Scenes That Should Not Be

In the fall of 2002, The Angst Guy introduced a competition thread on the old version of PPMB: write the worst possible scene for a Daria fanfic. This popular pastime grew until it became a regular feature on PPMB (and on SFMB for "Sex Scenes That Should Not Be"). Some of the most dreadful but hysterical bits of fanfic writing ever known have appeared in these threads, which continue to this day. The Angst Guy admits that he started the contest because he was depressed at the time and wanted to read something funny, and he is quite pleased that this peculiar form of therapy has worked.

Message-board threads in this vein often have variations on the "Scenes That Should Not Be" title, but they are still instantly identifiable. Sometimes writers put entries in these threads that turn out to be hugely popular, later expanding the tidbits into longer tales, but this is (thankfully) not usually the case.