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Retroactive continuity, orretcon for short, is a literary device in which facts in the world of a fictional work that have beenestablished through the narrative itself are adjusted, ignored, supplemented, or contradicted by a subsequently published work that recontextualizes or breakscontinuity with the former.[2]
There are various motivations for applying retroactive continuity, including:
Retcons are used by authors to increase their creative freedom, on the assumption that the changes are unimportant to the audience compared to the new story which can be told. Retcons can bediegetic or nondiegetic. For instance, by usingtime travel orparallel universes, an author may diegetically reintroduce a popular character they had previously killed off. More subtle and nondiegetic methods would be ignoring or expunging minor plot points to remove narrative elements the author doesn't have interest in writing.
Retcons are common inpulp fiction, and especially incomic books by long-established publishers such asDC andMarvel.[4] The long history of popular titles and the number of writers who contribute stories can often create situations that demand clarification or revision. Retcons also appear inmanga,soap operas,serial dramas, movie sequels,cartoons,professional wrestlingangles,video games, radio series,role-playing games, and other forms ofserial fiction.[5]
An early published use of the phrase "retroactive continuity" is found in theologian E. Frank Tupper's 1973 bookThe Theology ofWolfhart Pannenberg: "Pannenberg's conception of retroactive continuity ultimately means that history flows fundamentally from the future into the past, that the future is not basically a product of the past."[6]
A printed use of "retroactive continuity" referring to the altering of history in a fictional work is inAll-Star Squadron #18 (February 1983) fromDC Comics. The series was set on DC'sEarth-Two, an alternative universe in whichGolden Age comic characters age in real time.All-Star Squadron was set duringWorld War II on Earth-Two; as it was in the past of an alternative universe, all its events had repercussions on the contemporary continuity of the DC multiverse. Each issue changed the history of the fictional world in which it was set. In theletters column, a reader remarked that the comic "must make you [the creators] feel at times as if you're painting yourself into a corner", and, "Your matching of Golden Age comics history with new plotlines has been an artistic (and I hope financial!) success." WriterRoy Thomas responded, "we like to think that an enthusiastic ALL-STAR booster at one ofAdam Malin'sCreation Conventions in San Diego came up with the best name for it a few months back: 'Retroactive Continuity'. Has kind of a ring to it, don't you think?"[7]
Retcons sometimes add information that seemingly contradicts previous information. This frequently takes the form of a character who was shown to have died but is later revealed to have somehow survived. This is a common practice inhorror films, which may end with the death of a monster that goes on to appear in one or more sequels. The technique is so common insuperhero comics[2] that the term "comic book death" has been coined for it.
An early example of this type of retcon is the return ofSherlock Holmes, whom writerArthur Conan Doyle apparently killed off in "The Final Problem" in 1893,[1][8][page needed] only to bring him back, in large part because of readers' responses, with "The Empty House" in 1903.
The characterZorro was retconned early in his existence. In the original 1919 novel,The Curse of Capistrano, Zorro ends his adventures by revealing his identity, a plot point that was carried over to the 1920 film adaptationThe Mark of Zorro. In order to have further stories starring Zorro, authorJohnston McCulley kept all the elements of his original story, but retroactively ignored its ending.
One notable example isIsaac Asimov’s 1950fixup novelI, Robot, a collection ofscience fiction short stories originally published inSuper Science Stories andAstounding Science Fiction from 1940 to 1950. Compiled into a single publication byGnome Press in 1950, the collection features aframing sequence in which the stories are told to a reporter by Dr.Susan Calvin, chiefrobopsychologist atU.S. Robots and Mechanical Men, Inc. Changes necessary to fit the new version included the name of the company (originally the Finmark Robot Corporation), new, earlier references to theThree Laws of Robotics, and new interpolated scenes featuring Dr. Calvin herself.
The TV seriesDallas annulled its entire ninth season as just the dream of one of its characters,Pam Ewing. Writers did this to offer a supposedly plausible reason for the major character ofBobby Ewing, who had died onscreen at the end of season eight, to be still alive when actorPatrick Duffy wanted to return to the series. This season is sometimes referred to as the "Dream Season" and was referred to humorously in later TV series such asFamily Guy andCommunity as a "gas-leak year". Other series such asSt. Elsewhere,Newhart, andRoseanne employed the same technique.[9][10]
Unpopular stories are sometimes later ignored by publishers, and effectively erased from a series' continuity. Later stories may contradict the previous ones or explicitly establish that they never happened.[citation needed]
A notable example of subtractive retconning is theX-Men film series. AfterX-Men: The Last Stand faced criticism for abruptly killing off characters such asCyclops andJean Grey, its sequel,X-Men: Days of Future Past, features the characterWolverine traveling back in time to 1973 to prevent an assassination that, if carried out, would lead to mutant extinction. The result of this is a new timeline where Jean and Cyclops never died.[11]
Retroactive continuity is similar to, but not the same as, plot inconsistencies introduced accidentally or through lack of concern for continuity; retconning, by comparison, is done deliberately. For example, the ongoing continuity contradictions on episodic TV series such asThe Simpsons (in which the timeline of the family's history must becontinually shifted forward to explain why they are not getting any older)[12] reflects intentionally lost continuity, not genuine retcons. However, in series with generally tight continuity, retcons are sometimes created after the fact to explain continuity errors. Such was the case inThe Flintstones, whereWilma Flintstone was mistakenly given two separate maiden names over the course of the series: "Pebble" and "Slaghoople".[13]
Though the term "retcon" did not yet exist whenGeorge Orwell wroteNineteen Eighty-Four, the totalitarian regime depicted in that book is involved in a constant, large-scale retconning of past records. For example, when it is suddenly announced that "Oceania was not after all in war with Eurasia. Oceania was at war with Eastasia and Eurasia was an ally" (Part Two, Ch. 9), there is an immediate intensive effort to change "all reports and records, newspapers, books, pamphlets, films, sound-tracks and photographs" and make them all record a war with Eastasia rather than one with Eurasia. "Often it was enough to merely substitute one name for another, but any detailed report of events demanded care and imagination. Even the geographical knowledge needed in transferring the war from one part of the world to another was considerable." Seehistorical revisionism (negationism).
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