WARNING: Very, very minor spoilers for The Last Jedi referenced below. In fact so minor I wouldn’t even bother with this warning except people have been threatening to flay each other alive over revelation of any content and I like having my skin where it is. So there’s this biological concept known as parallel evolution, which basically boils down to the idea that similar characteristics can develop among species that have no common ancestors, or at least no recent ones. Bats, for example, evolved wings to fly in much the same way birds do. When the ancestors of modern cetaceans gave up on this whole “walking on land” schtick and returned to the ocean, they went back right back to fins. Certain configurations just seem to be gravitated towards as the best solution without any conscious imitation going on. Similarly, I like to think variations on this happen in fictional circles. I mean nowadays it’s hard to imagine anyone being ignorant enough of Superman to come up with a super-strong flying dude and truthfully maintain they did so without any influence of previous archetypes, but we’re often all too quick to cry “rip off!” even in cases where it’s entirely possible that two similar characters or stories could be created by people who had no knowledge of the other work. Ideas blooming in parallel. After all, even if a bat resembles a bird and a dolphin resembles a shark, there are clear differences when you take a closer look. So case in point, The Last Jedi debuts a new character named “Rose” who is a non-skinny lady in green utilitarian garb with a toolbelt, a medallion that’s important to her, and technical know-how. Whoa, right? Except okay, she’s Asian. And more importantly, not particularly sneaky in manner. And… I mean if you took Rose and combined her with the attitude, ethnicity and mannerisms of Sombra from Overwatch, that’d be getting a lot closer to Zombie Ranch‘s Rosa, but still there’s that idea of parallel evolution. Legally speaking, copyright law says that ideas cannot be copyrighted, only the expressions of those ideas… which is why you can publish comics featuring nigh-invulnerable super-strong guys that fly so long as they don’t stray too close to the Big S. How close is too close? Well, that’s why lawyers and courts exist, and people tend to have much stronger cases if they can prove, for example, that Big Studio A had Script B in their possession for an amount of time before passing on it but then producing Movie C which was suspiciously similar. It’s all very messy and usually ends in the Studio paying the aggrieved party a “shut up and go away” settlement which they might or might not deserve. But anyhow, although shady rip-offs do happen, I feel that in most cases when someone comes up with a character or concept similar to yours, it’s best to give them the benefit of the doubt, especially when the differences are enough it’s a real stretch to say you would have even inspired them. At a certain point it borders on hubris. And hell, I long ago admitted that Rosa’s character was inspired by Tuco from The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, but she’s come quite a ways since then, enough that I’d hesitate to describe her just in that configuration. She’s evolved, in parallel or otherwise.