Canon Shot

The problem with “canon” isn't that it exists. It's that people use it as a limiting influence rather than a guideline. They try to, as someone said, snap all the tabs together and create a gigantic flow chart which restricts rather than encourages creativity. As if there was one, single interpretation to rule them all. Instead, what a consistent body of work offers is a resource, a starting point, for all future stories to spring from. It doesn't tell you what you can't do but suggest what you shouldn't by virtue of pointing out what you should. Following the canon might tell you, for example, that Tony Stark is actually a hero, not the colossal dick who's the evil mastermind behind all your universe's recent woes.