Boo-yah! Eligibility Post!

[ficmod]

Welcome! To the 2019 Eligibility Post!

This is the place to make your case for any canons that you know live in the gray area of "does this count as ten years old?" I will keep a running list here of the canons that I have decided on, one way or another.

When making your case, please include the canon's full name (as you would nominate it in the tagset), the date(s) of all the canon material that has been released, and your reasoning as to why I should accept it. Here's an example:

Ella Enchanted - Gail Carson Levine (1997)

A prequel, Ogre Enchanted, was published in 2018. While the events of Ogre take place in the same timeline/continuity, it follows a main character who did not appear in Ella. The main cast of Ogre is for the most part completely separate, apart from two characters (their identities being spoilers) who were extensively mentioned in Ella, but appeared only briefly in the original book. Therefore, I feel as if the two novels should be considered separate canons.

ETA 2/10/19: In cases of tie-in comics and novels, my rule of thumb is: 1. are the tie-ins well known? 2. are they by the same creators? and 3. does it clearly follow the original canon in terms of continuity/characters? If the answer is "no" to at least two of these, I won't consider them as disqualifying material. If you disagree with me about a particular judgment call, feel free to point out why - I'm not super familiar with everything, and Google can only do so much!

Reviewed Fandoms

Avatar: The Last Airbender - NOT ACCEPTED

Babylon 5 - ACCEPTED

Babysitter's Club (Ann M. Martin) - ACCEPTED

Band of Brothers (TV) - ACCEPTED

Batman Beyond (tv series) - ACCEPTED

Battlestar Galactica (TV) - ACCEPTED

Bewitched (TV) - ACCEPTED

Birds of Prey, Vol 1 - ACCEPTED

Blake's 7 (TV) - ACCEPTED

Carnivale (TV) - ACCEPTED

Cowboy Bebop (anime) - ACCEPTED

Dead Like Me (TV) - ACCEPTED

Doctor Quinn Medicine Woman - ACCEPTED

Excalibur (Comic) - ACCEPTED

Farscape (TV) - ACCEPTED

Final Fantasy VIII (1999) - ACCEPTED

Final Fantasy IX (2000) - ACCEPTED

Firefly (TV) - ACCEPTED

Gabriel (2007) - ACCEPTED

Harry Potter (J. K. Rowling) - NOT ACCEPTED

Hellsing (manga) - ACCEPTED

Highlander - ACCEPTED

Inuyasha - A Feudal Fairy Tale (manga) - ACCEPTED

The L Word (TV) - ACCEPTED

Man from UNCLE (TV) - ACCEPTED

Percy Jackson (book series) - NOT ACCEPTED

Practical Magic (1998) - ACCEPTED

The Pretender (TV) - ACCEPTED

Ravenous (1999) - ACCEPTED

Rurouni Kenshin (anime) - ACCEPTED

Sabrina the Teenage Witch (1996 - 2003) - ACCEPTED

Shoujo Kakumei Utena | Revolutionary Girl Utena (Anime) - ACCEPTED

Stargate Atlantis - ACCEPTED

Stargate SG-1 - ACCEPTED

Stargate Universe - NOT ACCEPTED
Star Trek: Voyager - ACCEPTED

Sweet Valley High/Confidential - NOT ACCEPTED

Sweet Valley Junior High/Twins/Senior Year/University - ACCEPTED

Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles (TV) - ACCEPTED
 
Terminator (movie series) - NOT ACCEPTED

Xena Warrior Princess (TV) - ACCEPTED

Young Riders (TV) - ACCEPTED

Comments

[beatrice_otter]

How are you handling Star Trek series? Are you counting them as one large whole (in which case, no Star Trek is acceptable) or are you counting each Star Trek series differently (in which case, TOS, TNG, DS9, VOY, and ENT would be eligible, but not the reboot or Discovery)?

What about Batman Beyond (a cartoon that ran from 1999-2001)? It's different enough from the main corpus of Batman works (different guy in the suit, different time period, etc.) that it might warrant being eligible even though Batman as a whole is not.

What about Terminator: the Sarah Connor Chronicles (2008-2009)? The main movie franchise is inelligible, but the series has lots of plots and characters not included in any other Terminator franchise. The main characters are John and Sarah Connor, but it has lots of new characters never used elsewhere: Cameron, Derek Reese, James Ellison, Catherine and Savannah Weaver, Jesse Flores and Riley Dawson, etc. The general plotline is the familiar pattern from the Terminator movies (trying to prevent Skynet from taking over, using various time travel shenanigans) but the specific instances are different.

[ficmod]

As stated in the FAQ, the general rule is that if either the main cast of characters OR the continuity is significantly different, I will count it as a separate canon. So since most of the Star Trek TV shows follow completely new groups of characters, I would allow any of them that ended 12/31/2009 or earlier.

Same goes for comics. If you'd like to nominate a specific run of Batman, you can make a case to me on this post about why you feel it's separate enough from more recent iterations of Batman. Batman Beyond, being a discrete show with its own continuity, would be considered a separate canon from Batman as a whole. If you wanted to nominate that, though, you'd have to make a case here as to why I shouldn't disqualify it based on the comic book title of Batman Beyond, which ended in 2013.

Could you elaborate a bit more on how different the Terminator series is, and why you feel like it should be counted separately? Is it made clear in the TV show that it's not a prequel to the newer, more recent films?

[beatrice_otter]

I didn't know Batman Beyond had a comic book, so I have no idea whether the two are close enough to count.

As for the Terminator series, Sarah, John, and Kyle (in flashbacks) are the only crossover characters between the show and the movies. And the basic setup (trying to stop Skynet from ending the world, future John Connor is the leader of the resistence against the machines, both Skynet and Future John sending people back in time to change things). However, a whole lot of the details are different. There are many regular characters (Cameron, Derek Reese, James Ellison, Catherine Weaver, Cromartie/John Henry) and supporting characters (Jesse Flores, Riley Dawson, Savannah Weaver, Charlie Dixon) who never show up in the movies, and lots of plot threads that don't show up either. The largest difference being the series ending: it ends on a cliffhanger, with teenage John traveling to the future in a spur of the moment decision that ends up with him in a future in which John Connor is not the leader of the resistance because John Connor wasn't there. None of these plot points or characters show up in Terminator Salvation or Terminator Genisys.

[ficmod]

I'll look into Batman Beyond and get back to you.

With the ending (plus with the Jeremy Bearimy-nature of time travel fiction), I'm okay considering the show separately. If it ends on a significantly different track that contradicts the movies, then in my book, I'm going to say that's a different continuity.

[elperian]

Popping in to say thank you for considering and accepting The Sarah Connor Chronicles!

[ficmod]

So, Batman Beyond does have a run of comics that are still being published today. They're definitely part of the same continuity and contain the same characters. However, they're from a different creative team, and their popularity compared to the tv show is debatable.

It's also a comic-related fandom, so if you want to nominate it, I'll consider the series as its own contained "run," as if you were nominating a certain volume of Batman.

I hope that seems fair! As always, I'm open to counterarguments.

[beatrice_otter]

Sounds fair!