What makes a fandom popular?

[feliciacraft]

(ETA: Anonymous replies screened but enabled.)

So I’ve been thinking about what attributes in canon material-be it a book, a movie, a TV show, an anime series or whatever-tend to create large, popular fandoms.

Comments

[winegums]

I think part of it has to do with genre. Like Friends/Sex and the City or True Detective 1 were hugely popular/acclaimed, but I don't think you find many people writing Friends or Seinfeld fiction. While Buffy has a massive and active fandom to this day, and it never got even half the recognition/press the others I've named did.

And SFF/anime etc tends to draw types who are likely to be more active in engaging with other fans and wanting to puzzle things out when they're not to their satisfaction - basically, the hardcore fans, the kind you'd call a fandom in the first place. As you pointed out, that usually happens when there's a cool setting or world building, or a really attention-grabbing concept (like Sherlock Holmes in the 20th century). And of course, the writing, casting (for movie/tv series) and ships do matter.

[feliciacraft]

Hmm, yeah, I think you make a good point there -- sitcoms probably don't draw a lot of fanfic writers, and SFF/anime fans are self-selecting to be more engaged with the material and other fans.

When it comes to Sherlock, though, it's always been popular, modern setting or not. (Jeremy Brett will always be my Sherlock.) I suspect Johnlock is a huge draw there, because it will never be canon, and that drives people to create their own slash material.

[winegums]

true, Sherlock Holmes has been a fandom for over a century (I mean, there is a reason there are Holmes-themed landmarks all over the real Baker Street, how would that happen if not for fans? Even if they don't call themselves a fandom per se), it's the serialised nature and genre that does it I guess.

For books, it's extremely rare to see standalone books get huge fandoms, that mainly happens to books in series (HP, Discworld, Game of Thrones, etc etc) so when an author gives you so many books worth of material to use as canon, it attracts more of a fandom. Same goes for standalone movies, even genre ones, I think those rarely get ficced on a large scale.

[tei_lj]

YES YES Jeremy Brett with be Sherlock Holmes forever.

[feliciacraft]

RIGHT??!?

(So glad I'm not alone in this. Media tends to have a very short, revisionist attention span. Whoever is latest is always best.)