End-of-year fandom meme
I’ve somehow never done this meme, I think, but I love reading other people’s and get good recs out of it, so here we go!
Your main fandom of the year?
Tie between Harry Potter (my default because it’s where my friends are, and also the fandom I wrote a novella-sized fic for) and Final Fantasy XV, which I discovered halfway through the year. It did feel like a battle between them, getting my novella-sized, and almost certainly last big, H/D fic out while full of new fandom energy for something else.
Your favourite film watched this year?
Mother! I think. Get Out, The Last Jedi, and Thor: Ragnorak were all brilliant in their own ways, but Mother! is very, very Gothic and I love Gothic fiction. Plus the way that Gothic tropes and the Biblical/ecology allegory and the creator/muse stuff were all layered together was really interesting and impressive, and the cast and the use of the set were AMAZING.
Your favourite book read this year?
This year and books has been a fucking disaster, basically because I developed this weird block around this one particular book I couldn’t finish or give up on. I've read a fuckton of longform articles this year because I've not been reading novels. My favourite book out of TWO AND A HALF, then, is Prisoners of Geography by Tim Marshall. It has a few howlers, mostly to do with colonialism (Spain has always struggled due to its poor geography my arse) but overall it’s a very helpful overview of global politics and the way they’re defined by geography. It’s split into ten sections, e.g. Latin America, Korea and Japan, and tends to do some broad history and then discuss the current situation as it’s impacted by geography, e.g. China’s naval ambitions as a result of its need to guarantee access to oil via the Malacca Strait.
Your favourite album or song to listen to this year?
Hmm... Bodak Yellow and some songs from Matildaand Dear Evan Hansen, that was new. More Mountain Goats and grime, because I am boring and do not change. I think I’ll give it to For Forever from Dear Evan Hansen, because it’s a gorgeous song and also let me feel my Final Fantasy XV feelings without weeping pathetically, as happens if I hear Florence and the Machine’s songs for the actual game.
Your favourite TV show of the year?
Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, without a shadow of a doubt. It’s the funniest thing I’ve ever seen and has an incredible sense of suspense and pace for a comedy. I adore musicals, and this is such a good one, with great songs that embrace emotion and are hilarious mini-parodies and use their ability to set up themes and ideas. It’s such a clever examination of romance tropes that never falls into lazy cynicism about the genre, and it’s only got better in its treatment of mental health issues as it’s really dug its teeth into Rebecca’s problems. The diversity on show is great - a bisexual middle-aged lawyer, a Filipino hunky love interest, and the way it all influences characters’ lives without defining them. Also, because it’s all made with a feminist sensibility and feminist assumptions, it can do much deeper analysis and make much better jokes about women’s experiences and about feminism as a movement than I’ve seen anywhere else on TV.
A full post about this may be coming :)
Your favourite DW/LJ community of the year?
Hmm. I’m sort of bad at following comms as opposed to people and feeds these days; does the drunkfinalfantasy tumblr count? I like the Mary Sue feed for fandom news and analysis with a feminist bent, and
50books_poc has survived the plague of Winterfox to be a good source of book recs.
Your best new fandom discovery of the year?
RPing on Tumblr as a way of... well, roleplaying, which I’ve never really done before, but more importantly as a way I can actually meet people and chat with them through Tumblr fandom, which has previously seemed impossible. Hopefully I’ll do a lot more of it this coming year.
Your biggest fandom disappointment of the year?
No Sif in Thor: Ragnorak, when she could easily have been in the Heimdall bits.
Your fandom boyfriend of the year?
No contest: Noctis Lucis Caelum, emo prince of my heart. I cried over this boy (a) for an hour in my room on the phone to my BFF and (b) in public, crouching by the Thames in an ankle-length velvet dress because I was being crushed by JRPG-induced feels. He is my absolute darling and deserves only good things and the best of everything. He gets many terrible things because the world can be dark and cruel, but he also gets the best of everything in Gladio, Ignis and Prompto.
Your fandom girlfriend of the year?
Ummm. This is harder, because there were a lot of great women (TLJ!Rose, Kara, Natasha) but no falling headlong into infatuation like I did with Noct. Aranea is in strong second place - tough and funny and sexy and practical and secretly sweet, a mercenary who still has people she won’t work for, and is quietly kind when Prompto’s at his limits. LOOOOOOOOOOVE.
But Rebecca from Crazy Ex-Girlfriend has got to be it. She is gorgeous to a degree that distracts me at basically all times she's on-screen, and the actress/writer/producer is so incredibly talented and funny and great, and Rebecca is layered and amazing and tears at my heart. She’s so clever and sharp and hilarious, so selfish but so lovable and the programme never shies away from how awful she can be or assumes we’ll stop loving her because of it. So intensely vulnerable in her emotional extremes, and how can you not sympathise with that?
Your biggest squee moment of the year?
Seeing Hamilton in previews at the West End. Not my most ~fandomy moment, probably (that goes to crying down the phone to my BFF over a fictional prince from a video game while he tried to comfort me with promises of fix-it fic and polyship roadtrips) but definitely the most SQUUUEEEEE.
The most missed of your old fandoms?
Er. Avengers/Thor, probably.
The fandom you haven’t tried yet, but want to?
I’m suuuuper behind on Steven Universe, does that count? There are also some books I wanna get obsessed with. Oh, and Carmilla! All adaptations of lesbian vampire Gothics are belong to me.
Your biggest fan anticipations for the New Year?
Series 2 of Jessica Jones!!!! Black Panther! EPISODE ARDYN. But basically just playing through FFXV instead of watching playthroughs, and getting to write as much fic as I can in between studying for exams. No deadlines, all fun.
This was originally posted at https://lokifan.dreamwidth.org/365823.html. Comment wherever you like :)
Your main fandom of the year?
Tie between Harry Potter (my default because it’s where my friends are, and also the fandom I wrote a novella-sized fic for) and Final Fantasy XV, which I discovered halfway through the year. It did feel like a battle between them, getting my novella-sized, and almost certainly last big, H/D fic out while full of new fandom energy for something else.
Your favourite film watched this year?
Mother! I think. Get Out, The Last Jedi, and Thor: Ragnorak were all brilliant in their own ways, but Mother! is very, very Gothic and I love Gothic fiction. Plus the way that Gothic tropes and the Biblical/ecology allegory and the creator/muse stuff were all layered together was really interesting and impressive, and the cast and the use of the set were AMAZING.
Your favourite book read this year?
This year and books has been a fucking disaster, basically because I developed this weird block around this one particular book I couldn’t finish or give up on. I've read a fuckton of longform articles this year because I've not been reading novels. My favourite book out of TWO AND A HALF, then, is Prisoners of Geography by Tim Marshall. It has a few howlers, mostly to do with colonialism (Spain has always struggled due to its poor geography my arse) but overall it’s a very helpful overview of global politics and the way they’re defined by geography. It’s split into ten sections, e.g. Latin America, Korea and Japan, and tends to do some broad history and then discuss the current situation as it’s impacted by geography, e.g. China’s naval ambitions as a result of its need to guarantee access to oil via the Malacca Strait.
Your favourite album or song to listen to this year?
Hmm... Bodak Yellow and some songs from Matildaand Dear Evan Hansen, that was new. More Mountain Goats and grime, because I am boring and do not change. I think I’ll give it to For Forever from Dear Evan Hansen, because it’s a gorgeous song and also let me feel my Final Fantasy XV feelings without weeping pathetically, as happens if I hear Florence and the Machine’s songs for the actual game.
Your favourite TV show of the year?
Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, without a shadow of a doubt. It’s the funniest thing I’ve ever seen and has an incredible sense of suspense and pace for a comedy. I adore musicals, and this is such a good one, with great songs that embrace emotion and are hilarious mini-parodies and use their ability to set up themes and ideas. It’s such a clever examination of romance tropes that never falls into lazy cynicism about the genre, and it’s only got better in its treatment of mental health issues as it’s really dug its teeth into Rebecca’s problems. The diversity on show is great - a bisexual middle-aged lawyer, a Filipino hunky love interest, and the way it all influences characters’ lives without defining them. Also, because it’s all made with a feminist sensibility and feminist assumptions, it can do much deeper analysis and make much better jokes about women’s experiences and about feminism as a movement than I’ve seen anywhere else on TV.
A full post about this may be coming :)
Your favourite DW/LJ community of the year?
Hmm. I’m sort of bad at following comms as opposed to people and feeds these days; does the drunkfinalfantasy tumblr count? I like the Mary Sue feed for fandom news and analysis with a feminist bent, and
50books_poc has survived the plague of Winterfox to be a good source of book recs.
Your best new fandom discovery of the year?
RPing on Tumblr as a way of... well, roleplaying, which I’ve never really done before, but more importantly as a way I can actually meet people and chat with them through Tumblr fandom, which has previously seemed impossible. Hopefully I’ll do a lot more of it this coming year.
Your biggest fandom disappointment of the year?
No Sif in Thor: Ragnorak, when she could easily have been in the Heimdall bits.
Your fandom boyfriend of the year?
No contest: Noctis Lucis Caelum, emo prince of my heart. I cried over this boy (a) for an hour in my room on the phone to my BFF and (b) in public, crouching by the Thames in an ankle-length velvet dress because I was being crushed by JRPG-induced feels. He is my absolute darling and deserves only good things and the best of everything. He gets many terrible things because the world can be dark and cruel, but he also gets the best of everything in Gladio, Ignis and Prompto.
Your fandom girlfriend of the year?
Ummm. This is harder, because there were a lot of great women (TLJ!Rose, Kara, Natasha) but no falling headlong into infatuation like I did with Noct. Aranea is in strong second place - tough and funny and sexy and practical and secretly sweet, a mercenary who still has people she won’t work for, and is quietly kind when Prompto’s at his limits. LOOOOOOOOOOVE.
But Rebecca from Crazy Ex-Girlfriend has got to be it. She is gorgeous to a degree that distracts me at basically all times she's on-screen, and the actress/writer/producer is so incredibly talented and funny and great, and Rebecca is layered and amazing and tears at my heart. She’s so clever and sharp and hilarious, so selfish but so lovable and the programme never shies away from how awful she can be or assumes we’ll stop loving her because of it. So intensely vulnerable in her emotional extremes, and how can you not sympathise with that?
Your biggest squee moment of the year?
Seeing Hamilton in previews at the West End. Not my most ~fandomy moment, probably (that goes to crying down the phone to my BFF over a fictional prince from a video game while he tried to comfort me with promises of fix-it fic and polyship roadtrips) but definitely the most SQUUUEEEEE.
The most missed of your old fandoms?
Er. Avengers/Thor, probably.
The fandom you haven’t tried yet, but want to?
I’m suuuuper behind on Steven Universe, does that count? There are also some books I wanna get obsessed with. Oh, and Carmilla! All adaptations of lesbian vampire Gothics are belong to me.
Your biggest fan anticipations for the New Year?
Series 2 of Jessica Jones!!!! Black Panther! EPISODE ARDYN. But basically just playing through FFXV instead of watching playthroughs, and getting to write as much fic as I can in between studying for exams. No deadlines, all fun.
This was originally posted at https://lokifan.dreamwidth.org/365823.html. Comment wherever you like :)