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reenkaMy mother's visiting, so I have even less time to catch up with anything than usual. But guilt aside, talking to my mother is really helpful sometimes, especially about fandom. Heh. Talk about unspoiled viewpoint. Though of course she's observed me for awhile, and I've been a fan of this-or-that for as long as I remember... though I'm a lone-wolf sort of fan. Don't play well with others, all that. But anyway.
My first "real" fandom was Star Trek, right... and my mother likes to remind me, asking me what I think of William Shatner's priceline commercials & all that. And why don't I care. And how come I went straight from an insane urge to read every Star Trek commercial novel released to an equally intense need to watch every anime ever released. I was sort of surprised, 'cause anime isn't a fandom-- it's a form of media. It's like loving comics or films-- it's a much more visual and passive thing than being a reader of some particular set of linked novels. So then my mother brought up the fact that after all, Star Trek too is primarily in a visual medium, right? Well, not to me.
I've never been a fan of Star Trek, the -show-. The original source, if you will, of the commercial fandom (which I stumbled across through a garish display at my local library before I ever knew about the show's existence). I could take it or leave it. I loved the films (especially "The Voyage Home", which is one of my all-time favorite movies, probably 'cause it has the most Jim&Spock in it), and the original series is okay, and TNG is quite good... but if you're talking visual sci-fi, my tolerance is high but my enjoyment stunted, compared to the written variety. My mother, surprisingly, wasn't taken aback by this incongruity, unlike a lot of people who're quite surprised to know I'm a lukewarm fan of the HP novels in general most times, while I'm a rabid fan of H/D fanfic, and in fact my appreciation for both isn't necessarily even -connected-. "It depends on what you're looking for", she said.
And that's just it. That's why I can easily be a fan of one medium of roughly the same content, but not another. Lots of people say the loved the book but not the movie (and vice versa, but not as often), in terms of movie adaptations of books they love. I think this is the same phenomenon, for me. Fanfic, in its own way, is another medium. It's a shared world. It focuses on (romantic, and often sexual) relationships. If you read the HP books looking for Draco exploration, dark Harry and romance, you'd be sorely disappointed. But that's what I like about HP fanfic. Similarly, if you read most HP fanfic expecting wacky adventure and children's-book level sexuality along with off-the-wall humor and parody... you'll be very disappointed.
It's kind of the way I'm not really into (a lot of) manga, though everyone says it's much better written/plotted/drawn than most anime. I don't -care-. The medium stops me. I'm obsessed with comics, and it bothers me that American comics, even the black and white ones, are tons better produced than a lot of manga. I hate there not being color. The spare, exaggerated style just doesn't work as well for me as a package, and I can't get over it very easily.
The reason I was a fan of the Star Trek books was because there was often in-depth character exploration, because I really got to -know- the characters in a very intimate way. Watching the show, it was usually problem-of-the-week with very limited, slow-building characterization which isn't really enough to keep me interested, especially in the original series (which I'd been reading). So... since I was looking for psychological depth and rigorous exploration of the consequences of a life spent in that future, clearly I couldn't be a fan of both the books and the show equally. They're just too different, and my preferences are too skewed one way, in terms of what I like in a story.
I'm such a kink-based reader... a genre reader, if you will. I find what I like and I go after it, every time. Some people will read anything, I think, with only slight adjustment, whereas I definitely know what I like in a story (or any medium, really). I've always been like that, finding a small entertainment niche and pursuing it, way before I began to read fanfic, I think. When I was little, I like fairy-tales more than anything else. But I was very particular about what sort of fairy-tales I liked... I knew I didn't like ones with animals in it, and I knew I didn't like Christian allegories, and darker was definitely better-- but not too dark, because I wanted things to work out. Naturally, soon enough I began writing them myself-- it was that urge to have things perfect, to get what I wanted, that combined with a natural desire to express myself and made me into a semi-prolific writer of somewhat juvenile, embarrassing fantasy. Though honestly, I was better than some~;)
I think that's where the desire to write fanfic came from-- this realization that this is what I liked, and that I could do it better, more to my tastes (than the other fanfic out there). That's why I don't really do well at writing for most fandoms besides HP-- it's not even that I don't try, it's just that I don't have a particular aptitude or any clearer of an understanding, so I lose interest. In HP, I wanted to tell Harry & Draco's Ultimate Story: that's what started kept me trying, after the initial burst of "why not" inspiration faded.
Every now and then, I just like to convince myself I'm not as much of a freak as it seems at first. Or maybe there could be a reasonable explanation for everything, I don't know... but certainly, it only makes sense that one likes the things one does for some sort of reason. Oh well. Another mystery of the universe solved; time for bed.
My first "real" fandom was Star Trek, right... and my mother likes to remind me, asking me what I think of William Shatner's priceline commercials & all that. And why don't I care. And how come I went straight from an insane urge to read every Star Trek commercial novel released to an equally intense need to watch every anime ever released. I was sort of surprised, 'cause anime isn't a fandom-- it's a form of media. It's like loving comics or films-- it's a much more visual and passive thing than being a reader of some particular set of linked novels. So then my mother brought up the fact that after all, Star Trek too is primarily in a visual medium, right? Well, not to me.
I've never been a fan of Star Trek, the -show-. The original source, if you will, of the commercial fandom (which I stumbled across through a garish display at my local library before I ever knew about the show's existence). I could take it or leave it. I loved the films (especially "The Voyage Home", which is one of my all-time favorite movies, probably 'cause it has the most Jim&Spock in it), and the original series is okay, and TNG is quite good... but if you're talking visual sci-fi, my tolerance is high but my enjoyment stunted, compared to the written variety. My mother, surprisingly, wasn't taken aback by this incongruity, unlike a lot of people who're quite surprised to know I'm a lukewarm fan of the HP novels in general most times, while I'm a rabid fan of H/D fanfic, and in fact my appreciation for both isn't necessarily even -connected-. "It depends on what you're looking for", she said.
And that's just it. That's why I can easily be a fan of one medium of roughly the same content, but not another. Lots of people say the loved the book but not the movie (and vice versa, but not as often), in terms of movie adaptations of books they love. I think this is the same phenomenon, for me. Fanfic, in its own way, is another medium. It's a shared world. It focuses on (romantic, and often sexual) relationships. If you read the HP books looking for Draco exploration, dark Harry and romance, you'd be sorely disappointed. But that's what I like about HP fanfic. Similarly, if you read most HP fanfic expecting wacky adventure and children's-book level sexuality along with off-the-wall humor and parody... you'll be very disappointed.
It's kind of the way I'm not really into (a lot of) manga, though everyone says it's much better written/plotted/drawn than most anime. I don't -care-. The medium stops me. I'm obsessed with comics, and it bothers me that American comics, even the black and white ones, are tons better produced than a lot of manga. I hate there not being color. The spare, exaggerated style just doesn't work as well for me as a package, and I can't get over it very easily.
The reason I was a fan of the Star Trek books was because there was often in-depth character exploration, because I really got to -know- the characters in a very intimate way. Watching the show, it was usually problem-of-the-week with very limited, slow-building characterization which isn't really enough to keep me interested, especially in the original series (which I'd been reading). So... since I was looking for psychological depth and rigorous exploration of the consequences of a life spent in that future, clearly I couldn't be a fan of both the books and the show equally. They're just too different, and my preferences are too skewed one way, in terms of what I like in a story.
I'm such a kink-based reader... a genre reader, if you will. I find what I like and I go after it, every time. Some people will read anything, I think, with only slight adjustment, whereas I definitely know what I like in a story (or any medium, really). I've always been like that, finding a small entertainment niche and pursuing it, way before I began to read fanfic, I think. When I was little, I like fairy-tales more than anything else. But I was very particular about what sort of fairy-tales I liked... I knew I didn't like ones with animals in it, and I knew I didn't like Christian allegories, and darker was definitely better-- but not too dark, because I wanted things to work out. Naturally, soon enough I began writing them myself-- it was that urge to have things perfect, to get what I wanted, that combined with a natural desire to express myself and made me into a semi-prolific writer of somewhat juvenile, embarrassing fantasy. Though honestly, I was better than some~;)
I think that's where the desire to write fanfic came from-- this realization that this is what I liked, and that I could do it better, more to my tastes (than the other fanfic out there). That's why I don't really do well at writing for most fandoms besides HP-- it's not even that I don't try, it's just that I don't have a particular aptitude or any clearer of an understanding, so I lose interest. In HP, I wanted to tell Harry & Draco's Ultimate Story: that's what started kept me trying, after the initial burst of "why not" inspiration faded.
Every now and then, I just like to convince myself I'm not as much of a freak as it seems at first. Or maybe there could be a reasonable explanation for everything, I don't know... but certainly, it only makes sense that one likes the things one does for some sort of reason. Oh well. Another mystery of the universe solved; time for bed.
