In honor of the leap year, I thought that we might talk about making the leap of faith when it comes to enjoying fiction. It’s a principle called suspension of disbelief.
“Suspension of disbelief or willing suspension of disbelief is a term coined in 1817 by the poet and aesthetic philosopher Samuel Taylor Coleridge, who suggested that if a writer could infuse a “human interest and a semblance of truth” into a fantastic tale, the reader would suspend judgement concerning the implausibility of the narrative. Suspension of disbelief often applies to fictional works of the action, comedy, fantasy, and horror genres.” - wikipedia.org
Now, I am not a literary scholar and there are many different takes and interpretations on the multiple aspects involved in this principle that I cannot even begin to cover here. But I would like to talk about how this principle can be applied to the world of Alternate Universes in the fanfiction world and a fandom in general.
I am a multiverse lover. There I said it. I enjoy many incarnations of TMNT. Movies past and present, the different cartoon incarnations and even though I don’t have many of the comics I can see the appeal of their story arcs, on the dark and the light side. So why is it that when the turtles themselves have been through so many commercial interpretations, do we sometimes cling to the idea of ‘cannon’ to the exclusion of the many other interpretations of the characters offered to us by the fandom through fanfiction, fanart and roleplays?
Now this is not to say that you have to like all or even ANY of the ‘headcannons’ that are out there. Everyone has different tastes. However I would propose that loosening your idea of how a character should act, or in other words, suspend your belief in your own interpretation of them, will allow you to enjoy a broader range of content.
My own benchmark for reading a story is that I start from a position of giving the author the benefit of the doubt. You say that 2k14!Raph is secretly a songwriter and dreams of performing to an audience in central park. Well ok then. Make me buy into it. Cite the hip hop album he and Mikey are making as something he really enjoys doing. Tell me about how he nervously dons his trench coat to do a street performance. Tell me how he uses music to deal with his feelings of inadequacy. Expound on how he does everything possible to make sure none of his brothers know how much it really means to him. (spoiler: they all know) Tell me about how they hijack a stage in the middle of the night and Don rigs the A/V controls and they all pitch in to give a rocking show for all their friends so Raph can live his dream. AWESOME!! If you write it well, give me reasons and make me fall in love with your idea, then I will sing your praises and write you pages and pages of happy reviews.
If it is just a poorly done rewrite on the “Out of Our Shells Tour” or even worse, the “Christmas Special” I will burn it with fire.
You see we are talking about mutated talking turtles who practice ninjutsu and have been known to travel through time and fight aliens. We have already suspended the belief of what should be plausible and stepped into the world of fantasy. To claim that such a fantasy cannot be further distorted because of an arbitrary set of limitations we impose, that it is impossible for them to act a certain way or be put into an outrageous situation, is just a little silly. Will the choices an artist or writer makes lead to the scenario being more appealing? Absolutely!! Suspending belief doesn’t mean ignoring quality.
We could speculate and debate on the finer points of this principle for ages. But February 29th is too rare of a day to be spent on such pursuits. My overall point is you might find something you really love if you take the time think outside the box and give it a chance. And there is no time like the present! So, go out and read, write or draw your favorite AU today.
Are you willing to take the leap?