FanPreferredCouple Cleanup

I've been thinking, it seems alot of entries in Fan-Preferred Couple are not disproportionately popular or are outright an Official Couple.

Also in a game series where basically anyone can be paired by the player with no set canon, how does one determine a Canon Couple? Like say Fire Emblem Fates, what determines a Fan-Preferred Couple there?

edited 2nd Feb '17 9:31:42 PM by Monsund

In a work that has no canon couple, I personally think it might be best not to use Fan-Preferred Couple at all. That's because we run the risk of people just gushing about couples they like while trying to make it seem like way more people share their opinion than might actually exist. Such gushing is not something we want on the wiki.

That being said, I think it might be better to get some other thoughts here as well, in case I don't have a full understanding on what is allowed for the trope.

We do have an on-going TRS discussion for this trope.

I'm reviving a 2 year old thread but the TRS thread has been locked for a while. Does anyone know how crossover ships are to be handled? Do they count seperately from their canon series or do ships from crossovers not count unless they're more popular than one/both characters canon ships? I recently removed an example from the Video Game page because it amounted to "Samus is a Launcher of a Thousand Ships and gets paired with everyone", but even with that Samus has pairings listed in Metroid and Super Smash Bros (which makes sense since two ships listed are popular in their own right).

The main criteria for Fan-Preferred couple is that it should be more popular than the Official Couple involving one of the people in it, even if it is a popular couple on its own right. I am a little fuzzy about whether crossover ships would be allowed or not, even if they are more popular than the Official Couple.

I happen to have (possibly overzealously) tried to re-open the discussion about Fan-Preferred Couple about a month ago, so the most recent topics made on the subject are those below.

Here is a summary of the issues surrounding Fan-Preferred Couple from my point of view.

Here is my idea for a rewrite of the trope.

I didn't go any further due to a lack of responses, which I took as an indication that my approach wasn't working out.

Edited by Nazetrime on Apr 17th 2019 at 12:11:03 PM

So I'd assume the Robin/Shulk entry on the Video Game page counts as this trope in that case? It's more popular than Shulk/Fiora, which is Shulk's canon pairing from his home series, but there's the problem of Robin not having a canon pairing with anyone and Robin/Shulk is less popular than pairings with Robin and other characters from their home series, unless anyone that they can marry in Awakening are technically counted as their canon pairings.

I agree with Fan-Preferred Couple needing a rewrite, especially since there doesn't seem to be any sort of rules in regards to crossover pairings or games with dating sim elements that don't have a canon pairing per se. I've always assumed in the case of the latter that any character the player character can hook up with counts as an official pairing regardless of it being truly canon or not, and that any pairing involving the player character can only be "fan-preferred" if the player character cannot hook up with the other half of the pairing at any point, as well as it fufilling the popularity requirement.

I have decided to revive this thread as I feel it could use some cleaning up. I don't know if I am allowed to but I hope to help clean up a trope I am legitimately interested in.

Edited by Bullman on Jun 24th 2020 at 8:16:27 AM

Anyone is allowed to help with a cleanup project

Cool. So I really don't were to start. This my first time at the start of a clean up process. I figured we start by finding some bad entries.

Edited by Bullman on Jun 24th 2020 at 8:21:07 AM

Usually what happens is that people find examples we need to discuss and start a discussion about them. So if you find examples of Fan-Preferred Couple that might need to be cut or rewritten, post them here and we'll chat about them.

Okay well there's one that I found on She's the Man:

• Fan-Preferred Couple: Viola/Olivia seems to be more popular than any of the Canon pairings.

Now this is on the main Live-Action Films page. It's one hundred percent true. They have the most fan fics about them on Archive of Our Own and arguably Fanfiction Dot Net. I just think it needs to be expanded.

Edited by Bullman on Jun 24th 2020 at 8:28:04 AM

Yeah, that's a bit of a zero context example. You're right to think it needs a bit of expanding to explain why it's the FPC. I'd say go ahead and expand it.

Okay. How's this?

• Fan-Preferred Couple: Most of the fanfiction about this film on Archive of Our Own has Viola and Olivia ending up together rather than with there respective love interests of Duke and Sebastian respectively. This mainly due to most of the flirting and build up being between the two rather than Olivia and Sebastian. Whose relationship has no build up. This also stems from the fact that many find Duke and Viola relationship cliched and boring, while feeling that Viola and Olivia have more chemistry.

Feel free to tell me if it's not good.

Edited by Bullman on Jul 3rd 2020 at 5:43:18 AM

I'd rewrite this section due to some grammar issues and the final sentence comes across a little bit as complaining. Perhaps, something like this:

Edited by Wyldchyld on Jul 3rd 2020 at 11:58:57 AM

Okay. So something like this:

• Fan-Preferred Couple: Most of the fanfiction about this film on Archive of Our Own has Viola and Olivia ending up together rather than with there respective love interests of Duke and Sebastian respectively. This is mainly due to most of the flirting and build up being between the two rather than Olivia and Sebastian. It also stems from fans feeling that Viola and Olivia have more chemistry than Duke and Viola.

Edited by Bullman on Jul 3rd 2020 at 6:09:03 AM

Two or three proofreads:

• Fan-Preferred Couple: Most of the fanfiction about this film on Archive of Our Own has Viola and Olivia ending up together rather than with their respective love interests of Duke and Sebastian. This is mainly due to most of the flirting and build up being between the two rather than Olivia and Sebastian. It also stems from fans feeling that Viola and Olivia have more chemistry than Duke and Viola too.

Edited by futuremoviewriter on Jul 3rd 2020 at 4:51:12 AM

I like it. Can I add it to the She's the Man and the Live-Action Films?

Edited by Bullman on Jul 3rd 2020 at 12:58:45 PM

Well, if we're going the proof-reading route, I'd suggest the following grammar/punctuation tweaks to futuremoviewriter's suggestion:

• Fan-Preferred Couple: Most fanfiction about this film on Archive of Our Own has Viola and Olivia ending up together rather than with their respective love interests, Duke and Sebastian. This is mostly due to flirting and build-up occuring between them rather than between Olivia and Sebastian. It also stems from fans feeling that Viola and Olivia have more chemistry than Duke and Viola.

Edited by Wyldchyld on Jul 5th 2020 at 3:15:53 PM

That's good. Sorry. My grammar has never been to good. I'm going to seek help for it. Thanks for that. I already added it if you don't mind.

Now I found another entry. That doesn't give any context.

• Jess/Jules is this in Bend It Like Beckham.

Now unlike with She's the Man I have never seen this movie so I don't know how to expand it. But from my research it's true that they are the Fan-Preferred Couple. So has anyone here seen it?

Edited by Bullman on Jul 5th 2020 at 10:20:55 AM

I'm afraid I haven't seen it either.

So should I hide it then?

Yep.

Done.

I put these up not that long ago in the Live Action TV:

• American Housewife:
  • Oliver Otto and Cooper Bradford are shipped together very strongly for how much of a bromance they have and the fact that they have more chemistry than Oliver had with Alice, Gina or Brie when he was with any of them.
  • Oliver’s pairing with Gina is much preferred over his pairing with Alice or Brie.
  • Those not interested in the Oliver/Cooper ship and yet still want Cooper to become part of the Otto family pair him with Oliver’s sister Taylor and hope that Taylor’s current relationship with Dumb Jock Trip Windsor comes to an end soon for it. The pairing would also mean that Oliver and Cooper become brothers-in-law.

Good examples?

While it's sorta unavoidable given the nature of the page, I'd personally think examples should make sure not to drift into bashing of non-preferred couples, so I'm inclined to want to avoid "people prefer to ship Alice with Bob because of her lack of chemistry with Charlie"-type writeups.