This Week In Fandom History

+1! This week, Emily and V look at everyone's favorite fic format, the 5+1 fic. This humble story structure seems like it's always been a part of fandom, or just a part of human storytelling, but no! It all started with a little Clark/Lex story in Smallville fandom back in 2002, and boy, are we grateful. Come along with us as we talk about which fandoms grow these babies like lemons on trees, whic...

Well, this happened. This week, V and Emily take a look at two simultaneous fandom events in a fandom neither knows well: The Legend of Korra. And really, both events are the same event: the ending of the show. On the one hand, we have Makorras ready to pop biggest bottles when their ship becomes canon. On the other, we have a different (and queer!) ship becoming canon instead, a first for Western...

Gate those stars! This week, Emily and V take a look at fannish campaigns to save beloved TV shows and beloved characters, focusing on one in particular: the campaign to bring Daniel Jackson back to Stargate SG-1. From mailing marshmallows to taking out ads in Variety and The Hollywood Reporter, fans have done all kinds of things to make their voices heard by TPTB. Were they successful in bringing...

#reylos are at it again! This week, V and Emily dive headfirst into a HIGHLY requested event in fandom history: when reylo-turned-pro author Cait Corrain completely decimated their own career and tried to take the Reylo fandom down with it. This is the MsScribe story but with a 2024 twist! So many sockpuppets! So many hashtags! So much villainfucking! And SO MUCH MONEY! Get aghast with us as we im...

#relationshipgoals! This week, Emily and V look at a Incorrect Quotes post from The 100 fandom that broke containment in a big way, and how normies -- and apparently major newspapers -- do not do a modicum of Googling before they draw their lines in the sand about really dumb things that are obviously fictional. We also discuss Incorrect Quotes and Texts From posts in general, with a long diversio...

No, not THAT historical event from November 1963! This week, V and Emily take a trip back in time to a notorious week to explore how a real-life major event in history-history almost caused a major event in fandom history to die at the starting line! We're talking about how Doctor Who, the juggernaut fandom that's been on the air for over 50 years, almost never became a thing just because someone...

And he was like, BLEGHGH! IT'S ME! Or rather, it's us! We're back. This week, Emily and V take a look at the ways that Thor: Ragnarok divided the MCU fandom as a controversial entry into the Thor trilogy and, therefore, the MCU Infinity Saga as a whole. Emily was a long-time Thor fangirl when it came out; it was V's second or third MCU movie, ever. How did these different perspectives inform the w...

We don't know enough about this fandom to have a silly exclamation at the start of this summary, tbh! This week, V and Emily stumble along in the dark as they try desperately to fulfill a request from @thesilverstarling: the posting of the massive, massive MCYT Dream SMP RPF, "Heat Waves." We do our best. Truly. But we're so very old and uncool. That said, there are some genuinely fascinating aspe...

They're on a boat! This week, Emily and V finally tackle a topic requested by one of our wonderful Patreon supporters, @elismor, who also wrote up an AMAZING primer about the fandom and the event. We're venturing back to the wonderful, weird world wide web of the late '90s to see a mailing list [WAR!] -- a round-robin, not-technically-roleplaying-but-it-kinda-is, fanfiction extravaganza. But delig...

Happy November 5! This week, V and Emily are joined by special guest, Supernatural writer Meghan Fitzmartin, who gives us the skinny on what it was like from the other side of the curtain on November 5, 2020, and who tells us all about her new fandom-centric comic book, Mary Sue (available now from BOOM! Box). Misha Collins' silly vocal choices, Russian autocrats shipping Destiel, and the omegaver...

KABOOM! This week, V and Emily discuss a fandom that V was very much in, and is very much no longer in. Because no one is. Because the showrunner used the Hulu reboot to give a gigantic middle-finger to 15 years of passionate fandom. Why?! Why must showrunners Punish?!? Featuring also: Sex and the City and, of course, Marvel (but we promise it's not all Endgame salt for once). We also get pretty d...

Not again... This week, Emily and V look at yet another time that a fandom cannibalized one of its own because of popularity. This time, it's Voltron: Legendary Defender fandom in the summer of 2016 and the massive fic (an all-time all-AO3 kudo-haver!) "Dirty Laundry" by gibslythe. While we didn't read the fic, and thus our opinions are colored by those of the people who wrote up the drama minute-...

Into the drift! This week, V and Emily talk, once again, about a movie that V has never seen but that fandom loves: Pacific Rim. Topics include the Mako Mori Test, why and how this fandom is the victim of Any Two White Guys syndrome, and... Jupiter Ascending? Also, why Pacific Rim: Uprising failed as a sequel and why sometimes filmmakers just getting to play with toys for millions and millions of...

Saluton! This week, Emily and V look at the life of one of fandom's under-appreciated heroes: Morojo, AKA Myrtle Rebecca Smith Gray Nolan (née Douglas), the Mother of Cosplay. From her genuine belief in the ability of humankind to be good, like in her favorite scifi stories, to her BANGIN' sewing ability and sweet-ass silk rompersuits, Morojo deserves to be way more well-known in fannish spaces. (...

Holy lunch at the Y, Batman! This week, V and Emily just rate which, if any, superheroes are fuckable, because DC's editorial team made an edict in 2021 that will never, ever, ever, never not be funny. Sources Vice Bleeding Cool Gail Simone on X This Week In Fandom History is a fandom-centric podcast that tells you… what happened this week in fandom history! Follow This Week in Fandom History on T...

Roll for initiative! This week, V and Emily use the actual "what happened this week in fandom history" event (the USPS released Dungeons & Dragons themed stamps) purely as an excuse to talk about a meatier topic: the Satanic Panic of the 1980s and its effects on fandom... focusing on the writing of one blorbo extraordinaire, Mr. Eddie Munson. Stranger Things did a great job with Eddie and the othe...

To us, our X-fandom-historians! This week, Emily and V venture once again into a fandom that has way too many moving parts to understand as they discuss the release of X-Men: First Class and the subsequent multiversal explosion of Cherik (Charles Xavier/Erik Lehnsherr, or Professor X/Magneto) fanworks. Even though this is literally a pairing V has written, we claim no knowledge of the X-Men franch...

Grab your towel and your hard-boiled egg, nerds! This week, Emily and V look at a double holiday once again, because May 25 is a big day for two big fandoms: Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy celebrates Towel Day, while Discworld remembers Sir Terry Pratchett and celebrates the Glorious 25 of May. Both of these hugely influential, beloved book series have spanned decades, genres, and all manner of...

There can only be one! And that one better fucking be Richie Ryan! This week, V and Emily tackle a requested topic from lovely Patron @elismor and look at the extremely confusing, way-too-many-installments fandom of Highlander. Specifically, Highlander: The Series. And specifically, teenage thief and heartthrob Richie Ryan, and how he was unjustly killed off by canon and revived by the formation o...

Let's get together, yeah yeah yeah! This week, Emily and V head to summer camp! That is, we discuss the podfic summer camp extravaganza that is VoiceTeam, an annual challenge to create creative podfic for any fandoms and pairings your heart desires... as a team. We also look at how podfic was THE COOLEST way to pick up chicks in the '90s, where podfic started back in the '80s as a way for sight-im...

Grab your tissues, it's a crying episode! This week, V and Emily look at the short life and long impact of X-Files BNF (Big Name Fan) and BNA (Big Name Author), Leyla Harrison. The very first thing she did when she got the internet was post an X-Files fic... and immediately got anon hate. From there, she became one of the cornerstone writers of '90s XF MSR fic and helped to shape the way we all st...

Going once, going twice, sold... unfortunately! This week, Emily and V look at an event requested back while it was actually happening: the 2023 fanbinding drama that nearly ended Dramione- and Reylo's fanbinding communities on Instagram. Mostly, though, it's an episode about people coming into fannish spaces without an interest in fannish community, and people who view fanfiction as "content" to...

Grab your floaties! This week, V and Emily travel back 25 years (gross) to the spring of 2000, when the internet was the Wild West and everyone was an asshole. Or maybe not everyone, but wow, this one e-mail list for The Sentinel sure was. We discuss the difference between tags, warnings, spoilers, and censorship, and we also discuss just how much has changed in the fandom landscape over the last...

We finally learned what Homestuck is! This week, Emily and V look at a very special double-holiday: April 13, the day that Neil banged out the tunes and, also, Homestuck Day. Who is Neil? The greatest pianist who ever lived, that's who. And what's Homestuck? That was our question every goddamn day of our lives until Emily dipped a toe into the extremely deep water that is the Homestuck multiverse...

In light of certain fandoms' creators recently using their considerable fortunes to substantively make life worse for trans people, particularly trans women, this week, V and Emily take a look at a pioneering gender-nonconforming person who, literally, founded modern scifi fandom: Donald Wollheim. We look at Donald's fannish history, including hosting the very first scifi con ever; publishing Lord...