Over is Over

A few days ago, a friend of mine in the industry pointed me to a blog post by someone else in the industry. (Names withheld to protect the innocent, the guilty, and me.) It was a pretty long post, and it covered a bunch of specific details, but the gist of it was that “steampunk is over.” That there’s nothing left of the genre but people imitating other people in the genre.

Seems to me that I’ve heard that before.

I hear that superhero movies were over–a couple of years before Batman Begins, Iron Man, and (especially) The Dark Knight.

After the initial peak of popularity for Anne Rice, Tanya Huff, PN Elrod, and White Wolf’s Vampire: the Masquerade, I heard that vampires were over. I’ve heard the same said more recently, in the wake of Twilight. (Leaving aside the usual arguments as to whether those are actually vampires.) If that’s true, and vampires are “over,” you might want to tell Jasper Kent, or Clay and Susan Griffith, or the folks behind True Blood. Or heck, even the guys at White Wolf, who are about to release a brand new MMORPG based on Masquerade.

I’ve recently been hearing people say that zombies are over. I think AMC and Frank Darabont just put the lie to that rather handily.

People have been saying that sword & sorcery fantasy is over for years, even decades. Well, I’ve talked about that before; let’s just say you only have to browse the fantasy section at your local bookstore to see just how true that’s not.

Almost every sub-genre that’s attained any real popularity and has been around more than a few years has been declared over–by fans, by creatives, by experts in the field. And you know what? They’re always wrong.

Oh, sure, popularity wanes. Topics that were once everywhere become more scarce, harder to find. But they don’t go away, and more often than not, after a period of quiescence, they come roaring back. Maybe in a slightly different guise, maybe tweaked for a new generation (often more than traditionalists–myself included, when it comes to lots of fantasy and horror–would like), but they come back.

In my experience, at least, the bulk of the cries of “That’s over!” come from people who want it to be over. Maybe they’re tired of superhero movies. Maybe they prefer urban fantasy to sword & sorcery. Maybe they’re sick of vampires as romantic figures and want to see them go away for a while so they can come back as the monsters they should be. *cough, cough*

And sometimes–I stress sometimes; I’m not painting everyone, or even a majority, with this brush–it’s because they’re bitter about the fact that they themselves couldn’t find success in the sub-genre. It’s a sad display of jealousy, but it does happen. I’ve seen it firsthand.

What might legitimately be “over”–and what I think a lot of people are actually talking about when they speak of an entire sub-genre being “over”–is a particular cycle of influence and mimicry. Anne Rice’s vampire books were a huge success, and suddenly every portrayal of vampires for many years cast them as steamy, romantic, tragic, operatic figures. Vampire novels weren’t being inspired by the myths of vampires. They were being inspired by Anne Rice’s novels. And then they were being inspired by books that were inspired by Anne Rice’s novels, or books that were inspired by games that were inspired by books that were inspired by Anne Rice’s novels. And so forth.

So sure, when a particular sub-genre starts feeding on itself like Ouroboros with the munchies, it’s probably time for that particular interpretation to take a siesta. But the sub-genre itself ain’t dead, and anyone who says otherwise is either genuinely mistaken or has an agenda.

What’s my point with all this? Honestly, I’m speaking mostly to the aspiring writers out there. One of the first lessons that many experienced writers, and agents, and editors give to the newcomers is that you shouldn’t chase the fads. Just because steampunk, or vampires, or cannibal marmosets with daddy issues are popular now doesn’t mean that they will be in two years when your next book comes out. “Write,” the say, “what you want to write. What you can get excited about writing. It may not sell, but you’ll have a better shot, and more fun, and a better finished product, than if you’re trying to ape the current hot stuff.”

And that’s true, but I wanted to make it clear that the reverse is also true. Don’t assume that because something’s popular and common that there’s no room for a new spin. Don’t throw away an exciting idea just because some pundit online said that a particular genre is “over,” or that it’s so narrowly defined that your story doesn’t fit. Don’t be derivative–we don’t need knock-offs–but a new spin? A zombie or vampire or steampunk story that we haven’t seen before? Not only is the genre never too over for that, but it just might be what a whole bunch of the genre’s fans, hungry for something both new and familiar at the same time, are looking for.

ARI MARMELL has an extensive history of writing for role-playing games but has always worked on improving and publishing his fiction at every opportunity–including publishing a number of eBooks and short stories. He is the author of Agents of Artifice, a “Magic: The Gathering” novel–but The Conqueror’s Shadow was his first wholly original published book. The Warlord’s Legacy, his upcoming book, goes on-sale January 25, 2011.

You can learn more about Ari and his writing at mouseferatu.com