Fandom eats my brain!
So I said that someday I would make a fandom post and it has finally arrived. Most of you people know what fandom is but for a couple of my more "sheltered" friends, (:-), love you guys anyway!) it just really means a collection of fans for a given tv show, movie, book, internet site, etc... that get together, talk about the show they love, make icons, post fanfic (I'll get to that in a minute), and many other things that are probably too numerous to mention. Except for getting into fights, that's something very commonplace in fandom. It wouldn't be an internet fandom if there wasn't some sort of blow up every once and while (or, if you're the Harry Potter fandom, every other hour since the new book was released). Fanfiction is one of the most popular aspects of fandom and is just fiction written by the fans about said shows. They can be what ifs, alternate universes, character backgrounds, stories about what happens to characters after a show/movie/etc ends and lots of other stuff. Most good fanfic works within the reality of the medium in question (I will hereby refer to it as a tv show just to make it easier on myself) and keeps all of the characters acting as they did on the show. Of course there is lots of bad fanfic out there. Lots and lots. Can you tell we've run into one of my pet peeves? But back to fandom in general. I'm sure there is a better introduction and definition of fandom out there so I apologize if you're confused. But I'm going to talk about how I've fit into fandom so hopefully this explanation will suffice.
I was first introduced to fandom due to the West Wing. I adored that show at first (later on is a rant for another time) and wanted to learn more about it. I followed recaps that were posted at Television without Pity and sort of delved into the forum. I lurked around for a while and mostly read what others discussed. Somehow I eventually got pointed towards the fanfiction site www.fanfiction.net A couple of people from the forum had either posted fanfic here or at least had read something here that they later mentioned on the forum. I followed along, found the page in question and started reading fanfic. I was hooked. At the time, most of the fic being posted was really good. Even now, when I venture back for an occasional read in that fandom I don't run into much badfic there. I guess it's a little more high brow so it avoids some of the 13 year olds writing love odes to Legolas or the people who think Harry/Draco have a secret forbidden love and are meant to be together and will bear many children (I swear to God I could get evidence of either of those statements if you wanted). From that initial foray into the West Wing fic I sort of fell into Buffy the Vampire Slayer fandom. I was already watching and loving that show so the jump was easy. I would occasionally read a bit of Star Trek fic but I never really got into that fandom. The shows never grabbed me like BTVS and West Wing did. In fact, I still read Buffy fanfic to this day. It was such a hugely popular fandom and since it got the spin-off show Angel, the fanboys and fangirls like me live on. Now finding good fic in this fandom is a little harder. It's definitely there and I know which site to look at now as well as how to know whether something is good from the title and summary alone (which doesn't always work). But there seems to be a much larger proliferation of badfic here. But before I talk about that, perhaps I should discuss why I enjoy fanfic so much.
I have always loved a fantasy world. My dreams are vivid stories that I actively participate in. I build elaborate storylines in daydreams from scratch, or more commonly, based on things I've seen in shows or movies. In some universe somewhere I'm Empress of a galaxy right now. Uh huh. Really! So I enjoy good tv shows with characters that I relate to or just enjoy watching. And they're only on tv for about 22 hours a year. That's not very much. So to have extra storylines being present online that I can read whenever is a supreme joy to me. But they have to be believable. I don't care if Buffy ends up saving the world thirty gazillion times, if I'm read a story where she starts beating her sister and friends for fun I'm not going to be happy. That's not believable. Sorry fans, but the original creators of the show got to me first and established the behaviour of characters and the rules of the Universe. If you're going to write stories about those people, they should behave like they do in the show. Otherwise, it becomes original fiction. And there is nothing wrong with original fic. But don't cloak it in the veils of those characters on TV. I like those characters and they don't behave like that.
I keep an eye on several fandoms currently, BTVS being one of them. I occasionally read fanfic for House, Stargate, and Firefly (my poor dead space western, 'sniff'). I used to read a lot of Stargate fic but since the spin off arrived and my favourite characters left the original series I don't venture in that direction very often anymore. And the House fandom seems to have an obsession with badly written male slash (two male characters in a relationship). While I will not argue that House often has really slashy subtext (one character teased another about being his boyfriend, etc...) it seems much of the fandom is a bit obsessed. But then again, who am I to argue with obsessed. Whenever I feel like not doing work (which is decently often) I'm usually headed to one of my fanfic sites in search of an interesting story. It has eaten my brains I swear.
I was first introduced to fandom due to the West Wing. I adored that show at first (later on is a rant for another time) and wanted to learn more about it. I followed recaps that were posted at Television without Pity and sort of delved into the forum. I lurked around for a while and mostly read what others discussed. Somehow I eventually got pointed towards the fanfiction site www.fanfiction.net A couple of people from the forum had either posted fanfic here or at least had read something here that they later mentioned on the forum. I followed along, found the page in question and started reading fanfic. I was hooked. At the time, most of the fic being posted was really good. Even now, when I venture back for an occasional read in that fandom I don't run into much badfic there. I guess it's a little more high brow so it avoids some of the 13 year olds writing love odes to Legolas or the people who think Harry/Draco have a secret forbidden love and are meant to be together and will bear many children (I swear to God I could get evidence of either of those statements if you wanted). From that initial foray into the West Wing fic I sort of fell into Buffy the Vampire Slayer fandom. I was already watching and loving that show so the jump was easy. I would occasionally read a bit of Star Trek fic but I never really got into that fandom. The shows never grabbed me like BTVS and West Wing did. In fact, I still read Buffy fanfic to this day. It was such a hugely popular fandom and since it got the spin-off show Angel, the fanboys and fangirls like me live on. Now finding good fic in this fandom is a little harder. It's definitely there and I know which site to look at now as well as how to know whether something is good from the title and summary alone (which doesn't always work). But there seems to be a much larger proliferation of badfic here. But before I talk about that, perhaps I should discuss why I enjoy fanfic so much.
I have always loved a fantasy world. My dreams are vivid stories that I actively participate in. I build elaborate storylines in daydreams from scratch, or more commonly, based on things I've seen in shows or movies. In some universe somewhere I'm Empress of a galaxy right now. Uh huh. Really! So I enjoy good tv shows with characters that I relate to or just enjoy watching. And they're only on tv for about 22 hours a year. That's not very much. So to have extra storylines being present online that I can read whenever is a supreme joy to me. But they have to be believable. I don't care if Buffy ends up saving the world thirty gazillion times, if I'm read a story where she starts beating her sister and friends for fun I'm not going to be happy. That's not believable. Sorry fans, but the original creators of the show got to me first and established the behaviour of characters and the rules of the Universe. If you're going to write stories about those people, they should behave like they do in the show. Otherwise, it becomes original fiction. And there is nothing wrong with original fic. But don't cloak it in the veils of those characters on TV. I like those characters and they don't behave like that.
I keep an eye on several fandoms currently, BTVS being one of them. I occasionally read fanfic for House, Stargate, and Firefly (my poor dead space western, 'sniff'). I used to read a lot of Stargate fic but since the spin off arrived and my favourite characters left the original series I don't venture in that direction very often anymore. And the House fandom seems to have an obsession with badly written male slash (two male characters in a relationship). While I will not argue that House often has really slashy subtext (one character teased another about being his boyfriend, etc...) it seems much of the fandom is a bit obsessed. But then again, who am I to argue with obsessed. Whenever I feel like not doing work (which is decently often) I'm usually headed to one of my fanfic sites in search of an interesting story. It has eaten my brains I swear.