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Tuesday Top Five: Fandom Adjacent
Mar. 18th, 2025 06:43 amInevitably, my friends’ and my fannish interests and participation don’t always line up completely. I like to think that we can still support and even vicariously enjoy some of each other’s fandom obsessions… or, at least, I try to offer them that support, to the best of my ability, because I’d like them to do the same for me, to the best of theirs. Here are five fandoms to which I would consider myself “adjacent” even though I’ve never created any fic for them (which is how I personally define participation, for these purposes, though that’s obviously not a universal metric).
1. Star Trek: Voyager
I’ve actually seen a scattering of Star Trek episodes, across several eras, because I know so many dedicated fans, though I’ve never sat down and watched any series from the beginning. And, of course, I love any and all stories about the franchise’s place in overall fandom history. But one of my closest friends in college was especially fond of Voyager and showed some of our social circle a sampling of episodes; we shared an appreciation for the episode “Meld,” and I fangirled intensely over the descriptions of telepathic contact in the fic that she wrote as a result. Although that experience was only one tiny facet of a very long friendship that incorporated several fannish obsessions – shared and otherwise – it was an early sign that we interacted with stories in very similar ways, and when she confessed that Brad Dourif’s character was “eating her brain,” I understood exactly what she meant.
If anybody is wondering whether she also showed me and our other friends “Threshold,” she absolutely did.
2. Kingdom Hearts
I am not a video game person and never have been. I heard enough about Kingdom Hearts, from my two best friends at the time (one of whom was the Voyager fan that I mentioned above) to recognize the parts of the story that would likely appeal to me (possession! hidden memories! dual identities! an elaborate media crossover not unlike the ones that I scribbled on every available scrap of paper as a young teenager!). If it had been in any other format, I might have been right there with them. I did read some of the manga, just to gain some understanding of what they were talking about, and could probably pick out Sora, Riku, Kari, and Axel from a lineup, although I am led to understand that at least one of them has a metaphysical doppelganger. Or three.
3. Les Miserables
My high school choir practiced a medley from Les Mis when I was a freshman (I don’t remember whether or not we actually performed it), and the theater department at my summer camp staged the musical during my last year, but there were probably a few years in between when I had no idea what the story was about, beyond the general historical setting. If that.
Around the time that the 2012 movie was released, my then-housemate showed me a recording of the 25th Anniversary stage production and read me enough passages from the original novel to convince me of Enjolras and Grantaire’s tragic love. I enjoy reading what other people have to say about all of the characters – but especially those two – even if I have yet to tackle the book or develop any particular desire to write about them myself.
4. Glee
I’ve seen the first season and part of the second, I’ve liked some of the songs, and I’ve watched Mic the Snare’s outstanding video essay more than once. My impression of Glee is that it offered compelling characters who were often frustratingly underserved by the plot, which created plenty of space for transformative fanworks, including crossovers. Thus, about a decade ago, I spent a lot of time talking with my friend D – who was more invested in the show than I was – about AUs in which Kurt Hummel was (variously! not all at once!) a vampire, a magic user, and a mutant with psychic empathy powers.
5. Supernatural
It’s difficult to be involved in modern fandom and be entirely ignorant of this show, and I’ve enjoyed fanfic and meta about it despite only having seen a relatively small number of episodes, many of which I experienced alongside my dear friend Elle (who gave me permission to identify her in this post). I’ve happily beta read some of her fic, and since the final seasons of SPN and The Magnus Archives happened at roughly the same time, we shared some of the joys and frustrations and worries that came from witnessing the end of an ongoing, episodic story in real time. I might never commit to watching all or even most of SPN from the beginning, and I’ll probably never adore it like she does, but I love her love for it. Anyone who thinks it’s a cool and fun hobby to sneer at fans of the Winchester brothers can take it somewhere else.
1. Star Trek: Voyager
I’ve actually seen a scattering of Star Trek episodes, across several eras, because I know so many dedicated fans, though I’ve never sat down and watched any series from the beginning. And, of course, I love any and all stories about the franchise’s place in overall fandom history. But one of my closest friends in college was especially fond of Voyager and showed some of our social circle a sampling of episodes; we shared an appreciation for the episode “Meld,” and I fangirled intensely over the descriptions of telepathic contact in the fic that she wrote as a result. Although that experience was only one tiny facet of a very long friendship that incorporated several fannish obsessions – shared and otherwise – it was an early sign that we interacted with stories in very similar ways, and when she confessed that Brad Dourif’s character was “eating her brain,” I understood exactly what she meant.
If anybody is wondering whether she also showed me and our other friends “Threshold,” she absolutely did.
2. Kingdom Hearts
I am not a video game person and never have been. I heard enough about Kingdom Hearts, from my two best friends at the time (one of whom was the Voyager fan that I mentioned above) to recognize the parts of the story that would likely appeal to me (possession! hidden memories! dual identities! an elaborate media crossover not unlike the ones that I scribbled on every available scrap of paper as a young teenager!). If it had been in any other format, I might have been right there with them. I did read some of the manga, just to gain some understanding of what they were talking about, and could probably pick out Sora, Riku, Kari, and Axel from a lineup, although I am led to understand that at least one of them has a metaphysical doppelganger. Or three.
3. Les Miserables
My high school choir practiced a medley from Les Mis when I was a freshman (I don’t remember whether or not we actually performed it), and the theater department at my summer camp staged the musical during my last year, but there were probably a few years in between when I had no idea what the story was about, beyond the general historical setting. If that.
Around the time that the 2012 movie was released, my then-housemate showed me a recording of the 25th Anniversary stage production and read me enough passages from the original novel to convince me of Enjolras and Grantaire’s tragic love. I enjoy reading what other people have to say about all of the characters – but especially those two – even if I have yet to tackle the book or develop any particular desire to write about them myself.
4. Glee
I’ve seen the first season and part of the second, I’ve liked some of the songs, and I’ve watched Mic the Snare’s outstanding video essay more than once. My impression of Glee is that it offered compelling characters who were often frustratingly underserved by the plot, which created plenty of space for transformative fanworks, including crossovers. Thus, about a decade ago, I spent a lot of time talking with my friend D – who was more invested in the show than I was – about AUs in which Kurt Hummel was (variously! not all at once!) a vampire, a magic user, and a mutant with psychic empathy powers.
5. Supernatural
It’s difficult to be involved in modern fandom and be entirely ignorant of this show, and I’ve enjoyed fanfic and meta about it despite only having seen a relatively small number of episodes, many of which I experienced alongside my dear friend Elle (who gave me permission to identify her in this post). I’ve happily beta read some of her fic, and since the final seasons of SPN and The Magnus Archives happened at roughly the same time, we shared some of the joys and frustrations and worries that came from witnessing the end of an ongoing, episodic story in real time. I might never commit to watching all or even most of SPN from the beginning, and I’ll probably never adore it like she does, but I love her love for it. Anyone who thinks it’s a cool and fun hobby to sneer at fans of the Winchester brothers can take it somewhere else.
