Editing Prequel (section)

{{Short description|Fictional work whose story precedes that of a previous work}}
{{For-multi|the mobile application|Prequel (mobile application)|the book|Prequel: An American Fight Against Fascism|the album|Prequelle}}
A '''prequel''' is a literary, dramatic or cinematic work whose story [[Precedent|precedes]] that of a previous work, by focusing on events that occur before the original narrative.<ref name=Silverblatt>{{cite book|last=Silverblatt|first=Art|year=2007|title=Genre Studies in Mass Media: A Handbook|publisher=[[M. E. Sharpe]]|isbn=9780765616708|page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=R7ixUTC8EpwC&pg=PA211 211]|quote=Prequels focus on the action that took place ''before'' the original narrative. For instance, in ''Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith'' the audience learns about how Darth Vader originally became a villain. A prequel assumes that the audience is familiar with the original—the audience must rework the narrative so that they can understand how the prequel leads up to the beginning of the original.}}</ref> A prequel is a work that forms part of a [[backstory]] to the preceding work.

The term "prequel" is a 20th-century [[neologism]] from the prefix "pre-" (from [[Latin]] ''prae'', "before") and "[[sequel]]".<ref name=mw>{{cite book|year=1993|title=Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary|edition=10th|publisher=[[Merriam-Webster]]|pages=[https://archive.org/details/merriamwebstersc00spri/page/921 921], 915, 1068, 246|location=[[Springfield, Massachusetts]]|title-link=Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary}}</ref><ref name=oxford/>

Like sequels, prequels may or may not concern the same plot as the work from which they are derived. More often they explain the background that led to the events in the original, but sometimes the connections are not completely explicit. Sometimes prequels play on the audience's knowledge of what will happen next, using deliberate references to create [[dramatic irony]].