One fangirl's journey: A written history
I actually wrote this yesterday because I was excessively bored. I posted it to tumblr for a brief time, but took it down for reasons. Now it's going here for reasons I can't quite fathom. I suppose that isn't true. I'm posting it here because I ultimately have more control of who sees it and because this is honestly the way I feel when I discover a new fandom, only to find out that my fanfiction selection is very, very limited.
I swear I have tiny fandom radar or something. To be honest, it isn't necessarily a bad thing. I've been involved in large fandoms before. I've been involved in small fandoms. I don't enjoy the drama that comes with large fandoms. Like with small fandoms, I'm just here for the fic. My first foray into fandom politics wasn't all that terrific. I've witnessed many BNF's stirring up trouble where there should have never been any, brow-beating lesser writers, and coming off as self-important assholes. Which is why I'm just here for the fic, folks.
I was so bored and fic-starved yesterday, I went in search of like-minded souls in the "Community" fandom. Big mistake. I was scared shitless. I don't know any of these people, but I see fandom politics are alive and well everywhere, with members tearing apart some poor writer's story until the person was so embarrassed, they deleted their story and... I just ... no. That kind of behavior isn't for me. I like to build people up instead of tearing them down. And...it is really intimidating for me to want to write fic when I'm in such an atmosphere. Part of me gets pissed and righteously inspired to new heights of ficcery and part of me simply wants to hide in the corner.
So instead of being creative I'm going to build a timeline of the fandoms I've been in because of reasons. I might miss some, but ... ah, hell. Let's see, here we go.
I'm going to exclude childhood fanfiction forays because it was completely me writing and imagining and playing. (fun, if embarrassing times with lots and lots of Mary Sues) Thank goodness the internet wasn't around then. Otherwise I would NEVER live it down.
Sherlock Holmes in almost every incarnation.
I fell deeply in love with the characters and their relationship when I was in middle school. It has yet to wane. My love for Holmes and Watson or Sherlock and John or Basil of Baker Street and Dawson will be a part of me until the day I die. 'nough said.
Star Trek (TOS) -
Read "The Price of the Phoenix," by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath. This story resonated with me because it was the closest a movie/TV tie-in came to the kinds of stories I used to love to write. Hurt/Comfort with a genuine love between the characters that screams pre-slash to me now.
I read an essay on K/S in a Star Trek book and became so intrigued by the concept that I tracked its ass down in the form of fanzines. Yes, I was fandom girl before fandom girls were cool. Anyway, I wrote to the author of the article and she gave me addresses where I could discover the wonderful world of fanzines for myself. And she welcomed me into fandom with open arms and was just...genuinely kind. I'm so grateful to her to have that experience, especially when I see so much cynicism in fandom these days with others of the attitude of "been there, done that, bought the t-shirt, now get off my lawn!" I was also delighted to discover that other people enjoyed hurt/comfort stories like I did. It took me forever to catch the slash bug (and it wasn't in this fandom) because the first stories I found were PWP's and fairly hardcore PWP's, at that. And PWP's have never truly been my thing.
The X-Files and Forever Knight.
Oh Mulder and Scully! While I loved the show for many years, I never really got into the fandom or the fanfiction side of the equation (except for the official books), but it deserves an honorable mention because I still have a fanzine I bought from the way back when. Same goes for Forever Knight.
Kung Fu: The Legend Continues...
Ah, such a simpler time. Here my love for this show was strengthened by the fanzines I read. This was a purely fanzine fandom. I have always loved shows centered around the father-son dynamic and this show was right up my alley at the time. And there was martial arts and a guy named Kermit who was an ex-mercenary who donned green sunglasses and drove a green car. What's not to love, right? My love for this show has waned with time, mostly due to learning more about David Carradine's personal life and my interests changing. I had an amazing fanfiction writer penpal and we even tried our hand at writing together. The story was never finished because of distance and crippling self-doubt (on my part), but it was a whole lot of fun at the time. This is one out of only two fandoms where I published fiction under my real name.
The Sentinel.
Ye gads! The fiction was amazing. I spent hours and hours being immersed in this universe and loving every fiction-y minute of it. However, the in-fighting murdered my love for this show, its fiction and its fandom. Train-wreck city. I think this fandom was the one and only fandom where I would have been in danger of finding myself on Fandom Wank. It was that bad. I wrote fic in this fandom and co-authored a well-received mpreg story there for which I am completely embarrassed over. At the time the concept of mpreg was still new and... well -- I don't know how to end that sentence due to sheer embarrassment. Sorry fandom. I knew not what I did.
MST3K.
After such a terrible, no good rotten experience in the Sentinel fandom, I switched gears and wanted something light and fun. I chose MST3K or the Mystery Science Theater 3000 fandom. God, I love this show. It still makes me laugh. When I'm depressed, I pop in some MST3K and all is right with my world for about an hour and a half. I loved the fanfiction. Thankfully, I avoided the flame wars over which host was better - Joel or Mike. I was never butthurt over any of that and I am very grateful. Also, I will always choose both. I love them both equally for entirely different reasons. Same thing goes with the Dr. Forrester and TV's Frank duo verses Pearl Forrester and Brain Guy and Professor Bobo as the loveable villains. The fiction generated by this show was laugh-out-loud funny. And that is not simply an over-used internet way to express myself. I literally horse-laughed my way through the fiction. Seen from a distance, the fiction could be considered pretty wanky and possibly cruel, but I never felt that way about it. Authors would take really bad fiction written by others and have the characters of Mike or Joel and the bots try to survive the experience by riffing on them. There were three authors who I could always count on for good-natured fun. It was also the one and only fandom I have been in that was mainly populated by men. While there were riffs on the fics, I never felt it was unnecessarily mean-spirited or cruel. The MST3K writers were simply making bad fiction good. There was one bad fiction writer - who for the life of me I can't remember his name - who took the riffing in stride and actually became a BNF in the MST3K fandom. While he was a bad writer, with horrible, humorous spelling errors such as "out pooped Sailor Mercury" instead of "out popped Sailor Mercury" - his imaginative efforts were amazing and undaunted. And he was quite prolific. I actually even wrote him a fan letter because he was such a good sport about the riffing. Even today, I can be completely and totally despondent and still read a MST3K-doctored "Eye of Aragon" and come away laughing and genuinely angst-free. I heard through the grapevine years later that one of my top three riffers had passed away due to cancer. I cried. I had written him a fan letter perhaps two years prior to learning of his passing, and instead of him thinking I was an an overly enthusiastic stalker fan-girl, he was gracious and truly appreciative to hear from me. I hope I made his day a little brighter. He certainly made mine. He still does sometimes.
Anne Rice's Vampire novels.
The writing was amazing. (Not Rice's, but the fans'.) I loved the speculative fiction. The fiction that came out of this fandom was so eloquent and uniquely different between each author, but the characters remained themselves no matter who was at the wheel. Anne Rice destroyed my love for this fandom because she began having her lawyers frighten off anyone who even had a stray thought about Louis and Lestat. To this day I still cannot read her novels without gagging. Her behavior left a bitter, overly-descriptive, man-tearish, purple prose taste in my mouth.
Queen of Swords. (Lady Zorro)
This was a very small and intimate group of fiction writers I enjoyed immensely. While I never wrote fiction for the group, the others were so caring and supportive of each other, I have stayed on their mailing list to this day.
Highlander: The Series.
This was a short-lived excursion. My love for the character of Mythos was my driving force. The fandom was so big that I was overwhelmed utterly and completely. I think I was on a mailing list for a week before discovering that BNF's wanted everybody who dared set foot on their shores to be hardcore history majors. I enjoyed some fic and left quietly very, very quickly.
Star Wars: The Phantom Menace.
Qui-Gon and Obi-wan made my heart go pitter patter back in the day. By this time I had learned my lesson about fandom and kept my distance. When all was said and done, I came away with one fic that kills me every time I read it and one favorite author that I remember distinctly.
Shadow Chasers.
This was a short-lived show from the 80's. It was kind of like X-Files, but extremely silly. The way I fell into this fandom is hard to explain even to myself. When I was a kid I had videotaped some music videos off the TV and my biological dad being a terrible and selfish human being that he was decided to tape over my videos to record porn and the pilot of this show. I know. Weird, right? Well, I had no interest in the porn, but I did fall in love with the characters of Benny and Jonathan. The first episode wasn't as silly as the series later was, but I had developed a life-long love for the characters from the pilot -- actually 3/4's a pilot because of...well...porn. Years later I came upon a Shadow Chasers fiction archive and fell in love with the characters all over again. And the fiction was high quality and amazing and...better than I had ever expected. The fans should have taken over writing this show for reals.
LOTR.
Oh, good heavens. The fic was incredible. The wank was incredible when viewed from a distance. I switched between 3 pairings like mad. It was like having three different fandoms at my fingertips because of all the fiction. It was fanfiction heaven. Sam and Frodo. Gimli and Legolas. Merry and Pippin (Merry and Pippin friendship). There was even a parody comic series made called "The Bag Enders" that made me laugh out loud a lot. Good times.
Pirates of the Caribbean.
I thankfully avoided all wank and just read to my heart's content. Bliss.
Black Adder / Jeeves and Wooster / Fry and Laurie.
I love my sweet, innocent Bertie Wooster. Fry and Laurie were amazing in all of these series. I had never really been a fan of this era in history, but these characters made me fall in love with it. Even real life seemed a little sweeter and a whole lot more innocent because of my making an acquaintance with these characters. They got me through some rough patches. Sometimes they still do.
Smallville.
Once again I avoid angst like the plague. My love for character redemption shines. I miss these days, the fiction was amazing.
Starsky and Hutch.
It still amazes me there is still wank in this fandom after so many years. It was truly breathtaking to behold. I came to this fandom the odd way, through the terrible Stiller-Wilson vehicle, but I eventually grew to love the original duo. There was this one person - one - who single-highhandedly ruined this fandom for me. I don't even know if she was a BNF, but the fandom tolerated her and her antics like she was a rich, spoiled child and they were the servants. She always spoke way too highly of herself at every possible turn and bragged that the reason she wrote so well was because she didn't "see" emotion like everyone else. She saw emotion as colors. And maths and shit... While that's all fine and dandy, her attitude toward everyone was atrocious. The fiction was great though, and I enjoyed it for quite awhile, but the whole experience began making me feel dead inside. Plus, everyone seemed friends with this wanky chick, and I couldn't even find one. Sadness.
Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure
LOL. Just lol. It was good times. I met a great friend. I love buddy movies, okay?
Good Omens.
Hmm. Somewhere in through here was Good Omens. Great book. Great fanfiction.
Red Dwarf.
Read the fic and pretty much moved on. The people were nice, though.
The Dresden Files.
I love the characters of Bob and Harry so much. I miss them terribly. Too bad we only got one season. I made some great friends though. I miss them, too. I actually wrote a crack fic that became uber-serious fun. I never published it because I didn't know how to end it. I had so much fun writing that thing. Like you won't believe. And...BOB! Redemption fic is truly my thing. I. love. it.
Hot Fuzz.
I have nothing bad to say about the fine folks of this fandom. They were gracious and good people. I miss them, too. And I wrote this epic fic (epic as in long) that kept me entertained and out of trouble for like a year and a half. I think my favorite bit was seeing just how many "fucks" I could write in one sentence. Danny was ranting at Nicholas who was being (of all things) stubborn. Shocker. It still makes me laugh. And bliss.
Thor and The Avengers.
I mentioned I love redemption fics. I still think there were moments in Thor that could have turned things around. That story truly is a Shakespearean tragedy which I think is why it resonates with me. However, the slash made me extremely uncomfortable because the characters grew up as brothers. My sense of right-and-wrong and my love for this fandom had a knock-down-drag-out fight. A house divided against itself simply cannot stand. I left fandom because of this and because Hiddleston-lovers were also making me very, very uncomfortable. I didn't want my enjoyment of a character to be mistaken for stalker fangirl syndrome. I never want anyone to look at me and see "crazy."
Psych.
I love this show. I think Shawn and Gus would make a great pairing. Apparently most of fandom does not agree. Which is fine. I love them as they are in the show. I couldn't ask for more. Although I did find one phenomenal fic that still blows me away. I'm so happy I found it.
Community: Troy and Abed.
My newest fandom love. Oh boys! I wrote whatever I wrote at the beginning of this post because there are too few fics in this fandom and I find myself rebelling against that. But I'm terrified to actually write anything. I'll let you know how it goes.
I swear I have tiny fandom radar or something. To be honest, it isn't necessarily a bad thing. I've been involved in large fandoms before. I've been involved in small fandoms. I don't enjoy the drama that comes with large fandoms. Like with small fandoms, I'm just here for the fic. My first foray into fandom politics wasn't all that terrific. I've witnessed many BNF's stirring up trouble where there should have never been any, brow-beating lesser writers, and coming off as self-important assholes. Which is why I'm just here for the fic, folks.
I was so bored and fic-starved yesterday, I went in search of like-minded souls in the "Community" fandom. Big mistake. I was scared shitless. I don't know any of these people, but I see fandom politics are alive and well everywhere, with members tearing apart some poor writer's story until the person was so embarrassed, they deleted their story and... I just ... no. That kind of behavior isn't for me. I like to build people up instead of tearing them down. And...it is really intimidating for me to want to write fic when I'm in such an atmosphere. Part of me gets pissed and righteously inspired to new heights of ficcery and part of me simply wants to hide in the corner.
So instead of being creative I'm going to build a timeline of the fandoms I've been in because of reasons. I might miss some, but ... ah, hell. Let's see, here we go.
I'm going to exclude childhood fanfiction forays because it was completely me writing and imagining and playing. (fun, if embarrassing times with lots and lots of Mary Sues) Thank goodness the internet wasn't around then. Otherwise I would NEVER live it down.
Sherlock Holmes in almost every incarnation.
I fell deeply in love with the characters and their relationship when I was in middle school. It has yet to wane. My love for Holmes and Watson or Sherlock and John or Basil of Baker Street and Dawson will be a part of me until the day I die. 'nough said.
Star Trek (TOS) -
Read "The Price of the Phoenix," by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath. This story resonated with me because it was the closest a movie/TV tie-in came to the kinds of stories I used to love to write. Hurt/Comfort with a genuine love between the characters that screams pre-slash to me now.
I read an essay on K/S in a Star Trek book and became so intrigued by the concept that I tracked its ass down in the form of fanzines. Yes, I was fandom girl before fandom girls were cool. Anyway, I wrote to the author of the article and she gave me addresses where I could discover the wonderful world of fanzines for myself. And she welcomed me into fandom with open arms and was just...genuinely kind. I'm so grateful to her to have that experience, especially when I see so much cynicism in fandom these days with others of the attitude of "been there, done that, bought the t-shirt, now get off my lawn!" I was also delighted to discover that other people enjoyed hurt/comfort stories like I did. It took me forever to catch the slash bug (and it wasn't in this fandom) because the first stories I found were PWP's and fairly hardcore PWP's, at that. And PWP's have never truly been my thing.
The X-Files and Forever Knight.
Oh Mulder and Scully! While I loved the show for many years, I never really got into the fandom or the fanfiction side of the equation (except for the official books), but it deserves an honorable mention because I still have a fanzine I bought from the way back when. Same goes for Forever Knight.
Kung Fu: The Legend Continues...
Ah, such a simpler time. Here my love for this show was strengthened by the fanzines I read. This was a purely fanzine fandom. I have always loved shows centered around the father-son dynamic and this show was right up my alley at the time. And there was martial arts and a guy named Kermit who was an ex-mercenary who donned green sunglasses and drove a green car. What's not to love, right? My love for this show has waned with time, mostly due to learning more about David Carradine's personal life and my interests changing. I had an amazing fanfiction writer penpal and we even tried our hand at writing together. The story was never finished because of distance and crippling self-doubt (on my part), but it was a whole lot of fun at the time. This is one out of only two fandoms where I published fiction under my real name.
The Sentinel.
Ye gads! The fiction was amazing. I spent hours and hours being immersed in this universe and loving every fiction-y minute of it. However, the in-fighting murdered my love for this show, its fiction and its fandom. Train-wreck city. I think this fandom was the one and only fandom where I would have been in danger of finding myself on Fandom Wank. It was that bad. I wrote fic in this fandom and co-authored a well-received mpreg story there for which I am completely embarrassed over. At the time the concept of mpreg was still new and... well -- I don't know how to end that sentence due to sheer embarrassment. Sorry fandom. I knew not what I did.
MST3K.
After such a terrible, no good rotten experience in the Sentinel fandom, I switched gears and wanted something light and fun. I chose MST3K or the Mystery Science Theater 3000 fandom. God, I love this show. It still makes me laugh. When I'm depressed, I pop in some MST3K and all is right with my world for about an hour and a half. I loved the fanfiction. Thankfully, I avoided the flame wars over which host was better - Joel or Mike. I was never butthurt over any of that and I am very grateful. Also, I will always choose both. I love them both equally for entirely different reasons. Same thing goes with the Dr. Forrester and TV's Frank duo verses Pearl Forrester and Brain Guy and Professor Bobo as the loveable villains. The fiction generated by this show was laugh-out-loud funny. And that is not simply an over-used internet way to express myself. I literally horse-laughed my way through the fiction. Seen from a distance, the fiction could be considered pretty wanky and possibly cruel, but I never felt that way about it. Authors would take really bad fiction written by others and have the characters of Mike or Joel and the bots try to survive the experience by riffing on them. There were three authors who I could always count on for good-natured fun. It was also the one and only fandom I have been in that was mainly populated by men. While there were riffs on the fics, I never felt it was unnecessarily mean-spirited or cruel. The MST3K writers were simply making bad fiction good. There was one bad fiction writer - who for the life of me I can't remember his name - who took the riffing in stride and actually became a BNF in the MST3K fandom. While he was a bad writer, with horrible, humorous spelling errors such as "out pooped Sailor Mercury" instead of "out popped Sailor Mercury" - his imaginative efforts were amazing and undaunted. And he was quite prolific. I actually even wrote him a fan letter because he was such a good sport about the riffing. Even today, I can be completely and totally despondent and still read a MST3K-doctored "Eye of Aragon" and come away laughing and genuinely angst-free. I heard through the grapevine years later that one of my top three riffers had passed away due to cancer. I cried. I had written him a fan letter perhaps two years prior to learning of his passing, and instead of him thinking I was an an overly enthusiastic stalker fan-girl, he was gracious and truly appreciative to hear from me. I hope I made his day a little brighter. He certainly made mine. He still does sometimes.
Anne Rice's Vampire novels.
The writing was amazing. (Not Rice's, but the fans'.) I loved the speculative fiction. The fiction that came out of this fandom was so eloquent and uniquely different between each author, but the characters remained themselves no matter who was at the wheel. Anne Rice destroyed my love for this fandom because she began having her lawyers frighten off anyone who even had a stray thought about Louis and Lestat. To this day I still cannot read her novels without gagging. Her behavior left a bitter, overly-descriptive, man-tearish, purple prose taste in my mouth.
Queen of Swords. (Lady Zorro)
This was a very small and intimate group of fiction writers I enjoyed immensely. While I never wrote fiction for the group, the others were so caring and supportive of each other, I have stayed on their mailing list to this day.
Highlander: The Series.
This was a short-lived excursion. My love for the character of Mythos was my driving force. The fandom was so big that I was overwhelmed utterly and completely. I think I was on a mailing list for a week before discovering that BNF's wanted everybody who dared set foot on their shores to be hardcore history majors. I enjoyed some fic and left quietly very, very quickly.
Star Wars: The Phantom Menace.
Qui-Gon and Obi-wan made my heart go pitter patter back in the day. By this time I had learned my lesson about fandom and kept my distance. When all was said and done, I came away with one fic that kills me every time I read it and one favorite author that I remember distinctly.
Shadow Chasers.
This was a short-lived show from the 80's. It was kind of like X-Files, but extremely silly. The way I fell into this fandom is hard to explain even to myself. When I was a kid I had videotaped some music videos off the TV and my biological dad being a terrible and selfish human being that he was decided to tape over my videos to record porn and the pilot of this show. I know. Weird, right? Well, I had no interest in the porn, but I did fall in love with the characters of Benny and Jonathan. The first episode wasn't as silly as the series later was, but I had developed a life-long love for the characters from the pilot -- actually 3/4's a pilot because of...well...porn. Years later I came upon a Shadow Chasers fiction archive and fell in love with the characters all over again. And the fiction was high quality and amazing and...better than I had ever expected. The fans should have taken over writing this show for reals.
LOTR.
Oh, good heavens. The fic was incredible. The wank was incredible when viewed from a distance. I switched between 3 pairings like mad. It was like having three different fandoms at my fingertips because of all the fiction. It was fanfiction heaven. Sam and Frodo. Gimli and Legolas. Merry and Pippin (Merry and Pippin friendship). There was even a parody comic series made called "The Bag Enders" that made me laugh out loud a lot. Good times.
Pirates of the Caribbean.
I thankfully avoided all wank and just read to my heart's content. Bliss.
Black Adder / Jeeves and Wooster / Fry and Laurie.
I love my sweet, innocent Bertie Wooster. Fry and Laurie were amazing in all of these series. I had never really been a fan of this era in history, but these characters made me fall in love with it. Even real life seemed a little sweeter and a whole lot more innocent because of my making an acquaintance with these characters. They got me through some rough patches. Sometimes they still do.
Smallville.
Once again I avoid angst like the plague. My love for character redemption shines. I miss these days, the fiction was amazing.
Starsky and Hutch.
It still amazes me there is still wank in this fandom after so many years. It was truly breathtaking to behold. I came to this fandom the odd way, through the terrible Stiller-Wilson vehicle, but I eventually grew to love the original duo. There was this one person - one - who single-highhandedly ruined this fandom for me. I don't even know if she was a BNF, but the fandom tolerated her and her antics like she was a rich, spoiled child and they were the servants. She always spoke way too highly of herself at every possible turn and bragged that the reason she wrote so well was because she didn't "see" emotion like everyone else. She saw emotion as colors. And maths and shit... While that's all fine and dandy, her attitude toward everyone was atrocious. The fiction was great though, and I enjoyed it for quite awhile, but the whole experience began making me feel dead inside. Plus, everyone seemed friends with this wanky chick, and I couldn't even find one. Sadness.
Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure
LOL. Just lol. It was good times. I met a great friend. I love buddy movies, okay?
Good Omens.
Hmm. Somewhere in through here was Good Omens. Great book. Great fanfiction.
Red Dwarf.
Read the fic and pretty much moved on. The people were nice, though.
The Dresden Files.
I love the characters of Bob and Harry so much. I miss them terribly. Too bad we only got one season. I made some great friends though. I miss them, too. I actually wrote a crack fic that became uber-serious fun. I never published it because I didn't know how to end it. I had so much fun writing that thing. Like you won't believe. And...BOB! Redemption fic is truly my thing. I. love. it.
Hot Fuzz.
I have nothing bad to say about the fine folks of this fandom. They were gracious and good people. I miss them, too. And I wrote this epic fic (epic as in long) that kept me entertained and out of trouble for like a year and a half. I think my favorite bit was seeing just how many "fucks" I could write in one sentence. Danny was ranting at Nicholas who was being (of all things) stubborn. Shocker. It still makes me laugh. And bliss.
Thor and The Avengers.
I mentioned I love redemption fics. I still think there were moments in Thor that could have turned things around. That story truly is a Shakespearean tragedy which I think is why it resonates with me. However, the slash made me extremely uncomfortable because the characters grew up as brothers. My sense of right-and-wrong and my love for this fandom had a knock-down-drag-out fight. A house divided against itself simply cannot stand. I left fandom because of this and because Hiddleston-lovers were also making me very, very uncomfortable. I didn't want my enjoyment of a character to be mistaken for stalker fangirl syndrome. I never want anyone to look at me and see "crazy."
Psych.
I love this show. I think Shawn and Gus would make a great pairing. Apparently most of fandom does not agree. Which is fine. I love them as they are in the show. I couldn't ask for more. Although I did find one phenomenal fic that still blows me away. I'm so happy I found it.
Community: Troy and Abed.
My newest fandom love. Oh boys! I wrote whatever I wrote at the beginning of this post because there are too few fics in this fandom and I find myself rebelling against that. But I'm terrified to actually write anything. I'll let you know how it goes.