It's All Fandom!

Long ago, before smartphones and slime tutorials, Ali Gordon and I met in a Broadway livejournal community. 20 years later, we reunite to talk about the good old days of stagedoors, student rush, and the Marriot Marquis 6th floor bathroom. We ask where the line is when fandom and passion become a real life job, andreminisce about our early days of being Broadway fans. We also learn that cousins ex...

Welcome back! For It's All Fandom's long-awaited return, I sit down with the self proclaimed inventor of fanfiction (don't google that): Mary, otherwise known as ruinthatboy. She's gone from professional fan author to rediscovering joy in the creative process, and has had to having to navigate bad faith controversy and willful misinterpretation along the way. You might know her work, or you might...

This episode is for anyone who fancies a fine fabric. Cecelia Grey aka Ceceliaisgray joins me in trying to be normal about Our Flag Means Death. We discuss the explosion of its fandom (which she has been tracking through the Archive of Our Own), incredible fanfiction tags, the season 2 renewal, and the Snapeification of Israel Hands, among other things. In her own words: "I've just never seen a fa...

Without romanticizing the crime and violence inherent to a life of piracy, the liberation from societal expectations is not unique to pirate narratives. At its core, Black Sails is a show about myth and story. Television writer Daphne Olive joins me to discuss the way different ways people perceive art, and how such things are expressed in online communities. We also discuss the benefits of taking...

After Ladyknightthebrave released a wonderful video essay all about Pacific Rim (that movie where they fight monsters with the power of friendship), I wanted nothing more than to talk with her about it here, too. I also wanted to excavate some shared memories and spill some tea about a strange fandom situation we both experienced in different ways. We discuss queer coding, science boyfriends, trig...

With The Matrix Resurrections' release date fast approaching, I spoke with writer Tilly Bridges about lipstick, the spinny dress phenomenon, and about the inherent transness of these very trans films. We barely scratch the surface of it all, so check out her #TransTuesday threads on twitter for a lot more nuance!  Tilly's twitter: @tillybridges Allison's twitter: @allyspock The show's twitter: @it...

From the president of his high school anime club to working for Discotek, Shaybs knows a thing or two about anime. I spoke with him about his all time favorite series, Ashita no Joe, an underdog story that revolutionized the anime industry and is still being referenced in modern anime to this day, 52 years after it started airing. We talk about boxing, the anime industry, burning out until all tha...

As you might have guessed from the title of their podcast, Maggie and V met on Livejournal, but after their first initial fandom brought them together, they haven't shared a fandom since. Their first fandom, and some of their subsequent fandoms as well, have fallen under the category of RPF (Real Person Fiction). While writing RPF is a fairly common practice, it is also rather controversial. The t...

Anyone who follows Shannon Strucci on twitter might have noticed how deep she's gotten into Lupin III, the anime series about a womanizing gentleman thief and his gang of pals! I know I just spoke with her in my last episode, but I couldn't resist bringing Shannon back. Lupin III is goofy like a kid's show, but its deep and complicated themes have it primed for a more mature audience. It is also r...

After recording my previous episode with Shannon Strucci (talking about Neopets) I found myself feeling nostalgic for the Y2K-era online roleplaying of my childhood. I asked you for your own stories, and here they are! 9 unique perspectives on the highs and lows of online roleplay, featuring cliques, wrestling, revolution, and more! This episode features submissions from: Blushippi , The Sin Squad...

Back when the only form of security the internet had against predators was to tell you to just assume that everyone you talk to is a 40 year old man, Neopets capitalized on the concept of a click-through adventure site and became a worldwide phenomenon. It was a fun website slash ad-revenue trap that taught children about luck, inflation, gambling, and the stock market. Shannon Strucci joins me to...

As fandom shifted from analog to digital, we have seen a seemingly endless stream of platforms through which to engage. But even now, there is no one way to engage that is more worthy than any other. In a break with tradition of this podcast, Elizabeth Minkel, "the world's loudest lurker," inspires a new topic: instead of discussing a specific fandom, we challenge a statement made in a previous ep...

What do you lose when you stop being able to engage in the fandom of a show you used to love? Artist and Youtuber Natalie has some answers, sharing her experiences of being in the Voltron fandom as well as what it's like to come out the other side. The show rose to intense popularity, but shot itself in the foot when it decided to forgo its entire premise in order to deliver a failed attempt at fa...

Happy Festivus everyone! Aside from the miracles and feats of strength, another way to celebrate this nondenominational winter holiday is with an airing of the grievances. This is a fandom podcast, so I've decided to host an airing of the fandom grievances. Please join me and my many guests as we rant, vent and complain about the things in fandom that aggrieve us. This episode features fandom grie...

After a chance encounter on twitter, I was so happy to talk to Emma Logsdon (the internet's #2 premier Locke scholar) about her favorite celebrity, Tom Hardy. As a native New Yorker who has never driven a car, she shares why she felt so connected to a movie about a man who does nothing but drive. We discuss the way Tom Hardy challenges stereotypical masculinity, how to maintain healthy boundaries...

Photographer Riley is a talented artist with an incredible eye and a passion for creativity. She's also quite passionate about a certain sky pirate and his scrappy orphan boyfriend. This is Balvaan, the ship name for rarepair Balthier and Vaan, two characters from Final Fantasy XII. Riley has a rich history with the Final Fantasy franchise, but was drawn specifically to Final Fantasy XII. This gam...

Some people play fantasy football. Some people cash in their savings to see Dave Matthews Band in concert 200 times. And some people write fanfiction. Gen is a prolific writer with a passion for music and a talent for incorporating it into her work. In this conversation, she explains her fascination with the American West, shares why writing is such a personal experience for her, and talks about t...

Noted fanfiction scribe and Delaware teen Angelina Meehan and I had a very similar middle school existence. As latchkey kids with access to the internet, we both filmed our own movie reenactments, we both covered our bodies in Bath & Body Works roll on glitter, and we were both very much in love with Ewan McGregor. Cinemablend praises him as "our nakedest actor," but Angelina was charmed by his bo...

Jessica Bone is what I like to call a gateway nerd: someone with their finger on the pulse of the nerd world, who is always happy to share her knowledge adn excitement. Friends from the once robust Sweeney Todd Broadway revival livejournal fandom, Jessica and I reunite over our love of Stormpilot and come to terms with enjoying the prequels. She also discusses what it's like to be a woman in nerd...

Meeting your significant other online is pretty commonplace these days, but was a much more radical concept back when filmmaker Brittany Alsot met her wife Ellie. Like many, Brittany recognized something of herself in The Matrix, a trans allegory disguised as a mainstream 1999 sci-fi/action film. Back in the early oughts, I knew her by her handle on The Hardline, a Matrix fanfiction archive and me...

This trans bar is full of trans women! I am joined by my friend and former fellow steampunk crewmember Lucy Wheeler to talk about Fortnite, a very popular video game whose reputation precedes it. Lucy is a self proclaimed "dumb girl with bad taste who will never change", but more importantly, she moderates a subreddit and discord server for queer and trans women in gaming. Together, we discuss the...

If you could watch only one Chinese drama, polyglot language nerd and writer Tchan says it should be Nirvana in Fire . It is a powerful show about one very smart man's mission to dismantle the systemic corruption that did him wrong, and it probably will make you cry. We talk about language nuance, viewing Chinese culture through the lens of Chinese media fandom, spending one's entire family vacati...

As an unabashed lover of nerdy things (and one of my best friends), Charlotte Raines has been an active participant in fandom since she was 9 years old. But the one fandom that will haunt her until the end of her days, one of the most infamous and chaotic fandoms to ever burst forth from the cursed loins of the internet, was a seemingly unassuming webcomic about four kids trying to save the world....

James D'Amato ( @OneShotRPG ) runs the One Shot Network, comprised of tabletop role playing game play throughs. The One Shot Network fandom is small but mighty, and as a fan turned creator himself, James talks about how to encourage and help facilitate a fandom's growth while avoiding the pitfalls of other, more negative/toxic fandoms. Things turn complicated when the concept of death of the autho...

Self-proclaimed "giant weeb" and talented cosplayer Marissa (@ glamatcha ) joins me as we mutually wonder when Yuri on Ice will return from the war. From scouring Chinatown for "dirty" VHS tapes to teaching herself hiragana so she could read manga, Marissa tells tales of the days back when the only formative anime source a lot of us had was Toonami. The world cried out for a realistic portrayal of...