Fandom nostalgia

[rheasilvia]

An attack of inexplicable fannish nostalgia has me in its grip.

Comments

[rheasilvia]

OMG, now that you mention it, I do have a vague memory of the eggbeater challenge, but it's frighteningly unclear... I really did forget it!

But I also forgot the Lone Gunmen in the poll, and a bunch of other things. Then again, if I packed in *everything*, it'd be 50 pages long. :-)

the scene where Mulder dragged Krycek to Skinner's and shirtless Skinner sucker-punched Krycek and chained him to the balcony, and omg, that scene is hotter than ever.

GOD YES.

In fact, Mulder never once manages to beat up on Krycek without it looking a whole lot like kinky sex. (It doesn't help that it just isn't very believable that Mulder of all people can beat up Krycek without Krycek letting him - and certainly not the way Mulder actually does it. *g*)

Also, I tend to burn out on fandoms I write fic for, so I expect I'll be done with the Vampire Diaries by the end of S4 at the latest. ;-)What, really? Every fandom? That's really sad! What about HP

[rheasilvia]

HP has a bad reputation for that kind of thing, I've heard - looks like it's well-deserved. That tart! Someone should really put a stop to its evuhl ways. *tsk*

Fandom can definitely be a source of fannish stress, yes. But the more I think about it, the more I realize canon itself plays a larger role with me than I'd have suspected. In two cases that I can think of, I stopped watching the canon to avoid burning out on the fanfic - Smallville and Merlin.

[pashoshi]

I think canon issues are a big factor in fannish burnout, at least for me. The first fandom I got really involved in was Battlestar Galactica, but I angrily stopped watching the show partway through the second season and I couldn't really get into any fic after that, even if it had nothing to do with the stuff that annoyed me. I also tend to have one main fandom at a time and not read much of anything in earlier fandoms, but a lot of times that's because I've burned out on those fandoms. It's a shame when there's still good fic being written, but I've never been able to make myself like something just because there's good fic, so it can't be helped.

[rheasilvia]

Yeah, I think you're right - canon suckage does take the steam out of it for me, too. That was definitely a factor in my XF burnout. It was also the main factor in my almost-burnout with SPN...

And I *so* see where your problems came from with BSG. I stopped watching that show too, after absolutely loving it in the beginning.

It's a shame when there's still good fic being written, but I've never been able to make myself like something just because there's good fic, so it can't be helped.

No, if the love is gone, there's nothing to be done...

I used to try to get interested in fandoms with large stores of good fiction, just for the fic. Often it worked - but sometimes the spark just didn't catch, and there was no help for it. The chemistry has to be right! :-)

[strangerian]

I do remember that at one point, I felt as though every new story I saw was composed entirely of fandom clichés

This, this is what I felt about Professionals Bodie/Doyle (and there wans't much else in Profs fandom) after about three years of eating them all up with a spoon. Possibly it was the teddy-bear stories, but definitely there were too many fanon cliches being used all. the. time. And it suddenly drove me insane, and I could not read about Bodie's sapphire eyes meeting Doyle's emerald orbs even once more.

Sadly, the new Sherlock is fast approaching this event horizon even now. I hope a new season will present more stories and screen pictures and so on, so that fandom need not dwell solely on having them fuck in yet more outré positions for yet more outré reasons.

[rheasilvia]

There were Teddy Bear stories in Pros, too? I thought that particular horror had been restricted to Highlander! Ack. I'm glad I missed them in Pros, at least... although I *did* come across some fairly startling elf and cat stories there.

I could not read about Bodie's sapphire eyes meeting Doyle's emerald orbs even once more.

Nobody should have to read about that kind of thing, ever, and if it occurs frequently, it's no wonder it can drive fans out of the fandom.

One thing to be grateful for is that neither of them had brown eyes! Duncan's chocolate orbs (usually accompanied by the white swan-like neck and changeable gold-blue-silver-bronze-sprinkled green depths of a really old guy) have left me scarred forever. Eyes should not be reminiscent of candy, especially not in a fandom with Caspian in it. *shudder*

Sadly, the new Sherlock is fast approaching this event horizon even now.Already? That is sad... I've only read a handful of stories there so far, and I like the way the characters were written. But yeah, three episodes is

[strangerian]

There were teddy bears having *tea parties* in Pros. Also a number of picturesque animals and even more picturesque elves. I had a pretty high tolerance for the elves and the AUs, actually, until it all got to be Too Much. I shouldn't have blamed the "emerald orbs" school of bad writing, which is just purple prose on a rampage, but it was easier than reiterating the character tics that had become empty labels.

I think one trigger for me to think a fandom is going over the top is when I see fans idolizing the actors. That's often a fan who no longer cares about the show characterization, and it skews the story-writing. At least you can't *do* that in RPF -- the fandom is already about the actor or singer.

But oh well. Possibly also I'm just getting crankier with age; not all fandoms or even most parts of most fandoms have this stuff going on, but I'm readier to see it and then ignore chunks of fandom, there being so much available now.

[rheasilvia]

The Pros teddy bears scare me. And I thought the Wiccans and cats were bad...

I find that I always have a higher tolerance in new fandoms, when the enthusiasm overflows and I am willing to overlook more stale plots and purplish prose than later on. And I have definitely raised my standards overall, in the years I've been reading slash. When I was just starting out, I was so giddy and so happily incredulous at the idea of slash - that something like it even existed for me to read - that I loved stories that have me shaking my head in decidedly non-happy incredulousness nowadays.

I'm sure the overall volume of available fiction (and fandoms!) also has much to do with it, as you say. It's possible to be choosy when there's a larger selection.

I think one trigger for me to think a fandom is going over the top is when I see fans idolizing the actors. That's often a fan who no longer cares about the show characterization, and it skews the story-writing. At least you can't *do* that in RPF -- the fandom is already about the actor or

[without_me]

I guess I tend not to burn out so much as fade away: fall in love with something else and gradually move on. (In the case of XF I got tar-and-feathered out of fandom and after that it hurt too much to read the fic for a while, but that was--thankfully--an anomaly.)

[rheasilvia]

That's generally how I do it, too - though I don't always fall in love with something new so much as get bored/impatient/fed up with the something old. *g* Canon and fanfic both play a part in that for me, I think.

Eeek, your XF experience sounds awful. :-( Fandom can be very unpleasant sometimes.

[rheasilvia]

Heee! Really? I can't say that particular pairing ever occurred to me, but why not. :-)

It's traditional for the first, unposted stories to be horribly bad, btw. Mine was Star Trek Voyager - Chakotay/Paris. You don't want to know, seriously.