@dmlundeen.bsky.social: Here’s one example of not doing that: Lev Grossman’s Magicians series. Secret world/portal fiction, check. Inspired by CS Lewis and JK Rowling, check (all written before she revealed herself as a shithead). Original, check!

This is such a pervasive style choice on her part that I cannot imagine engaging with it as being "bad" at coming up with names Like, you can fairly say it's not your bag, but the layers of on-the-nose, punny names are a feature, not a bug, of her creative process

I would describe it as stylistic choice that made some sense at the beginning when the first few books were aimed at younger kids, but is out of sync with the grown up themes of the other books.

Yeah, it's another of those things that somewhat works as an entertaining kids' book but doesn't really work at any greater depth. Which is fine in itself, there's plenty of place for books like that, but of course people have come to treat HP as something more than that.

It works best when she is embracing that a magical world is chaotic and not internally consistent and a contrast to our drabber world, which she maintains *reasonably* well through the septology. her attempts to clean it up have been unconvincing

The idea of a magical world just behind our boring predictable one is a classic setup. I know it’ll never happen but I’d love to see the franchise broaden by letting other authors do series for other countries.

Why not just write new books though, why be stuck recycling IP?

That works too, but realistically it helps to bolt a good story to an established ip to help things work.

Here’s one example of not doing that: Lev Grossman’s Magicians series. Secret world/portal fiction, check. Inspired by CS Lewis and JK Rowling, check (all written before she revealed herself as a shithead). Original, check!

Yes you can also do cool things by just doing stuff inspired by other authors.

He literally wrote the early drafts to include Narnia, so this example may not be doing what you hope it does

Okay. What’s your point, exactly, that he had a derivative idea and made it more original? Seems like what I suggested.

That you're being a hipster scold.

First time I’ve ever been accused of being a hipster. And I don’t think I’m scolding anyone by suggesting not recycling IP. I think it’s more interesting to make new worlds. You don’t have to agree with that of course.

It's the idea that the only valid art is something new, fresh, and untrod. That its somehow lesser art to make "Fury Road" because we've already seen Max in the post apocalypse. That if you want to make an action spy thriller, its better to not use Bond even if would get more readers.

I don’t actually hold that idea, I made a gentle suggestion toward making new worlds.

It's about as original as 50 Shades of Grey; you can decide how important that is as a yardstick

I'm sure the who superheroes thing kinda burned people out after a decade, but there's something kinda fun about seeing stories play out over extended periods. The Lord of the Rings isn't lesser for being a sequel to the Hobbit. Sherlock Holmes is fun because he's an ongoing character.

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