What Does Badfic Mean?
Fic TypeFanfiction that is spectacularly, often legendarily bad — sometimes sincerely, sometimes on purpose. Fandom's relationship with badfic spans mockery, affection, and outright canonization of works like My Immortal.
Badfic in Practice
Badfic as a category emerged alongside fic itself, but fandom built genuine institutions around it: sporking communities performed dramatic readings and line-by-line riffs, and certain works achieved immortality through their badness — My Immortal, the Harry Potter fic of contested authorship, is studied, performed, and quoted like scripture. Deliberate badfic is its own craft, with challenges rewarding the most gloriously awful prose, and the line between sincere and intentional badfic fuels eternal debate about famous specimens. The culture around badfic has softened over time, as fandom reckoned with the fact that most legendary badfic was written by actual fourteen-year-olds. Affectionate appreciation has largely replaced the old bloodsport.
Example usage
"We do an annual dramatic reading of the fandom's foundational badfic, complete with voices, and it heals something in all of us."
Related Terms
Sporking
Mocking a bad fic by quoting it with running humorous commentary — the successor to MSTing. The name evokes wielding a spork against deserving prose.
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Trollfic
A fic written to be deliberately, provocatively terrible — bad spelling, absurd plotting, and escalating outrage as performance art. The reader's bafflement is the intended product.
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MSTing
Mocking a piece of writing by interleaving it with running commentary, in the style of the TV show Mystery Science Theater 3000. A badfic gets reposted line by line with jokes inserted between the lines.
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Purple Prose
Writing so ornate it gets in its own way — cascades of adjectives, baroque metaphors, eyes never just 'blue' but 'twin cerulean orbs.' A classic critique in fic circles.
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