Due to the fact that I'm writing one (which I once swore never to do), I've been contemplating crossovers lately. Sometimes, I've found myself halfway to figuring out how one would work before I catch myself. I even have a few story files started, aside from Midnight Watch. So, my question is, what is the screwiest crossover you've ever seen or contemplated that actually works? What crossover plotbunnies have you dismissed to the vault of unwritten ideas?

Me, well, I've found that crossovers into serieses set in the real world to be rather simple. Location plays a factor, but can be overcome with a bit of creative thinking. I was surprised when Forever Knight crossed so smoothly into Harry Potter, and it has occurred to me that Friday the Thirteenth, the Series would be a simple cross, too. (Think about it. Cursed objects sold at one particular antique store. Horcruxes. Easy. I don't plan on writing it, though. Ever.) I have a partially written Harry Potter/JAG crossover, too, as well as a HP/Labyrinth cross. The lure of the plot bunnies got me. 'Sides, with the Labryinth crossover, I get to torture the Dursleys exceedingly.

I think, however, the best and screwiest crossover I've ever read was between Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Hercules: The Legendary Journeys - When Hellmouths Collide. Weird, I know, but it worked.

For HP, I still love Ishtar's Harry Potter/Addams Family crossover, Family Values.

 

Back in The Day, me and Vash hammered out quite an elaborate plot for a Harry Potter/Knights of the Old Republic Crossover. I've still got rather elaborate notes around here somewhere, mapping out the plot progression up until just after Bastila gets nabbed by Malak, with vague notes right up until the start of KotOR 2.

No promises, but after Team Gizka finishes the Restoration Project, it wouldn't overly surprise me to see this bunny lurch back into a horrible parody of life.

 

Denarian Knight

 

Back when Ranma 1/2 fanfiction was one of the most popular of the anime genre (next to Sailor Moon), it got crossed with nearly anything that moved, and it generally worked because of the mutability of the series itself. You could remain rather consistant, and accomodate any number of crossover series. We even got to joking that if it exists, there is a Ranma 1/2 crossover fanfiction of it (this was before the birth of Rule 34).

 

Ditto. It would be difficult to find a crossover that is better.

 

The difficulty with crossovers is that you have to balance two different worlds so that fans from either works are able to comprehend it without difficulty.

All too often, an author becomes too immersed into one work over another, losing the feel of a crossover and alienating half of the readers in the process.

Personally, the three crossovers I'd cite as being especially effective are Shezza's DR/DK Series, nonjon's HP/Firefly crossover, and The Wizard of Gotham, a Batman/HP crossover.


Shezza's DresdenFiles/HP crossover was really effective in that despite dealing with two entirely systems of magic and supernatural realms, he managed to integrate them seemlessly and without confusion to the reader. Even though I've never touched the Dresden Files series, I've been able to follow the story easily. In fact, it demonstrates another good characteristic of a good crossover: it immerses the reader into the new universe enough to make them curious about it. Shezza's story definitely makes me want to go read Dresden Files someday.


nonjon's work, Browncoat, Green Eyes crossed HP and Firefly. I'd never heard of Firefly prior to reading the story; in fact, the crossover was one of the reasons why I put off reading it for so long. However, despite the fact that his work was more Firefly-centric than HP-centric (the series that I was familiar with), he really great at giving all of the background necessary for the understanding of the story, without impeding the flow of the plot or the character interaction. By the time I got into it, the HP universe was in the back of my mind: it didn't matter that the story was more focused on another series because it was all so comprehensive and easy to understand.


Finally, the Wizard of Gotham is really cool in that it didn't actually change either of its crossover series, but merely made them compatible enough to coexist. The author found similarities (i.e. Bruce Wayne's and Harry Potter's hair, Poison Ivy's and Lily Potter's hair, etc.) that made the crossover and connections logical and sensible. This method was really clever and rather effective as well. I remember having a lot of "ohhh... I can't believe I never saw that" moments working through it- the novelty made it really enjoyable to read.

 

most screwed up Crossover?

Potter/Bible Black/Gundam Wing/Diablo 2/Ranma.

 

Link it. The power of Christ compels you!

Bratling: Here's an essay written on what it takes to write a good Ranma crossover. Some of it is pretty specific to Ranma, but a lot of the advice can be applied equally well to Harry Potter crossovers.

http://www.anifics.com/hosted/thermopyle/stories/ranmacrossoversf.txt

The main piece of advice, iirc, is to write a good story, not a good crossover.

 

Yak, it's more idle curiosity than seeking advice. The hard part is balancing and blending the universes into a seamless whole. I just kind of wondered what strange and marvelous crossovers that other people had found or thought up...

 

There are only a few crossovers I can read. I don't watch enough TV to understand half of the crossovers. I do love them though; the idea of merging two worlds and seeing how the characters react to one another just appeals to me.

During my Buffy the Vampire Slayer phase I read a lot of Buffy/HP crossovers, but they just SUCK. Back then I was new to fanfiction and so didn't understand just how much they sucked. That was during my Draco/Ginny phase, which I'm now over due to reading all of them, and finding the rest crap.

I read a Hp/Malcolm in the middle crossover. HiBob on FF.net did a serise of them. They aren't the best written things, but they are hilarious. Unfortunatly the last story was just... well... not good. It might have been good to others, but he crossed over a bunch of other things and I got lost.

 

Anyone read the ,Resident Evil/Harry Potter/Buffy the Vampire Slayer, story?

It wasn't that bad but not a story I would reread.

 

Harry's a politician?

 

I've got a WIP one that's a crossover with what's quite possibly the most obscure pen and paper RPG in existence (Unknown Armies), but it's shitty.

It's kind of funny. Crossovers are almost invariably crap, but the ones that aren't tend to kick so much ass it'd make Bruce Lee go "Oh, shit, best leave that alone" if he were still kicking.

(And I'm still waiting for a Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas/Harry Potter crossover. )

 

Yeah, can't remember the name though. It was over at Twisting the Hellmouth and starred Harry & Faith. Pretty good for the most part, though the ending was kinda crappy.

Aekiel

 

I think it may have been by Erised Burning. I'm about to check the library. Edit to come.

Edit: Yep. Harry Potter and the Dawn of the Dead by Erised Burning. That's the one.

 

I've read a few HP/Yu Yu Hakusho crossovers (being a YYH fan). There are a few 100k+ word ones, but for the most part they suck. There was one or two that were pretty good, but I don't remember the names, or have links to them.

There's a Ranma/HP crossover that's pretty long where Harry gets taken in by Genma when his parents die, and short story is he becomes a mini Ranma with magic. I couldn't really get into though despite being a huge Ranma fan. Just wasn't that good.

edit: as a general rule, don't cross series that don't take place in the same world. The reason why things like HP, Ranma, Tenchi, SM, YYH, etc. are easy to cross over is that they take place in the real world. Sure you have to have a good plot device (or 10) to overcome some basic difficulties, but since they take place in 'the real world' they can be crossed over with other series that take place in the 'real world'.

For example, it would be just about impossible to do a Hunter X Hunter/HP, Codex Alera/HP, etc. because they take place in entirely different worlds. And besides the whole cliched "dimension jumping" plot, there really isn't anything you can do to cross them over.

 

That story was made of win until the ending and it failed so epically I almost threw up in disgust.

I can't believe nobody has mentioned Black Dragon6 yet, he is just about the best Ranma crossover writer out there right now. With story's like Guardian and Millennium few can compete....well Ozzallos and Materia Blade have a co op R/SM cross called The Anarchists that is really good that might just beat out Guardian, and Obsidian Fox has a R/HP/Lovecraft story called Eldritch Asylum that gets updated one a year thats really good as well.

Links to all of this are here.

Eldritch Asylum: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/2056653/1/Eldritch_Asylum

The Anarchists (yes it is still going...just slow): http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3433414/1/The_Anarchists

Guardian: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/720841/1/Guardian

Millennium: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/2449022/1/Millennium

Now who said there wasn't still a few Diamonds to find on FF.net

 

Odd you should mention that. I've been wanting to write one for ages... well, sort of write one. HP, but inspired by Fear and Loathing. Just Harry getting smashed for two months of summer and a bit of school... one big trip. Figured the magical world would be the perfect place to wander round in a drug induced haze. Unfortunatly I never got around to writing it.. planning it out in my mind did serve to amuse me though.

 

I've steered away from HP crossovers. I assume you've read just about anything worthwhile enough to point out in the series.

This is a quick distillation of the pure gold crossovers I've come across over the years. There was a lot of near-gold that didn't make the cut. Often I don't care for the TV shows and books that they're based on. These fics were chosen because they are bloody good; not because "ZOMG! HP/My Little Pony is so *squee*!".

Mhalachai's, Balancing Act. Anita Blake/Stargate SG1.
http://www.tthfanfic.com/Story-8996/Mhalachai+Balancing+Act.htm

jAkL's, Far Beyond Normal. Buffy/Stargate SG1.
http://www.tthfanfic.com/Story-8322/jAkL+Far+Beyond+Normal.htm

LMouse's, A Slayer of Nightmares. Buffy/Inu Yasha.
http://www.tthfanfic.com/Story-11233/LMouse+A+Slayer+of+Nightmares.htm

Gabriel Blessing's, Finishing What You Start. Ranma/Sailormoon.
http://www.geocities.com/ranikkoku/gabriel_blessing.html

John Biles & Rod M's, Children of an Elder God. Evangelion/Lovecraft.
http://www.thekeep.org/~rpm/eva/coaeg.html

WFRose's... Everything. He's a prolific master of Ranma crossovers. Silence of the Lambs, Duke Nukem 3D, Panzer Dragoon Saga, American McGee, Jet Set Radio, Zelda, etc. etc. His story telling is very good. He's disciplined.
http://www.fanfiction.net/u/57925/

Rakna's, Chosen. Evangelion/Elseworlds. Not actually a crossover, though it is very similar to them. The alternate fantasy universe that the fic is set in could have easily come from another anime series like Legend of Lodoss Wars or Rayearth.
http://www.fanfiction.net/s/285515/1/Chosen

Read them,
Yak.

 

I've read this. It stands out in my mind because it's both incredibly emo and incredibly preachy while still managing to be incredibly good. Damned if I know how he pulled that off.

WFROSE is the fucking man. If you've got even the slightest interest in reading Ranma fanfiction, dig in. Right now. Don't let the fact that he doesn't really do summaries stop you.

We can't stop here. This is acromantula country.