Word of the Day

The ever-dubious Wikipedia (though they tend to be spot-on about things like this) defines this as "an attempt by fans of a work of fiction to explain or justify plot holes or continuity errors, often through convoluted contrivances".

For example:

In Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, Han Solo claims that his ship, the Millennium Falcon made the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs, even though the parsec is a measure of distance (the distance at which one astronomical unit subtends one arcsecond of sky), not of time. Officially licensed books (considered "C" canon under Star Wars canon rules) have claimed this is because the space around Kessel contains so many black holes and other anomalies that a journey to and from the system involves very large round trips to avoid these dangers. More skillful pilots, however, are able to fly closer to the anomalies and therefore cut the journey short. Han Solo's claim of making the run in under "twelve parsecs", then, indicates his skill and the agility of his ship the Falcon.