"Y'All Jus' Jellus!" The Scary World of Fandom

[Auroranorth]

Erinnyes, Elijah Wood has seen your site!!

Wood says he likes to surf the Web and look at doctored photos that put him in compromising positions with men.

“There’s one that’s called elijahwoodisveryverygay, which is actually a personal favorite of mine, it’s absolutely hilarious,” Wood said, reports World Entertainment News Network. “It’s this kind of joke Web site that maintains that they have proof that I am very, very gay in various photographs — photographic evidence (of me) holding hands with a male.”

Here's the site.

At least he has a sense of humor about it.

[dwanollah]

Ha! I love that site, too!

I've seen an interesting facet of Freaky Fans lately. I'm working on some stuff about the Betsy-Tacy series of children's books, and there're a couple organizations -- the Betsy Tacy Society and the Maud Hart Lovelace Society -- who're sort of Hatfield-and-McCoyish. Since there hasn't been much critical work on Lovelace and the Betsy-Tacy books, most of the people I've contacted have either been members of the societies, or are totally freaked out by the societies. "Are you a member of the Betsy-Tacy Society?" someone will often ask me, right away, and are usually relieved when I say no. In fact, one of the archive currators at the library yesterday (I'm currently in Mankato for a week on research) was very hesitant in talking with me for the first minute or two we were chatting. He mentioned that the BTS had some reading/event here last weekend, and I said "Yeah, I scheduled my trip to avoid that." "Oh, thank GOD!" he gasped. "I don't know how to say it, but... those people are freaks." I told him I'd heard that the MHL Society was slightly less freaky than the BTS. "Let's put it this way," he said. "One drinks Grape Kool-Aid, the other drinks purple Kool-Aid."

Even the housekeeper at my hotel was a little hesitant when she saw my stack of Betsy-Tacy books, because she'd had to deal with "them" before, and right off the bat asked me which of the societies I belonged to. "Neither, I'm just working on a critical book." "Oh, good. They're... well, they're very demanding." I guess there's a lot of dressing up and acting like book characters and very, very specific requests for music and food and surroundings and set-ups from the era, and each group has to be bigger and better and more specialer than the other.

And it's mostly women in their 50s-60s.

[pepper67]

It's a pity you can't find out how weird they are, Dwanollah. If they can freak out librarians and hotel staff, they must be bad!

[Neurochick]

I don't have a problem with fandom as long as it's treated like any hobby and not taken overboard. I have a demanding job, sometimes I write fanfic, sometimes I read it, it's fun, it's fantasy and that's it.

The fans who've scared me are the GSR's (Grissom/Sarah Romance from CSI: Crime Scene Investigaton), if you even imply that Grissom or Sara should be with someone else, man all hell breaks loose! I'm not kidding.

About 10 years ago I went to meet with a group of fans of a sci fi show we all loved; all of us had fun, watched videos, went to an amusement park etc...it was a blast. But there was one woman who did not have a good time, apparently she was REALLY into this fandom, I mean to the point that she didn't have a life. She really thought that some of the cast were going to be at this thing and was dissappointed when she realized it was just a group of friends. I talked to her and it turned out this woman had no life, and really did live in her parent's basement and she was probably over 30 at the time. Now that's sad

[duskwolf]

Let's see...my experiences with fandom...

Labyrinth fanfic: I implied that Jareth and Sarah aren't in love...I got one comment asking "aren't they supposed to be?" I even wrote a logical explanation in my fanfic as to why they weren't. I think it went largely ignored for that reason.

Buffy: I dated a girl (yes, a girl) who was into Buffy. So much so that the first time we spoke on the phone that she cut me off after the first minute because Buffy was on. Needless to say, that relationship didn't last long.

[pepper67]

I don't have a problem with fandom as long as it's treated like any hobby and not taken overboard. I have a demanding job, sometimes I write fanfic, sometimes I read it, it's fun, it's fantasy and that's it.

That's how I see it, Neurochick. I'm involved in two fandoms online, and it's purely for the fun of it. Some people though, take it far too seriously. Which is when that section of the fandom goes into meltdown. Of course, that's also fun to watch from the sidelines. ;D

[Hamatron]

I wander around the Harry Potter fandom sometimes. It's very interesting and varied-- there's adults that like to chat and write fics about the complexities of the series, there's cute little kiddies that get excited about movie trailers and the video games, there's the 13 year old girls who have no clue about the male anatomy writing NC-17 slash... and then there are the people who will hunt you down and cut you if you don't see their bizarre ship as cannon (Regulus and Cedric anyone? Ginny and Hagrid? The subtext is so there, people!).

When fandoms collide! This livejournal is sort of interesting to watch-- this guy's fandom is more in the area of DragonBall Z/various Japanese-ish cartoons, but he decided to read The Half Blood Prince and is reviewing it, chapter by chapter with his only exposure to Harry Potter being commercials on TV and weird moments when bumping into the fandom online occasionally. It's sort of fun to see the guy try to figure things out while making some pretty astute observations.

[memememe76]

The fans who irritate me the most are the Veronica Mars fans and Arrested Development fans. They invade my other tv threads so often, it's friggen annoying. They do stuff like "that last episode of Joey sucked! Why is this show still on while Arrested Development is on the verge of cancellation!" Guess what, I'm still not gonna watch that show.

Or Lost: "They don't resolve anything! JJ needs to get some lessons from Rob Thomas." Rob who? The Matchbox 21 guy?

Or Big Brother: "Ooh, James reminds me of sexy Logan--bad but sexy." Shut up.

They've become delusional. There are VM fans who refuse to think that Kristen Bell's rendition of Fame at the Emmys was nothing less than Tony-award winning. That they even voted for that Emmy Idol crap scares the crap out of me.

[Deleted]

memememe76 said:

The fans who irritate me the most are the Veronica Mars fans and Arrested Development fans. They invade my other tv threads so often, it's friggen annoying. They do stuff like "that last episode of Joey sucked! Why is this show still on while Arrested Development is on the verge of cancellation!" Guess what, I'm still not gonna watch that show.

Or Lost: "They don't resolve anything! JJ needs to get some lessons from Rob Thomas." Rob who? The Matchbox 21 guy?

Or Big Brother: "Ooh, James reminds me of sexy Logan--bad but sexy." Shut up.

They've become delusional. There are VM fans who refuse to think that Kristen Bell's rendition of Fame at the Emmys was nothing less than Tony-award winning. That they even voted for that Emmy Idol crap scares the crap out of me.

Yes, the VM fandom can be a very annoying place. I've heard KB sing on the show. Her voice has a quaint warble to it, but not much else.

Don't. Talk. About. Logan.

Why do people allow themselves to become that attached to certain shows? If I find myself becoming too emotinally involved I'll quit the fandom.

[realitybug]

I never got the VM fandom. Seems a little overhyped to me.

She's got a nice voice, but she sure has some crappy lip-synching skills. :-p

I watch Lost casually, and when I heard someone talk about Rob Thomas...I thought of the matchbox twenty dude, too and i was earnestly looking for him...