*comes out of fannish hiatus*

[ishtar79]

So much for my plan to keep up with fandom after my last post from *checks*...a month and a half ago. Part of it is my course kicking my ass (through two accounting and one finance modules back to back. For a math-challenged, humanities background person such as myself, it's a little like what hell must look like) and part of it is comics continuing to eat my brain (I've assimilated a good three quarters of Marvel's collected input).

-I did try to quickly familiarise myself with comicbook fandom, such as it is, and drew the following depressing conclusions:

1. It's a lot smaller in output and narrower in variety than you would expect. I get that it must be intimidating to newbs (you haven't seen crazy, convoluted canon until you've seen comicbooks), but still, considering the sheer size of the source material, you'd expect more.

2. On a related note, I find it amazing in that "not at all unexpected" way that in a fandom with such a rich selection of strong and fascinating characters to chose from, 90% of fannish output is still about the Pretty White Boys and Their Manpain.

3. Though the usual fandom annoyances are no reason to venture away from LJ/DW fandom into the untamed wilderness of the rest of the Internets, where the fanboys roam. Spending an afternoon reading an online argument in a comic book forum was a bit of a revelation. Imagine some of the most obnoxious, pedantic, fannish entitlement brats you might have run into over the years...and turn the volume up to eleven.

4. Apparently Cable and Deadpool are now sexy. For someone who mostly remembers them as their 90s, Walking Steroid PSA selves, it's an...interesting mental adjustment.

-ariadneelda pestered me into convinced me to watch Spartacus: Blood and Sand (though other appropriate working titles would have been: "Spartacus: Blood And Gratuitous T&A", "Spartacus: More Ridiculous Power Chords and Hilarious Manpain than Supernatural" or "Spartacus: So Annoying It Makes You Root For The Romans". I haven't hated a show fandom seems to love since another show which shall remains nameless (apart from just being mentioned two lines above), though I admit, mocking it is rather fun. There should really be more 'anti-fandoms' online, for people's snarky needs. Besides the anti-Twilight fandom, that is.

-The new DH trailer is looking good, probably mostly because it was blessedly Rickman-free (if I missed him, feel free to NOT correct me). At the same time, it made me kind of sad, because I know that when the second part comes out, that will be it for the HP fandom. I mean, canon has already closed, but I mean in terms of events creating any kind of fandom momentum. Hopefully the fandom will go on in some form, but still-end of an era.

-Note to self: never catch up with the big meta discussions before catching up with the flist. All this does, is remind you of the bad, headdesky parts of fandom and none of the fun, community one (seriously, the Haiti fic? WHAT THE FUCK. I actually yelled WTF when ariadneelda informed me of this revolting development over the phone, but reading the straight out of a 19th century 'colonialism, yay!' excerpts and the 'won't someone please think of the poor racist authors' were so much worse that what I was expecting. Why so sucky, fandom?).

Comments

[miranda-skye.livejournal.com]

Is anyone actually defending the Haiti fic? The kindest comments I've seen have been more pitying for the author's weirdly-timewarped view of the world and glaring naivety than anything else

[aegflota.livejournal.com]

I didn't get past the first episode of Spartacus. The slow-mo fight scenes drove me UP THE WALL.

[ishtar79.livejournal.com]

I've seen a few posts and comments claiming that the 'dogpiling' against the author is worse than the racism itself. I also saw another post comparing criticism of the fic to (I kid you not) book banning.

[ishtar79.livejournal.com]

The slow-mo fights are made of lulz. What about the squirting BUCKETS OF BLOOD? Isn't it amazing, the way the blood splatter covers the sky and then it turns out the wound is like, a papercut?

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

1. Every time someone whines about the Buffy fandom, Star Trek, Supernatural, or Doctor Who, I point out that this is nothing in comparison to the comic book and day time soap opera fandoms. If you want convoluted, racist, misogynistic, crazy, petty and insane - go there. Hee. (They're the reason - I tend to veer away a bit from being a part of a fandom. They are also partly why fandom gets a bad name.)

2.I think Cable and Deadpool became sexy towards the late 1990s, around 1998-1999 or thereabouts, when they did the first Deadpool and Cable stand-alone series. Sort of took off like Wolverine did in the 1980s. Wolvie finally hit the saturation point in the 1990s, only to be brought back into popularity by Hugh Jackman, albeit briefly. For a while there - they were adding Wolvie to every Marvel comic book - regardless of whether or not he had a reason to be there. Good way to kill interest in a character.

3. Haiti fanfic??? WTF??? Seriously, WTF?? Never heard of this thing...hmmm, maybe that's a good thing?

4.through two accounting and one finance modules back to back. For a math-challenged, humanities background person such as myself, it's a little like what hell must look like) Hee. Yep, pretty much. Totally sympathize.

5.There should really be more 'anti-fandoms' online, for people's snarky needs. Besides the anti-Twilight fandom, that is.

If you discover one for Bones - let me know. ;-)

I think the reason we only have the Twilight one - is well, Twilight has become such a cultural phenomena, that those of us who gag at the sight of it - need someplace to vent. (Not that I do or anything...) Curious if there's an anti-Harry Potter fandom? It was also a huge cultural phenomena. What about Avatar? (I think there is one for Avatar).

Haven't seen the Spartacus show - don't get Starz. Not sounding all that interesting - just another violent male romance novel/soap opera. I already watch one *cough*Supernatural*cough*, I don't have time for two. ;-)

[embers-log.livejournal.com]

So you've been catching up on Marvel comics... but how about Dark Horses' BtVS S8?? There has been a lot of angst over that and I'd love to hear your take on it....

And did you watch this past season of Doctor Who? I loved the series even though Matt Smith is not my favorite doctor, I still think he & Amy are a lot of fun... the Confidential for the finale just solidified my love for DW in general.

I can't really imagine joining an anti-fandom... I mean I truly hate Twilight (books movies and all licensed materials relating to it) but I'd rather pretend it doesn't exist than be reminded by an anti-fandom! lol

So I'm sorry to hear that accounting/finance is kicking your ass.... I'm frustrated w/life in general (I'm STILL homeless) but I shouldn't complain, I'm dog sitting at a house w/a swimming pool.

[ishtar79.livejournal.com]

1. I've heard about then comicbook fandom batshitery before, but reading those forums was...something else. To be fair, the lj portion of said fandoms doesn't seem strikingly worse than the average fandom, but those forums...*wow*

2. Wolverine is *still* in every Marvel comic. They actually make jokes about it the comics themselves.

3. Oh, it is so much worse than you imagine. Apparently the author was watching the disaster on TV and thought it would make for a great tapestry for Supernatural RPS, and the result was a whole novel that reads like something out of a 19th century British novel. There's a good summary (and a million links) here: http://amazonziti.livejournal.com/52274.html

4. They had us doing some *statistics*, FFS!

5. Bones is just terrible. It's so frustrating, because the premise had potential, but the execution (the plots! the subtext that Brennan needs to fixed! The saccharine sweet shippiness! The freakin' Fox News political philosophy!)

I don't know of any anti-fandom for HP. Avatar has drawn a lot of criticism for being yet another 'white saviour' narrative, but it's not a sustained thing like Twilight.

just another violent male romance novel/soap opera.

Ha! Best summary of Spartacus (and Supernatural) I heard.

[ishtar79.livejournal.com]

I haven't kept up with S8 recently. I'll get back to it at some point, just need to get in a Buffy mood again.

I've only watched the first two DW eps (I'm so behind on everything), and I quite like Eleven and Amy.

Wouldn't join an anti-fandom either, but I enjoy the occasional snarkfest.

I'm frustrated w/life in general (I'm STILL homeless) but I shouldn't complain, I'm dog sitting at a house w/a swimming pool.

I'm sorry about the continuing living situation. As far as temporary solutions go though, that one sounds nice.

(I really missed you and the other guys. I did honestly mean to catch up, but RL was way out of control)

...is that Joss in your icon?

[embers-log.livejournal.com]

Re: icon - Yes, Georges Jeanty (comic book artist doing BtVS S8) has done some Buffy covers which are patterned after some famous covers... that was his drawing of Joss from one of them... I've decided to have lots more icons of Joss because he IS the center of most of my favorite fandoms!

I mean to mention that I also have zero interest in 'Sparticus: B&S', but I feel bad about it because Joss' brother & sister in law are writing for it (along w/creator Stephen S. DeKnight)... and of course I loved them from 'Doctor Horrible' & 'Dollhouse'... so I wished I could love that too.... Oh well.

off topic query...

[embers-log.livejournal.com]

So NPH just twittered:
http://twitter.com/ActuallyNPH/status/17365853847
and said:
"Went to a trendy gay beach in Mykonos called Elia. Lots of posturing, lots of exposed aged wieners. It was all rather intimidating."
So this is something I missed when I went to Greece... have you been there?

[nokomis305.livejournal.com]

Comicbook fandom is kind of terrifying, especially out on the wider interwebs. I have gawked at many a horrifying fanboy argument! That being said. I loved when DCU fic was still being written by goodficcers on a regular basis, because Batfic in particular tended to be pretty awesome, but by and large people tended to leave a lot of the most awesome characters to the wayside, which was horribly disappointing (and why I pretty much stopped dipping my toes in that fandom.)

Re: off topic query...

[ishtar79.livejournal.com]

Mykonos is a very trendy island known in large part for its gay scene (I've only been there overnight while on holiday in another island). There are a couple of famous nudist beaches, so I'm guessing he's at one of those.

[ishtar79.livejournal.com]

I'm definitely getting the 'terrifying' part of comicbook fandom. I had noticed that a lot of good writers from other fandoms I knew seemed to write DC. It's a pity that the same problem of playing with a handful of characters I noticed in Marvel fandom seemed to happen there too.

Re: off topic query...

[ioanna.livejournal.com]

*jumping in*

I have been to Mykonos and stayed there for a little over a week. I haven't been to Elia (I think, I would probably remmeber) but we did go to Super Paradise which is supposed to be gay and nudist but we found it to be mostly straight and dressed. Maybe the gay nudists have moved on to Elia :p

I would describe the entire island as "straight-friendly". A lot of people go there just to party and get plenty of straight hookups from what I hear but my self-esteem went to zero there as a girl. I felt pretty much invisible. Still, it was nice to see people feeling free to be affectionate in public and the rest. The whole world should catch up.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

1. You've clearly never spent time in British and American comic stores...all I can tell you, is the television sitcom The Big Bang Theory? Is on target. They used to show the arguments in the letters pages...which were hilarious.

2. Really?? Mind-boggling. Although it does explain the movie franchise's intense focus on Wolverine, and little to no focus on the original five (Iceman, Angel, Cyclops, Beast and Marvel Girl).

3. Wait - someone actually wrote a *Supernatural* fanfic that takes place in modern Haiti and reads like a 19th Century British novel??? Oookay. I guess I can see that, if I hang upside down and squint. And I guess we should give them points for being creative, right? ;->

5. Bones is just terrible. It's so frustrating, because the premise had potential, but the execution (the plots! the subtext that Brennan needs to fixed! The saccharine sweet shippiness! The freakin' Fox News political philosophy!)

Ah, I feel vindicated now for hating that show. Really truly do.
And you are correct - it had a great premise. But it is sexist beyond belief...and well everything else you mention. Don't get the appeal or why just about half my flist loves it to pieces.
Okay, that's not true - I sort of do. But stil..

Hmmm, methinks Harry Potter was far too excellent a series, with true merit to ever get an anti-fandom. While Twilight is so wretchedly written - it just begged for one?

Re: off topic query...

[embers-log.livejournal.com]

evidently sweet little Neil is visiting all the trendy islands, here are his feet up on Santorini
http://yfrog.com/f1fsmlj
(I do remember that sunset, only I saw it from an internet cafe, because I'm a hopeless geek...)