Executive Meddling / Fan Works

• The Victors Project
  • In-Universe. Beyond the active meddling of the Gamemakers, the Capitol also occasionally arranges for certain children to be reaped. There are "soft fixes," in which the pre-selected tribute is allowed as much a chance to win as anyone else, and "hard fixes," in which the pre-selected tribute is marked for an early death.
  • This went Up to Eleven for the 28th Games, when Snow ordered the Gamemakers to appease the Sixatrons by rigging the Games such that the District 6 tribute—in this case, Chevy Anderson—wins.

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  • Another example is the 44th Games, where Snow ordered Brandybane to send a message to the Career Districts, who he felt were acting too entitled lately and taking their privileges for granted. Brandybane carried this out by creating a massive sinkhole at the very start of the Games, swallowing up the Cornucopia, all its supplies, and the entire Career pack that year, plus six other tributes. This guaranteed an outlier Victor (who ultimately turned out to be, ironically, the District 6 female tribute Maeve Collins) while also reminding the Career districts that even they were still subject to Snow's whims.
  • Interestingly, two "soft fixes" who win, Emrys and Circe, are both from District 5.
  • Roan Tully suffers from both ends of this: President Snow wants to rig the games to let Roan win after realizing he's willing to kill Katniss but Plutarch sabotages the games to ensure Roan goes through (well-deserved) hell in order to keep this from happening.

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• Another The Hunger Games fanfic series, The End of the World series by FernWithy also has some of this, with Haymitch noting that a gamemnaker who acts surprised that the Games could be rigged should be nominated for an acting award.
• The opening gag of the first episode of Vision of Escaflowne Abridged. When Hitomi is confused to find herself suddenly transported to Gaea, her companion explains it's due to sexist executives dropping the first episode.
  Van: The reason you're confused is that the network decided to skip the first episode. It seems that certain... elements didn't test well among that crucial, "Has a Penis," demographic.
  Hitomi: And that that was more important to them than maintaining continuity in the plot?
  Van: You're watching Fox.
• Spoofed in the April Fools chapter of Pokémon Reset Bloodlines, where an Anthropomorphic Personification (aptly named Execu Tivem Edlin and represented by a faceless figure in a business suit) attempts to sway the writer into taking the story in ways he really doesn't want to, including adding more Fanservice, speeding up harem antics and other similar clichés. It gets to the point that the writer gets fed up and threatens the executive with the tool he uses to write a story: a chainsaw.