Fanlore:Featured Article Archives/2022: Week 26

An unauthorized sequel is a work created with the unauthorized use of another fan's story/universe/character. They are sometimes the subject of controversy and discussion in fandom.

Some fans feel that any fan story is fair game to be used; others feel it should require specific permission until a shared universe is a certain (indeterminate) size, or has been declared open by the original author.

In 2017, Ruth Berman commented on writing sequels to other fan stories: "I suspect that the habit of thinking about someone else’s story and finding that the thoughts are turning into scenes & dialogue demanding to be written as a separate story is related to the impulse to write stories in other people’s universes in the first place. It’s a sort of hybrid between fiction and criticism."

Unauthorized sequels may be considered recursive, but many recursive fanfiction authors only proceed with permission.