End of an era!
When I first started this Livejournal, it was to follow a few friends I'd met through fandom. I didn't quite understand the utility of the journal at first, because my entree into online fandom was through webdesign--so we all had our own sites, maintained our own link lists and affiliates, etc. "Social media" as a concept wasn't a thing yet, so the idea that would wouldn't necessarily have to literally build everything yourself hadn't yet caught on.
But the fandom that brought me to LiveJournal was the anime/manga, Inuyasha, which I was introduced to around 2003. I started this journal in 2005, as my friends I'd made through webdesign/Inuyasha moved onto different fandoms (as I also did, somewhere around 05/06). The series itself concluded in 2008, though for me that was 3-4 fandoms later and I'd kept up with what was going on not at all. I sort of figured I never would.
My best friend (with whom I SHARED a fanfiction.net account for IY, for some reason?) picked it up again a bit ago, though, as part of her pandemic-induced media marathon, and she invited me to read with her. Which is what I just spent the last week doing.
It's interesting going back to something you used to love like that--my seminal text, really, because it was my first online fandom, the first series I produced and posted fanfic for, and the first reason I kept this journal. Though most of my friends from my Inuyasha days were my real-life friends in middle school, I actually do still keep in touch with some of my Inuyasha friends, though we haven't shared a fandom in 15 years at this point.
It's also interesting in that I can think back to what I loved about the series before (a lot of this I really don't remember the specifics of... though I mean, H/C and horror were big draws in that series, and LOOK AT ME NOW, ALL GROWN UP AND INTO THE EXACT SAME CRAP, LOL). But I also see the series in very different ways, and find myself drawn to different arcs and finding different resonances powerful.
I'll never love that series the way I loved it when I was 12. And there are generic conventions to long shounen manga series that would likely prevent me from getting into new series now. But honestly? Inuyasha holds up. It's a really solid, consistent manga series, from start all the way to the finish. And I'm definitely sitting here feeling feelings. In retrospect, I should have waited until evening to finish, because now I've finished 559 chapters of Inuyasha, and over 15 years of knowing this series (even if I only loved it for three years), and it just feels weird that it's barely 3pm and still plenty time left in the day. I just finished an epic quest! I just marathoned an epic quest! And you expect me to leave that headspace and... finish writing a grant application? Really?
It also doesn't escape my notice that today, the day I finished reading Inuyasha after a 15-year hiatus, was originally meant to be the day of the SPN finale. If this is how I feel after closing the book on Inuyasha--again, a thing I loved very, very much for about three years, 15 years ago--I know for sure I'm not yet ready for a SPN finale.
Thanks for the memories, Inuyasha. <3
But the fandom that brought me to LiveJournal was the anime/manga, Inuyasha, which I was introduced to around 2003. I started this journal in 2005, as my friends I'd made through webdesign/Inuyasha moved onto different fandoms (as I also did, somewhere around 05/06). The series itself concluded in 2008, though for me that was 3-4 fandoms later and I'd kept up with what was going on not at all. I sort of figured I never would.
My best friend (with whom I SHARED a fanfiction.net account for IY, for some reason?) picked it up again a bit ago, though, as part of her pandemic-induced media marathon, and she invited me to read with her. Which is what I just spent the last week doing.
It's interesting going back to something you used to love like that--my seminal text, really, because it was my first online fandom, the first series I produced and posted fanfic for, and the first reason I kept this journal. Though most of my friends from my Inuyasha days were my real-life friends in middle school, I actually do still keep in touch with some of my Inuyasha friends, though we haven't shared a fandom in 15 years at this point.
It's also interesting in that I can think back to what I loved about the series before (a lot of this I really don't remember the specifics of... though I mean, H/C and horror were big draws in that series, and LOOK AT ME NOW, ALL GROWN UP AND INTO THE EXACT SAME CRAP, LOL). But I also see the series in very different ways, and find myself drawn to different arcs and finding different resonances powerful.
I'll never love that series the way I loved it when I was 12. And there are generic conventions to long shounen manga series that would likely prevent me from getting into new series now. But honestly? Inuyasha holds up. It's a really solid, consistent manga series, from start all the way to the finish. And I'm definitely sitting here feeling feelings. In retrospect, I should have waited until evening to finish, because now I've finished 559 chapters of Inuyasha, and over 15 years of knowing this series (even if I only loved it for three years), and it just feels weird that it's barely 3pm and still plenty time left in the day. I just finished an epic quest! I just marathoned an epic quest! And you expect me to leave that headspace and... finish writing a grant application? Really?
It also doesn't escape my notice that today, the day I finished reading Inuyasha after a 15-year hiatus, was originally meant to be the day of the SPN finale. If this is how I feel after closing the book on Inuyasha--again, a thing I loved very, very much for about three years, 15 years ago--I know for sure I'm not yet ready for a SPN finale.
Thanks for the memories, Inuyasha. <3