everything's FINE

[sab]

Things I know about yesterday: Donnatella Moss didn't die. I learned that on AIM. Then I learned about denialcorp on AIM as far as SV's concerned, and I share the following: EVERYTHING'S FINE. Then I saw Angel and lots of people died, but since it was the APOCALYPSE and also most of them were demons I'm pretty sure that's not a spoiler. Seriously, it's not a spoiler, I'm just being cavalier about mortality.

And in that spirit, I give you raincitygirl's denialcakes LJ entry, full of distracting comedic links and Jon Stewart's commencement address at William & Mary College. The latter is really damned good.

*

I'm living in a place where I don't really have a participatory fandom; where my diversity is manifest as dilution, or the center cannot hold, something like that. Babylon 5's the deepest of my current wading pools, and, I say again, dude, any fandom where ff.net's the go-to fic archive (Enemies & Allies, being specialized, and having under 20 stories, not withstanding, of course) is a sorry state of affairs.

But B5's representing in a big way. There's a loud and energetic group of girls here on LJ, and over at t_m; folks like barkley and andrastewhite are watching the episodes anew and we're having character discussions and some fearsome debates. Totally not sneezing at the B5 fandom, of whose ranks I am proud to be a member: I love you all.

But I was thinking about the experience of fandom, of *a* fandom (rather than fannishness in general), and I do kinda miss being part of a big meaty one. For the purposes of this argument, "Big Fandom" describes a group of people who largely know one another's names and reputations, where there's BNFs and where people can be identified by writing style, where there's a dozen specialized fic archives and fan sites that people know by name or acronym, where there's flamewars and aggravation and community -- all around one specific show/book/medium.

Maybe LJ and the current tread toward polyfanism has created a dilution of the big-ass fandoms, but they're still around. You can see it in HP, for one thing, in SV, in the Buffy/Angelverse still, even. In the comicverse/Batverse/JL-verse too, at this point. And there's probably still folks participating in the West Wing fandom, though I don't know the state of it at the moment. CSI and Alias both seem to have considerable community followings. What else? Where's the Big Fandom, nowadays?

I had it last in Farscape, before that was WW, and to a degree in SN, though Sports Night never had the same kind of community feel as other Big Fandoms. Before that, of course, was XF, the One Big Fandom To Rule Them All, and before that, I had Trek, the One Big Fandom To Birth Them All.

Now -- I have B5, and we're the fannish equivalent of the kiddie table. We're trying our damndest, but at the end of the day, there's maybe a dozen of us total, t_m and ff.net. Jeremiah never got off the ground, though the Samwise and Markus fans are representing over on valhalla_sector like troopers. Band of Brothers will never be a fannishy fandom, because, oddly, we've got too much respect for it to take it to that loving/mocking place. camp_toccoa is an awesome community, and a great crowd, but, you know, not the same thing.

And then there's Firefly, which, as Punk commented when we were discussing this, is a side-dish fandom. Everyone's got a lump of Firefly on the side, next to their main-course Angel or HP or SV or Farscape. Firefly -- there's no there there, despite the fact that it surpasses, in sheer numbers, all three of my other fandoms combined.

So, what's the buzz? Am I alone in this? Are other folks noticing a fannish diaspora that's caused a dilution in the concept of Big Fandoms? And for you kids who are still in Big Fandoms -- where are they? HP, SV, Alias? How're they workin' out for you?

Comments

[moireach.livejournal.com]

I kind of get the feeling in the most tertiary of ways that LOTRips may be the big monkey of the hour. Also PoTC was getting all big for a while, too, but now it's maybe dwindled?

Before that, of course, was XF, the One Big Fandom To Rule Them All, and before that, I had Trek, the One Big Fandom To Birth Them All.

It's funny 'cause it's true!

[sevenall.livejournal.com]

My feeling is that we Marvel people are slowly going DC. There's always movieverse, of course.

But LotR is still as prolific and full of fanatic love as ever :-)

[ratcreature]

Heh. That is because DC comics RULE. ;)

*hides her stash of Daredevil and Spider-Man comics*

[kerlin.livejournal.com]

whitelight1 linked to your post and as for CSI: I suppose you could call it a big fandom, in that it's the #1 show in America or some such jazz, but...it doesn't quite feel as "big" as Farscape did. (does?) Its main archive is ff.net, which is the devil, though there are smaller specialized archives for pairings. It hasn't got much of a community in that it's incredibly factionalized. So while on paper it would fit a lot of the requirements, I just don't get that vibe.

[mmeguilotn.livejournal.com]

Pop as a fandom is actually fairly large and yet fairly cohesive. Not on the scale of something like HP of course, but it feels pretty there. And, whatever you think of RPS, most popslashers are legitimate fans of the media as well. They buy the albums and the DVDs and pay obscene amounts of money to go to charity events.

I find that the HP fandom is so large that there are practically BNFs by pairing. So that you'll find someone who's very well-known in Snape/Harry circles, but the Harry/Draco people won't have even heard of them.

[iamsab.livejournal.com]

Yeah, popslash, I totally forgot. How has popslash survived in the last few years? Is it still going strong? Several of the folks I knew who were in the fandom have moved on -- or at least spread out their interests -- so I don't know if it's as centralized as it was. Though it's still definitely ubiquitous.

And, interesting about the HP fandom. That whole fandom empire frightens me no end.

[mmeguilotn.livejournal.com]

Popslash is still alive and kicking. I'm a post-hiatus newbie, so I can't really say what it was like back in the heady days when the bands were actually together. Some people may have drifted away, and a lot of the popslashers I know write in other fandoms as well, but there is definitely a core group that is very hooked in.

[tangleofthorns.livejournal.com]

Yeah, CSI is kind of a faux-fandom--there's the barking mad Gil/Sara love brigade, and then there are... everybody else, but there's not a real unifying factor. One of the amazing things about TWW, I always thought, was that there were good writers (present company included) who wrote in different pairings and genres and moved between them fluidly--really well-rounded BNFs, in other words.

I don't know what's up with those Smallville/Everwood type people, but there seem to be lots of them, too.

I'm kind of feeling fandom-disaporic, myself; I'm vaguely into lots of things, but it sure doesn't help that TV sucks so bad anymore it's hard to develop an attachment, and I'm still grieving the loss of TWW as the show I was compelled to watch. I don't have a home base anymore, and that's okay, because really I should be writing less fanfic and more original fiction anyway, but I miss it the same way you do.

[iamsab.livejournal.com]

There's definitely a there there in Smallville -- I get the feeling Everwood is a side-dish fandom in the way Firefly is (and possibly CSI too).

I think you might be right and that we've just caught a downward slope of TV in general, as all the old fannish shows are cancelled and none of the new shows are really biting. Wonderfalls showed promise and promptly vanished, and that was the closest I've heard to a new fannish show on the horizon. Alas.

[selenak.livejournal.com]

any fandom where ff.net's the go-to fic archive (Enemies & Allies, being specialized, and having under 20 stories, not withstanding, of course) is a sorry state of affairs.

Well, from the days B.H. (before hobsonphile) and Enemies and Allies, I remember, through desperate search for some Centauri and Narn fanfic, seeing quite a lot of Marcus/Ivanova and John/Delenn archives. Admittedly I was in no position to check whether they were still active - I was too frustrated that Londo, Vir and G'Kar weren't present at all.

muffinmonster also runs a Psi Corps story archive (it's linked at alfredbester's journal), but the last update has been, err, a while. Still, all this being said, I agree, compare it with Trek at its heyday or the Jossverse and it's all still the kiddie table.

My fannish experience started with Star Trek as well, and it was a pleasant one, so I have good memories of the Big Fandom experience, but I can't say the Small Fandom experience frustrates me. It's quite fun, being a pioneer.*g*

[iamsab.livejournal.com]

Yeah, jumpnow.de is unabashedly John/Delenncentric -- I haven't seen the other archives, but really, the good B5 fic (yours, 'Raste's, Deborah Judge's, etc) is only assembled on ff.net. SUCH a sad truth.

but I can't say the Small Fandom experience frustrates me. It's quite fun, being a pioneer.*g*

Agreed, particularly here, because B5 is so friendly and awesome. But I almost miss some of the...anonymity of a big fandom. Then again, as the internet gets smaller, with LJ and blogs and so on, there's not really anonymity anywhere in fandom to be found.

[deborah-judge.livejournal.com]

*bows* Glad to hear you like my stories! I greatly admire yours, which is why I just friended you.

My last fandom was the Silmarillion, which was also based on ff.net. The difference was, it was much more tightly organized - there was *one* mailing list, and we used it for discussion, and to plug our fics on ff.net. The B5 fandom seems to be very fragmented by pairing, and broken down into very many small lists and LJ-communities. Which makes it harder to get to know people, and also harder to find what's out there. There are advantages to the way we have it, though - the Silmarillion community nearly broke down because when people didn't get along there was nothing they could do to avoid each other. And the community we have is nice too.

[selenak.livejournal.com]

Well, you could always found a new archive.*g*

Also, couldn't resist. The new galaxygab is out. That should provide angst for Delenn and G'Kar both. Aren't I generous?*g*

[raveninthewind.livejournal.com]

I'm friending you because I need some B5 love in my life.

I've bought all the DVD sets, and I've begun the series from the beginning, becaue I'm sure there are a few episodes that I've missed.

I've not ever been active in the B5 fandom; my love for this show has been sated by reruns until the DVDs started coming out, and I just got bootlegs of the movies that I want to watch with a friend I converted.

Anyway, now that Angel is dead, I want something to go along with my fairly new due South obsession. (Speaking of fandoms, that one has had a big resurgence in the past year, with new fans finding the show and new activity on lj.)

[pearl-o.livejournal.com]

I was going to comment on due South, actually. It seems to have been going through this cycle where it *was* Big Fandom, started to move on, and now is back to Big Fandomness again, which is both weird and exciting.

[raveninthewind.livejournal.com]

It's wonderful how the DVD releases can spark interest in a flagging fandom. Second- and third-generation waves can only benefit from experienced writers, although the old-school fans might be uneasy at new folks bustling in (this is not true for DS, but I have heard that's a problem in some fandoms).

I see the new blood in QAF has improved fic quality--when the fandom was new, the writers were mostly newbies; now the writers seem mostly to have other fandom experience, and that's reflected in story quality. (Now if only they'd write something besides B/J! /snark)

I'm also interested in how the newbies will affect S&H and The Professionals fandoms.

[raveninthewind.livejournal.com]

Oh, I almost forgot: there are some B5 stories here (but I admit I haven't read any, so I can't speak for the quality):
http://www.jenavira.com/por/

[jenavira.livejournal.com]

*gazes up the thread* Dude, someone just pimped my B5 fic. That's...surreal.

I have to say, having always been in fairly small fandoms, I rather like it this way. I always thought of B5 as my "big fandom" because there's so much more there than in anything else I do. (I've kind of flirted around the edges of bigger ones, like Buffy and XF, and oh yeah, HP, but I don't really consider myself part of any of those fandoms.) (Which raises an interesting question. What constitutes the "fandom"? Is it the LJ communities, the message boards, web sites, e-mail lists, all of them together, how they interact? Anthro thesis project, here I come.)

[dafna]

Before that, of course, was XF, the One Big Fandom To Rule Them All, and before that, I had Trek, the One Big Fandom To Birth Them All.

Oh, that's just a perfect way of saying it. I used to say that you could tell who started in Trek and who started in XF and now, there are people who, like, have LOTRips as their first fandom, which just blows my mind.

[killabeez.livejournal.com]

Your post is along the lines of thoughts I've been having lately re: fandom, and where I fit in (or not). :) It's not new; I went digging around LJ archives and found this post I wrote about a year ago. I think it's the great wave of emotional outpouring re: the Angel finale, the excitement about the HP movie, and the negative reaction to Troy that's got me realizing again how out of step I am with most fans. (Angel and Joss in general tend to leave me cold, my allergy to HP continues unabated, while I really enjoyed Troy and could easily become fannish about it). But I wonder if your return to B5 isn't like my rekindled affair with Kirk and Spock. Nothing like feeling lonely to make you call up your old boyfriend, is there? *g*

I'm living in a place where I don't really have a participatory fandom; where my diversity is manifest as dilution, or the center cannot hold...

Yup. If you mean, by "participatory fandom," one where you're actively participating with other people, I can relate. I'm certainly "participating" in K/S, Jeremiah, Highlander and Mag7, as well as Deadwood, Hornblower and possibly Troy, but most of that is me over here in the corner, playing alone with my toys. HL's probably the biggest exception, in that I do actually interact with other fans a bit, but I can't seem to tolerate the active mailing lists. Yesterday, before I read your post, I did some housekeeping and deleted about 6 of my few remaining (nomail) lists, mostly in Hornblower, M7 and HL fandoms, keeping only one each.

Maybe LJ and the current tread toward polyfanism has created a dilution of the big-ass fandoms, but they're still around.

I think that's exactly it. The comments from the Escapade vidshow, particularly those that complained about "not enough vids in my fandom/my pairing," make this painfully clear, to me. As I said then, there were vids from many of the bigger fandoms: SV, LotR, Hornblower, dS, HL, Buffy/Angel, etc. The problem wasn't the vids; the problem was that fandom has become so diluted/diversified that there was no way a two-hour vid could represent everyone, or even come close. And in my own experience, Hornblower and Jeremiah in particular have disappointed me this way -- there are some wonderful folks in both places, but not one soul who relates to them in quite the way I do, and that seems to make a big difference in how I feel about them. In Hornblower, the Horatio/Archie fans all love Archie best, while I'm all about Horatio; then there's the Bush fans, the Pellew fans, the Edrington fans -- but again, the fans of these characters tend to put Horatio second, if they even really like him at all. In Jeremiah, it's the same. Many Markus fans, but Jeremiah's my guy -- and Jeremiah/Kurdy is really my pairing, even if Jeremiah/Markus is a lovely distraction. But of those who like Kurdy, it seems to be Kurdy/Smith that gets written. In Kirk/Spock fandom, I've found some wonderful folks, but there, my very polyfannishness is a drawback, and frowned upon; I often feel like an alien there, too, because the kinds of stories I want to read and the ideas I want to talk about are in the small minority.

(aside: I just read a Hornblower story yesterday that made me so incredibly happy, it may have singlehandedly revived my seriously waning interest in that fandom. *g* And further disproving my "nobody to talk to" theory, I just found out that one of my favoritest of Mag7 writers likes Jeremiah/Kurdy. Must send her eps pronto!)

And for you kids who are still in Big Fandoms -- where are they? HP, SV, Alias? How're they workin' out for you?

Is Alias a big fandom? *g* I'm not really involved in it (again, where is the Will/Sydney that I crave?), but it seems to be smallish, though very talented. I guess Star Trek: TOS and Highlander still count as big fandoms, but I really don't participate in them much more than I do in Hornblower or Mag 7, because the conversation just isn't going where I want to go, you know? Sometimes I tune in and listen a bit, but the meaningful conversation for me happens with one or two individuals, and between me and my toys over here in the corner.

rambling, rambling... did any of that make sense? *g*

[ratcreature]

Where's the Big Fandom, nowadays?

I'm kind of hoping DC comics might become the next Big Fandom. It's certainly grown a lot during the bit over a year I've been active. I guess, in a way it's been a "big fandom" for a long time, but from what I've seen not necessarily in the "fanfic fandom" way. However I think in some way the fact that it is comics hinders its "growth potential" -- the vast nature of comics canon and the large number of characters (even if you're just into some subsections) can come across as rather intimidating to the newbie. And it's not a cheap hobby, either. The toons help to make it more accessible, but as much as I like them, my true love are the comics, so I'm hoping those catch on more. And I dread the next Batman movie (not to mention that "Catwoman" thing, that doesn't really seem to have much in common with Catwoman at all), because so far I disliked *all* Batman movies, and the Superman ones as well for the most part. Somehow DC doesn't manage to make decent comic movies like Marvel is able to.