Clear Up Definition and Correct Misuse: Urban Fantasy

Just as an observation, rather than anything else; I think the problem is that Urban Fantasy is a really recent genre when compared to others in the "fantasy" family. It's only really caught on in the last 10-15 years, and of the few works before that, they were really alpha releases with most tropes borrowed from the high and low fantasy (or pulp detective and/or sci-fi) genres only tweaked a little. Heck even most of the stories from 10 years ago were beta-versions.

Magical Realism is even newer as widely used genre, I don't think it is even fully formed yet, so there is bound to be a lot of overlap and confusion over definitions as both genres are still in evolution. With regard to Urban Fantasy that means that a lot of tropes, and a lot of the write up were written before it settled down, and probably no longer applies. Not misuse per se, but out-dated information based on what was available at the time.

I do believe though that Urban Fantasy should have most of the plot take place in Urban (or at very least Suburban) settings. The standard weird goings on in the countryside type of fantasy isn't Urban Fantasy. I can't quite define it, but there is a definite different feel between that type of story and Urban Fantasy. The movie An American Werewolf In London probably sums that up, the first part on the moors is by no means Urban Fantasy, but then it moves to London and we can see a real, early, version of Urban Fantasy tropes at play.

edited 22nd Jun '11 7:14:55 AM by CrypticMirror

Urban Fantasy, as I see it, is a setting in which magic exists alongside technology. Something set in the 90's in New York, but some people have magic crystals that let you summon demons, would be Urban Fantasy. Magi Tech is when they use Magic to make technology and vice-versa, for example, using magic energy crystals as/in long-lasting batteries for electronics.

Urban Fantasy and Magi Tech don't really have to be separate. What if only certain people had access to magic crystals to put into the batteries, and the Magic energy crystals have uses beyond being put in batteries?

Hmm, when I said I found silly not considering works setting in the 'country side', I think I meant 'suburban'. I was thinking in small, but modern, towns, not the middle of the mountains. I guess I used the wrong words.

Cryptic has a point. Countryside isn't really this trope. Though towns, even small towns tend to get the feel well.

I fully agree. I just understood badly what 'countryside' means. Sorry my bad English.

But school settings like Hogwarts with the surrounding town have the right elements without being strictly 'city'.

Why are you mentioning this now?

Anyway, a school like Hogwart may do feel 'urban' enough for the trope. I am not entirely sure, though.

Because we're trying to define trope limits.

Hogwarts is certainly not Urban Fantasy, in many ways it is a throwback to a sort of Victorian Fantasy setting). Not even close. I feel that any town that qualifies ought to have at least four streets (tarmacked) as bare minimum, electricity should be common, and there should be normal amenities such as cafe's, bars, shops, some industrial capacity (or at least some small modern workshops and warehousing) and at least one petrol station along with a bus stop. If it fails on those (but is still set in the post WW 1 time period-near future) then I'd call it Rural Fantasy.

edited 22nd Jun '11 9:29:14 AM by CrypticMirror

You're thinking Gaslamp Fantasy. A YKTTW is being worked on right now.

Gaslamp would be the historical version. Rural Fantasy would be fantasy stories set in a small modern-era town, village, hamlet, farmstead in the countryside. For example first bit of An American Werewolf In London is Rural Fantasy, but the latter parts are Urban Fantasy. The Magicians House, Century Falls and The Snow Spider are the only other examples I can think of, but it is the sort of book I'll put back on the shelf at the bookshop, and the type of show I tend not to watch (although back in the 1980s the Weird Goings on in the West Country was a staple of BBC).

Urban Fantasy should have enough modern-era infrastructure to make you feel that you are safely wrapped up in technology and law and order. If the unreal exists in it, it would be a smack in the face to most residents.

edited 22nd Jun '11 10:28:16 AM by CrypticMirror

Come to think of it, I imagine there's probably a number of things where you have some monster/ancient creature/witches left over in the woods/countryside/Midlands county known for its pottery. Things from Marble Hornets through The Village to The Blair Witch Project. Or even The Wicker Man...well, y'know, if there were actually some fantasy elements in it.

I'm all for creating a Modern Fantasy supertrope, but I think we're getting a little far afield in some of our definitions of the sub-tropes. With Urban Fantasy, I really feel that the Urban should come first. It's like our own world with a magical underpinning that only the the initiated are aware of. So yes, the Masquerade is an essential part of it. I think of things like Anita Blake, Fables, and the like. And yes, I really do feel that it needs to be set in some version of our own reality/ world/ history. By contrast, Magical Realism is where a singular fantastic element is introduced into an otherwise normal life - for this I think of Harvey and its spiritual successor Wilfred, Practical Magic or Stephen King's IT. Most of the other Magic in Modern times uses seems to me to fall under Magical Mundane. I would put the Twilight books here, as there is no Urban element to them, the Harry Potterverse here as the magic is too widely accepted by all of the featured characters, {{Buffy: The Vampire Slayer}} and Angel for the same reasons, and the various Magical Girl series here and similar stories. I think those stories that do not take place on Earth, like Hunter X Hunter, need to either be assigned to the Modern Fantasy supertrope or else a new sub-trope needs to be suggested for them. However, in the end, if it does not take place in a modern urban / industrialized 'real-world' environment, then it's not Urban Fantasy.

edited 22nd Jun '11 11:40:23 AM by Noswill

I'd dispute Buffy and Angel as not being Urban Fantasy (well Angel started off as Urban Fantasy anyway, how it ended up on the other hand), apart from that I think I agree.

edited 22nd Jun '11 11:40:58 AM by CrypticMirror

Even if you say the "urban" part is important for Urban Fantasy (which, I admit, make sense), I fail at seeing how "The Masquerade" and "setting on Earth" is important. Yeah, both are common, but shouldn't be necessary for a much broader trope.

Because the genre is based on realism. Once you've changed those factors, it falls into other fantasy genres. It loses the elements that make this genre what it is. It's a more realistic sort of fantasy.

I'd say the has to be on Earth bit comes from it being a contemporary-society trope, if it is set from about 1920 (I'd personally argue it should be the end of WW 2 not WW 1 that it starts, the interwar period is more the era of the high pulps, Urban Fantasy seems to be late 40s at the earliest as it starts as a supernatural take on the Film Noir period) to 202? then it is going to be Earth based. If it is in its own world then other fantasy/sci-fi setting-tropes apply.

As for the masquerade being present, well nearly every work that falls within the genre has masquerade as standard. It is kind of a chicken and egg thing, but I personally think it goes with the sense of claustrophobia and isolation that most of the hero/protagonists in the genre seem to experience. It is hard to have an isolated hero if there isn't a secret to protect.

Presumably as the genre evolves then The Masquerade will begin to show up more in aversions, and subversions. That just hasn't happened yet.

I'm hoping some of that made sense, it has been a long day here.

edited 22nd Jun '11 2:48:59 PM by CrypticMirror

You keep insisting on that, but this is quite arbitrary. You are saying the "genre use it", but you are not giving any reason for why we should restrict the genre for such. Also, neither elements are indicatives of realism.

But what if it is a a "world similar to Earth but not Earth itself"? Why should it be a different trope? I see no reason for that. Specially not for a broad label such as Urban Fantasy.

As for the Masquerade. "Nearly every work that falls within the genre has masquerade as standard" doesn't mean "It must have masquerade or it is not the trope". I understand a Masquerade is common place and the standard, but there is no reason to restrict the trope to shows that only use it.

Because that's how authors, fantasy conventions, and the publishing industry define it. I'm talking about defining the term as it's defined everywhere else. (Save wikipedia because they're insane.)

I, personally, would say "set in something recognizable as the modern-day real world, in a city or large town with modern conveniences" is the key part; The Masquerade is common, but not necessary. For example, I would call Sunshine Urban Fantasy — vampires and magic-users are out in the open (though not exactly common), but there's still enough of the trappings of mundane 21st century life (the heroine works at a coffee shop; she has movie nights with her family; she drives a car and uses the internet...) for the setting to feel familiar.

The supernatural elements not being hidden from Muggles doesn't make them mundane necessarily; they could still be treated as a big deal. I mean, "vampires exist and are widely known about, and they're incredibly dangerous and the hero has to kill them" is different from "vampires exist and are widely known about, and being one is as unremarkable as having blonde hair". And just because the main characters in series like Buffy may begin treating the supernatural elements as run-of-the-mill doesn't mean those series fall into Mundane Fantastic if the rest of the world doesn't treat them that way.

edited 22nd Jun '11 8:11:58 PM by bluepenguin

Buffy's real issue with being Urban Fantasy is that it seemed like everyone in town knew, they were just pretending they didn't. It was kind of not a big deal on the Hellmouth. Sunnydale was supposed to be weird in that regard, but it sort of killed the Urban Fantasy idea.

Thanks. It is more or less this I have been trying to say all along.

Yeah, but for my understanding of Urban Fantasy vs. Mundane Fantastic, it doesn't matter so much whether they know about it as whether they treat it as though it's at all dangerous or unusual. My point is that although Buffy and her friends may see a horrible demonic being and go "welp, must be Thursday", not everyone would. It's not quite on the level of vampires strolling around in the open drinking from blood bags and no one giving them a second glance (to use the trope-distinction example given a couple pages back).

... Then again, it's been ages since I've seen the show, so I probably shouldn't be trying to use it in my arguments.

I don't think Mundane Fantastic is even a genre, it's an aspect that is common to a number of genres of fantasy. It basically just describes how comfortable the general population in a story is with the magic elements in that world. Some urban fantasies have it, others don't. Some high fantasies have it, others don't. It's not a genre unto itself.

Also agreeing with bluepenguin, Sunshine, The Hollows and Anita Blake'' are all undeniably Urban Fantasy, and none of them are operating under a Masquerade.

And I kind of think we should leave talk of trying to fit most Anime into lit categories all-together. Anime has it's own qualifiers for these things. Pokemon and Digimon are both Mon series, and outside of that it's really pretty impossible to try to catagorize them, because the thing about anime is even clearly supernatural or fantasy elements are often handwaved with scientific sounding technobabble. It's sort of a common trait of anime. you can say that Digimon is clearly sci-fi because it basically calls itself sci-fi, but actually so does pokemon to a pretty big extent (it's just less obvious because it doesn't, say, going to "the digital world"). It's just not exactly as believable as science, like Digimon is. What defines either of them isn't their fantasy-ness or their scifi-ness (although again, admittedly digimon comes closer) but really by their mon-ness.

I will say though that some anime are clearly one thing or another. Durarara and Bakemonogatari are clearly Urban Fantasy.

Also is anyone cares, in his writing Podcast Brandon Sanderson pointed out a pretty good reason why Harry Potter isn't an urban Fantasy (this was actually discussed in an episode). basically the fantasy elements and the realistic elements never really cross-over, instead it's almost like a portal fantasy. For instance, in Harry Potter, you don't see Death Eaters carrying guns, or wizards watching television, they hardly even know it exists. It's separated, even beyond the scope of a masquerade. They aren't in the modern world, in hiding, they might as well be in a different world altogether. That's why it's a High Fantasy that happens to be set in modern times.

I agree with all of this. In fact, it seems that it's getting more common for Urban Fantasy works to dispose of The Masquerade and be about what happens after non-human races come out of the coffin. Isn't The Sookie Stackhouse Mysteries another work that does that? (I only know about it second-hand.)

edited 23rd Jun '11 1:22:26 AM by DoktorvonEurotrash