoming a source of entertainment. Sometimes these fan-made explanations become so popular and widespread that they slip into accepted canon, and the original creators of the characters accept them.
An example of a fan-created retcon is in Star Wars. In the film, ''Return of the Jedi'', it appears that the character Boba Fett suffers a horrible death in the belly of the Sarlacc. However, the Fett character was extremely popular and few fans were pleased with his inglorious death. Popular casual speculation held that he had somehow escaped "off-screen" and later Star Wars books, graphic novels and even a Star Wars Unleashed action figure accepted this conjecture and depicted Boba Fett as having escaped the ordeal. How exactly Fett survived is not specified. In certain novels involving Boba Fett, he says that he detonated a bomb inside the belly of the sarlacc, blowing him out of the stomach. It is important to note, however, that though George Lucas acknowledged that "some people think he survived anyway" when talking about the character in the commentary for the DVD version of the movie, he did not confirm or deny Fett's fate.
A lesser known example is in the film ''The Return of the Musketeers'', based on Alexandre Dumas's ''Twenty Years After'' (''Vingt ans après''), his sequel to ''The Three Musketeers''. In the film ''The Four Musketeers'', Michael York, as D'Artagnan, presumably kills De Rochefort, played by Christopher Lee. However, in ''The Return of the Musketeers'', both York and Lee turn up again, playing the same roles they had in the previous film, and it is explained that De Rochefort was seriously wounded, but not killed.
Another such an example is the Musical Wicked, which reinterpret many background assumptions inherent in the Wizard Of Oz. Rather than the Wicked Witch of the West being merely being evil, she is instead shown as a tragic eco-warrior pushed into open rebellion against the Wizard due to the Wizards immoral actions. Addtional things such as her hatred for Dorothy stemming from the death of her sister, the origins of the cowardly lion, the tin woodsman and the scarecrow and the fact that the Witch survives her apparent death at Dorothy's hands are other examples of retcons within Wicked.
It is commonplace for characters to remain the same age, or to age out of synch with real time; this can be considered an ongoing implicit retcon of their birthdate. When historical events are involved in their biography, overt retcons may be used to accommodate this; a character who served in the army during World War II might have his service record retconned to place him in the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War, etc. This is similar to a problem faced by many works of future history: the events they describe happening in years after the initial publication do not conform to history as it actually happens. To accommodate such discrepancies, retcons may be used in later stories, altering dates or other details. An example of this can be found in the films Escape from New York and Escape from L.A.
While retconning is usually done without comment by the creators, DC Comics has on rare occasions promoted special events dedicated to revising the history of the DC Comics universe. The most important and well known such event was the mini-series ''Crisis on Infinite Earths''; this allowed for wholesale revisions of their entire multiverse of characters. It has been argued that these were not true retcons, however, because the cause of the changes to their universe actually appeared within the story, similar to stories in which a time traveler goes to the past and changes history from how he remembered it.
Sometimes retconned alterations are so drastic as to render prior stories untenable. Many of the retcons introduced in ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' and DC's later ''Zero Hour'' were specifically intended to wipe the slate clean, and permit an entirely new history to be written for the characters. This is commonly referred to as a reboot. This is often very unpopular, upsetting fans of the material that has been removed from continuity.
Unpopular or embarrassing stories are sometimes later ignored by publishers, never referred to again, and effectively erased from a series' continuity. They may publish stories that contradict the previous story or explicitly establish that it "never happened", for example by claiming that events in a previous installation were "just a dream". Likewise, an unpopular retcon may even be re-retconned away, as happened with John Byrne's ''Chapter One'.
An example of subtraction can be found in Disney's ''The Lion King'' series. After the success of the first movie, Disney released a group of books titled ''The Lion King: Six New Adventures'' in which Simba is said to have a son named Kopa. It is also mentioned in the storybook version of the film that he has a son. However, in the film sequel '', Simba only has a daughter named Kiara. Kopa is non-existent and no mention is made of him. Kiara also has a different coloring and more feminine features than the cub shown at the end of the first movie.
(See also Fanon, Soap Opera Rapid Aging Syndrome.)
Retcons and loose continuity can lead to more retcons. When the "explanation" for an inconsistency makes it into an official work, this is another retcon. The "Star Wars" universe constantly employs this tactic to prevent inconsistencies.
Retroactive continuity is similar to, but not the same as, plot inconsistencies introduced accidentally or through lack of concern for continuity; retconning is done deliberately. For example, the ongoing continuity contradictions on episodic TV series such as ''The Golden Girls'' reflects very loose continuity, not genuine retcons. However, in series with generally tight continuity, retcons are sometimes created after the fact to explain continuity errors. Retconning is also generally distinct from replacing the actor who plays a part in an ongoing series, which is more properly an example of loose continuity (i.e. the different appearance of the character is ignored), rather than retroactively changing past continuity. An exception to this can be when the difference in appearance is explained, such as the case with "regeneration" in ''Doctor Who''.
Retconning is also distinct from direct revision; when George Lucas re-edited the original Star Wars trilogy, he made changes directly to the source material, rather than introducing new source material that contradicted the contents of previous material. However, the later series of Star Wars prequels did qualify as "new source material", and many fans have pointed out instances that apparently retcon elements of the original trilogy.
The "clean slate" reinterpretation of characters - as in movie and television adaptations of books, or the reintroduction of many superheroes in the Silver Age of Comics - is similar to a reboot retcon, except that the previous versions are not explicitly or implicitly eliminated in the process. These are merely alternate or parallel reinterpretations such as the character re-interpretations of the DC animated universe or the Ultimate Marvel line of comics.
The animated series Frisky Dingo often gives previously unseen exposition in the "Previously on..." portion of the episode. (Not exactly Retroactive continuity because it only gives new information instead of changing already established events.) In addition to this, a brand-name "Ret-con" usually appears with products in these segments.
In Stephen King's novel, Misery, the protagonist, Paul Sheldon, is forced to write a sequel to his book ''Misery's Child'', in which the main character, Misery Chastain, dies. He at first attempts to retcon the events in that book, but his captor, Annie Wilkes, regards this as cheating and makes him create a sequel that doesn't actively deny what the reader already knows.
★ List of retcons
★ Back-story
★ Canon
★ Plot hole
★ Prequel
★ Reboot
★ Fanon
★ Jumping the shark
★ Spin-off
★
★
1. Doyle, Arthur Conan (1893). "The Adventure of the Final Problem." The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes.
'Retroactive continuity' or 'retcon' is the deliberate changing of previously established facts in a work of serial fiction. The change itself is referred to as a "retcon", and the act of writing and publishing a retcon is called "retconning".
Retcons are common in comic books, especially those of large publishing houses such as Marvel Comics and DC Comics, because of the lengthy history of many series and the number of independent authors contributing to their development; this is the context in which the term was coined. Retconning also occurs in soap operas, movie sequels, professional wrestling, video games, radio series, series of novels, and can be done in any other type of episodic fiction. It is also used in roleplaying, when the game master feels it is needed to maintain consistency in the story or to fix significant mistakes that were missed during play.
| Contents |
| Origins |
| Types |
| Addition |
| Alteration |
| Subtraction |
| Reconciliation |
| Related |
| Literature Involving Retconning |
| See also |
| Footnotes |
Origins
The first printed instance of the phrase "retroactive continuity" is in All-Star Squadron #18 (cover-dated February 1983). The series is set on DC's Earth-2, an alternative universe in which Golden-Aged comics proceeded in real time, thus Superman is in his 60s and Batman is dead, for example, whereas on Earth-1, DC's primary universe, they are always perpetually in their late-20s/early-30s, depending who writes them. All-Star Squadron is also set in the 1940s, so it is in the past of an alternate universe, thus all its events had repercussions in the contemporary continuity of the DC multiverse. It literally changed the history of the fictional world in which it was set.
In the letters column, a reader remarks that the comic "must make you [the creators] feel at times as if you're painting yourself into a corner," and that "Your matching of Golden-Age comics history with new plotlines [sic] has been an artistic (and I hope financial!) success." Roy Thomas responds, "we like to think that an enthusiastic ALL-STAR [sic] booster at one of Adam Malin's Creation Conventions in San Diego came up with the best name for it, a few months back: 'Retroactive Continuity.' Has kind of a ring to it, don't you think?" The term, possibly in limited use before All-Star Squadron #18, then took firm root in the consciousness of fans of American superhero comics.
"Retroactive continuity" was shortened to "retcon", reportedly by Damian Cugley in 1988 on USENET. This historical detail is noted in several on-line sources, such as Comic Vine, Webster's Dictionary On-Line and Answers.com, but all of these sources either quote or paraphrase Wikipedia itself. Hard evidence of Cugley's abbreviation have yet to surface. Cugley used the newly-shortened word to describe a development in the comic book Saga of the Swamp Thing, which reinterprets the events of the title character's origin by revealing facts that, up to that point, are not part of the narrative. In this case, the revelation is that the titular character's memories are false and he is not who he thinks he is. Alan Moore's retcons often involve false memories, for example Marvelman (aka Miracleman in America), and .
The term eventually crossed over into other science-fiction and fantasy sub-cultures and even into the fictional worlds themselves. In the BBC's Doctor Who spin-off series Torchwood, "retcon" is the name of a drug used to erase people's memories, thus changing how they perceive the history of their own lives, which is much like one of Alan Moore's memory retcons.
The term "retcon" was also used by the Birmingham University Treasure Trap society as early as 1987.
Types
Although there is considerable ambiguity and overlap between different kinds of retcon, there are some distinctions that fans have made between them, depending on whether the retcon in question adds to, alters, or removes material from the narrative's continuity. These distinctions often evoke different reactions from fans of the material.
Addition
Some retcons do not directly contradict previously established facts, but "fill in" missing background details, usually to support current plot points. This was the sense in which Thomas used "retroactive continuity", as a purely additive process that did not "undo" any previous work, a common theme in his work on ''All-Star Squadron''. Kurt Busiek took a similar approach with ''Untold Tales of Spider-Man'', a series which told stories that specifically fit between issues of the original ''Amazing Spider-Man'' series, sometimes explaining discontinuities between those earlier stories. Yet another retroactive continuity book was ''.
Related to this is the concept of shadow history or secret history, in which the events of a story occur within the bounds of already-established events (especially real-world historical events), revealing a different interpretation of (or motivation for) the events. Some of Tim Powers novels are examples of this, such as ''Last Call'', which suggests that Bugsy Siegel's actions were due to his being a modern-day Fisher King. Alan Moore's additional information about the Swamp Thing's origins didn't contradict or change any of the events depicted in the character's previous appearances, but changed the underlying interpretation of them. This verges on making alterations to past continuity. Such additions and reinterpretations are very common in Doctor Who novels, though they are not usually referred to as retcons by Doctor Who fans. The Star Trek books, ''The Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh (Volumes 1 & 2)'', by Greg Cox, detail the fictional Eugenics Wars, giving alternate explanations for real world events such as the Indian nuclear test of 1974.
Additions are among the better-received types of retcons, because nothing is actually undone, and because people generally appreciate the explanation of [previously] ambiguous and/or mysterious events.
Alteration
This kind of retcon often adds information that effectively states "what you saw isn't what really happened" and then introduces a different version. This is usually interpreted by the audience as an overt change rather than a mere addition. The most common form this takes is when a character shown to have died (sometimes explicitly) is later revealed to have survived somehow. This is well known in horror films, which may end with the death of the monster, but when the film becomes successful, the studio plans a sequel, revealing that the monster survived after all. The technique has been used so frequently in superhero comics that the term ''comic book death'' has been coined for it. The first famous example in popular culture is the return of Sherlock Holmes: writer Arthur Conan Doyle killed off the popular character in an encounter with his foe Professor Moriarty, only to bring Holmes back, due in large part to audience response.[1] On the other hand, many of these situations offer plausible explanations for how the character survived, by building on what we thought we saw, in which case they can be considered additions. Fans may invent unofficial explanations for inconsistencies, the challenge itself becoming a source of entertainment. Sometimes these fan-made explanations become so popular and widespread that they slip into accepted canon, and the original creators of the characters accept them.
An example of a fan-created retcon is in Star Wars. In the film, ''Return of the Jedi'', it appears that the character Boba Fett suffers a horrible death in the belly of the Sarlacc. However, the Fett character was extremely popular and few fans were pleased with his inglorious death. Popular casual speculation held that he had somehow escaped "off-screen" and later Star Wars books, graphic novels and even a Star Wars Unleashed action figure accepted this conjecture and depicted Boba Fett as having escaped the ordeal. How exactly Fett survived is not specified. In certain novels involving Boba Fett, he says that he detonated a bomb inside the belly of the sarlacc, blowing him out of the stomach. It is important to note, however, that though George Lucas acknowledged that "some people think he survived anyway" when talking about the character in the commentary for the DVD version of the movie, he did not confirm or deny Fett's fate.
A lesser known example is in the film ''The Return of the Musketeers'', based on Alexandre Dumas's ''Twenty Years After'' (''Vingt ans après''), his sequel to ''The Three Musketeers''. In the film ''The Four Musketeers'', Michael York, as D'Artagnan, presumably kills De Rochefort, played by Christopher Lee. However, in ''The Return of the Musketeers'', both York and Lee turn up again, playing the same roles they had in the previous film, and it is explained that De Rochefort was seriously wounded, but not killed.
Another such an example is the Musical Wicked, which reinterpret many background assumptions inherent in the Wizard Of Oz. Rather than the Wicked Witch of the West being merely being evil, she is instead shown as a tragic eco-warrior pushed into open rebellion against the Wizard due to the Wizards immoral actions. Addtional things such as her hatred for Dorothy stemming from the death of her sister, the origins of the cowardly lion, the tin woodsman and the scarecrow and the fact that the Witch survives her apparent death at Dorothy's hands are other examples of retcons within Wicked.
It is commonplace for characters to remain the same age, or to age out of synch with real time; this can be considered an ongoing implicit retcon of their birthdate. When historical events are involved in their biography, overt retcons may be used to accommodate this; a character who served in the army during World War II might have his service record retconned to place him in the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War, etc. This is similar to a problem faced by many works of future history: the events they describe happening in years after the initial publication do not conform to history as it actually happens. To accommodate such discrepancies, retcons may be used in later stories, altering dates or other details. An example of this can be found in the films Escape from New York and Escape from L.A.
While retconning is usually done without comment by the creators, DC Comics has on rare occasions promoted special events dedicated to revising the history of the DC Comics universe. The most important and well known such event was the mini-series ''Crisis on Infinite Earths''; this allowed for wholesale revisions of their entire multiverse of characters. It has been argued that these were not true retcons, however, because the cause of the changes to their universe actually appeared within the story, similar to stories in which a time traveler goes to the past and changes history from how he remembered it.
Subtraction
Sometimes retconned alterations are so drastic as to render prior stories untenable. Many of the retcons introduced in ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' and DC's later ''Zero Hour'' were specifically intended to wipe the slate clean, and permit an entirely new history to be written for the characters. This is commonly referred to as a reboot. This is often very unpopular, upsetting fans of the material that has been removed from continuity.
Unpopular or embarrassing stories are sometimes later ignored by publishers, never referred to again, and effectively erased from a series' continuity. They may publish stories that contradict the previous story or explicitly establish that it "never happened", for example by claiming that events in a previous installation were "just a dream". Likewise, an unpopular retcon may even be re-retconned away, as happened with John Byrne's ''Chapter One'.
An example of subtraction can be found in Disney's ''The Lion King'' series. After the success of the first movie, Disney released a group of books titled ''The Lion King: Six New Adventures'' in which Simba is said to have a son named Kopa. It is also mentioned in the storybook version of the film that he has a son. However, in the film sequel '', Simba only has a daughter named Kiara. Kopa is non-existent and no mention is made of him. Kiara also has a different coloring and more feminine features than the cub shown at the end of the first movie.
(See also Fanon, Soap Opera Rapid Aging Syndrome.)
Reconciliation
Retcons and loose continuity can lead to more retcons. When the "explanation" for an inconsistency makes it into an official work, this is another retcon. The "Star Wars" universe constantly employs this tactic to prevent inconsistencies.
Related
Retroactive continuity is similar to, but not the same as, plot inconsistencies introduced accidentally or through lack of concern for continuity; retconning is done deliberately. For example, the ongoing continuity contradictions on episodic TV series such as ''The Golden Girls'' reflects very loose continuity, not genuine retcons. However, in series with generally tight continuity, retcons are sometimes created after the fact to explain continuity errors. Retconning is also generally distinct from replacing the actor who plays a part in an ongoing series, which is more properly an example of loose continuity (i.e. the different appearance of the character is ignored), rather than retroactively changing past continuity. An exception to this can be when the difference in appearance is explained, such as the case with "regeneration" in ''Doctor Who''.
Retconning is also distinct from direct revision; when George Lucas re-edited the original Star Wars trilogy, he made changes directly to the source material, rather than introducing new source material that contradicted the contents of previous material. However, the later series of Star Wars prequels did qualify as "new source material", and many fans have pointed out instances that apparently retcon elements of the original trilogy.
The "clean slate" reinterpretation of characters - as in movie and television adaptations of books, or the reintroduction of many superheroes in the Silver Age of Comics - is similar to a reboot retcon, except that the previous versions are not explicitly or implicitly eliminated in the process. These are merely alternate or parallel reinterpretations such as the character re-interpretations of the DC animated universe or the Ultimate Marvel line of comics.
The animated series Frisky Dingo often gives previously unseen exposition in the "Previously on..." portion of the episode. (Not exactly Retroactive continuity because it only gives new information instead of changing already established events.) In addition to this, a brand-name "Ret-con" usually appears with products in these segments.
Literature Involving Retconning
In Stephen King's novel, Misery, the protagonist, Paul Sheldon, is forced to write a sequel to his book ''Misery's Child'', in which the main character, Misery Chastain, dies. He at first attempts to retcon the events in that book, but his captor, Annie Wilkes, regards this as cheating and makes him create a sequel that doesn't actively deny what the reader already knows.
See also
★ List of retcons
★ Back-story
★ Canon
★ Plot hole
★ Prequel
★ Reboot
★ Fanon
★ Jumping the shark
★ Spin-off
★
★
Footnotes
1. Doyle, Arthur Conan (1893). "The Adventure of the Final Problem." The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes.
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