Just in case we didn’t get the memo that One Direction are basically the hugest pop band in the world right now, prolific across the world’s iPods, without even having to forcibly place their albums onto said iPods (hey U2), a fanfiction story based on the curly-haired boy lothario that is Harry Styles is to become a film.
Anna Todd, the 25-year-old Texan who started a fanfic on Wattpad, a community full of eager fanfic-ers and readers, not only has a three-book deal, but a film in the works. Yup, it’s been ‘optioned’ by Paramount, reports The Guardian. And optioned is pretty big film speak – and means that someone out there somewhere actually thinks this is a good idea.
It’s the adaptation of After, a story about a girl called Tessa who has to convert a student called Hardin Scott from being ‘rude to the point of cruelty’ into being a nice guy. As Tessa ‘is compelled to dig deeper and find the real Hardin beneath all his lies’, it becomes very obvious that Hardin is heavily based on Harry Styles. It’s such a popular fanfiction, it’s had one billion clicks.
Though Hardin also sounds pretty similar to 50 Shades Of Grey’s Christian Grey, EL James won’t be eager to sue – see, her erotic book was actually spun as a fanfiction take on Twilight. It’s enough to make you want to take a long break from the internet, but the basic premise – mean guy is mean to girl, girl tries to change him by tapping through his tough veneer to get to that gooey sweet centre, guy changes – is the age-old stuff people still seem to lap up.
Some people aren’t too happy with the idea of lovely Harry Styles – who recently posed with a sheet of paper saying #HeForShe to show that he’s keen to stand up for women and girls’ rights – being the inspiration for such a nasty character.
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A petition on Change.org called ‘The book was bad enough, don’t let them make it into a movie’ has got 23,000 signatures from Directioners eager to see all optioning and the possible production of a film destroyed like the hairs on the back of Simon Cowell’s hands.
As well as accusing Anna of being a ‘lying, scheming woman trying to make money off of young, innocent fans’ (um, what is One Direction’s management company, then?), the blurb next to the petition makes one pretty great point:
‘After is… the tale of a girl who is physically, mentally and emotionally abused by a misogynistic boy, who everyone, and by that I mean EVERYONE, will see as Harry Styles.’
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At present, Harry’s people don’t seem to be too distressed by it. Maybe they’re cool with it helping to big up his rep as a sexy womaniser? It’s worked for him so far…
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Harry Styles Says One Direction Are Just As Popular As The Beatles – Just Not As Good
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.