Not A Fix-It — Tag Meaning
A defensive tag that appears after devastating canon events, when readers flood the archive hoping for repairs. It announces that this fic engages with the painful canon rather than undoing it — exploring the aftermath, the grief, or the consequences as they stand.
What to Expect From "Not A Fix-It" Fics
The canon tragedy remains intact and is usually the subject. Read for processing and catharsis, not rescue.
How to find Not A Fix-It fics on AO3
On AO3, click any tag to see every work that uses it, then refine with the "Filters" sidebar — combine it with your fandom or ship, set a rating, or exclude tags you don't want. See our AO3 filtering guide for the full walkthrough.
Browse "Not A Fix-It" works on AO3Related Tags
Fix-It
Fandom's repair shop: a fic that rewrites a canon event the author (and usually the fandom) considers a mistake — a death undone, a breakup averted, a finale done right. Fix-its surge after controversial canon installments and are one of the clearest expressions of fanfiction as a corrective art form.
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Angst
One of the foundational tags of fanfiction, covering stories centered on emotional pain — grief, longing, guilt, heartbreak, despair. Unlike a content warning, Angst describes mood: the fic dwells in difficult feelings and wants you to feel them too. It says nothing on its own about whether things improve.
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Grief/Mourning
The canonical tag for fic centered on loss and its processing — funerals, anniversaries of deaths, the long ache of absence. Some of fanfiction's most acclaimed character studies live under this tag, as writers give characters the space to mourn that serialized canon rarely allows.
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Sad Ending
The honest counterpart to Happy Ending: this story concludes in loss, separation, or grief, and the author is telling you up front. Tagging it is considered basic courtesy on AO3, since an unmarked sad ending is one of fandom's cardinal reading betrayals.
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