Just because there are technically no executives, doesn't mean Fan Works are immune to Executive Meddling.
- The Bolt Chronicles: Subverted in universe in "The Pilot." James's vision for his new "Bolt" TV show sees his script dumbed down and his underscore music request refused by network higher-ups. It becomes a big hit despite (or more likely because of) this.
- In-Universe: this is why the titular Show Within a Show in The Calvin, Hobbes, and Paine Show was retooled into a Variety Show after Watterson left. Another incident Calvin describes was when they were forced to do a parody of The Blair Witch Project in 1999, just like every other comedy show did at the time.
- Spoofed in the Halloween Unspectacular X story "The Focus Group", which sees the Nicktoons get bought out by a corporate entity that decides to enforce changes on them. This includes changing their outfits (making Jenny a Ms. Fanservice and forcing Timmy to wear blue because "pink is for girls", for example), kicking Spongebob from the team for being Ambiguously Bi, adding a black male (not a female because they've already got Jenny) to the team because "Black Lives currently Matter" (and failing to come up with a candidate), banning the team from fighting any villain besides Dark Laser because all the other options would be "problematic" to fight, and threatening to liquidate the team and turn it into a toy license if they refuse to go along with these changes. It ultimately turns out that this trope was invoked as part of a plan by Preston Northwest, Vlad Masters and Mr. Burns to defeat every hero team on the planet by putting them under corporate scrutiny.
- The Hunger Games:
- The End of the World series by FernWithy also has an In-Universe example, with Haymitch noting that a gamemaker who acts surprised that the Games could be rigged should be nominated for an acting award.
- Saving the Boy has a rather extreme In-Universe example, where the Gamemakers literally do everything in their power to ensure Peeta wins the Games since it was a direct order from President Snow himself. On top of having far fewer dangers directed toward him than most tributes, no matter how favored, usually do, he's gifted several game-breaking supplies such as high-tech armor, a lot of which he doesn't need thanks to his fat sponsor account (much of which was money donated from Snow himself). As an example of how rigged the Games are in his favor, the Gamemakers outright program the mutts they put in the arena to ignore him completely. Short of being killed by another tribute or falling afoul of more mundane hazards such as nightlock, it is impossible for Peeta to lose, and indeed, he does end up winning.
- The Victors Project has several In-Universe examples:
- Beyond the active meddling of the Gamemakers, the Capitol also occasionally arranges for certain children to be reaped. There are "soft fixes," in which the pre-selected tribute is allowed as much a chance to win as anyone else, and "hard fixes," in which the pre-selected tribute is marked for an early death.
- Exaggerated for the 28th Games, when Snow ordered the Gamemakers to appease the Sixatrons by rigging the Games such that the District 6 tribute—in this case, Chevy Anderson—wins.
- Another example is the 44th Games, where Snow ordered Brandybane to send a message to the Career Districts, who he felt were acting too entitled lately and taking their privileges for granted. Brandybane carried this out by creating a massive sinkhole at the very start of the Games, swallowing up the Cornucopia, all its supplies, and the entire Career pack that year, plus six other tributes. This guaranteed an outlier Victor (who ultimately turned out to be, ironically, the District 6 female tribute Maeve Collins) while also reminding the Career districts that even they were still subject to Snow's whims.
- Interestingly, two "soft fixes" who win, Emrys and Circe, are both from District 5.
- Roan Tully suffers from both ends of this: President Snow wants to rig the games to let Roan win after realizing he's willing to kill Katniss but Plutarch sabotages the games to ensure Roan goes through (well-deserved) hell in order to keep this from happening.
- After the author of Origin Story included a scene with Tony Stark (among a few others) speaking with George W. Bush (President at the time of the Civil War arc), the Twisting The Hellmouth mods declared that the scene violated policy, and was ordered to "remove George W. Bush and Dick Cheney from the story.". He did so. The mods only then declared that, no, he was supposed to remove the entire scene, not just sub out the real-world politicians for easily-recognized replacements. The author (not to mention several other popular writers) no longer posts on TTH.
- Spoofed in Chapter 25, the April Fools chapter of Pokémon Reset Bloodlines, where an Anthropomorphic Personification (aptly named Execu Tivem Edlin and represented by a faceless figure in a business suit) attempts to sway the writer into taking the story in ways he really doesn't want to, including adding more Fanservice, speeding up harem antics and other similar clichés. It gets to the point that the writer gets fed up and threatens the executive with the tool he uses to write a story: a chainsaw.
- TEEN FORTRESS 2: MarissaTheWriter came in contact with "Logic Edtor", who wanted to fix one chapter of horrible spelling and grammar, a Mary Sue cameo, indiscernible mixture of different fandoms and overall OOC-ness; however, the original was posted as well as the fixed chapter. (This is in fact with agreement from the author, unlike My Immortal's hacked chapter.)
