To an extent it’s a problem with fandom: the fact is that you’ve got thousands of intelligent people thinking about a problem, and statistically speaking some of them are likely to come up with something more clever than the creators. […] There comes a point at which, frankly, fandom IS better than the creators. We have more minds, more cumulative talent, more voices arguing for different kinds of representation, more backstory… The thing is that I rarely get involved with a show without a fandom anymore, because I actually enjoy the analysis and fic and fun more than I enjoy the show itself. Similarly, I get drawn into shows I otherwise wouldn’t really consider by the strength of their fandom. And I want the shows to live up to their fandom, but it’s an almost impossibly high bar, because the parts of fandom I choose to engage with are often parts that wouldn’t be considered sufficiently accessible or relevant to a majority of viewers. So… basically, for me, fandom is primary, and canon is secondary. The latter is really only there to facilitate the former.
glitterarygetsit, in a discussion on fan responses to media on facebook
#this is the first time i’ve really articulated this #and i was quite pleased with it #this is the thing: i care so much less about original material than i do about fanworks
(via imorca)
On the one hand, sure – fandom of mediocre art tends to be better than the art, or at least more interesting, because there are a lot of creative nimrods out there who didn’t go to professional expressing themselves school to have their sharp corners sanded off – but for the same reasons fandom of good art tends to degrade its subject, because fandom (taken collectively, as this person does) is only interested in telling certain types of stories and can only understand certain character archetypes, meaning that fanwork of property A (absent names, eye color and haircuts) tends to be indistinguishable from fanwork of property B.
But that’s not what this person is talking about, is it? They’re not talking about fandom the mass entity – they’re talking about the outliers, the long tail. “I engage with parts of fandom that wouldn’t be considered sufficiently accessible or relevant to a majority of viewers”, they say, inversely snobbing it up. Far be it from me to speculate about the particular itch this person has, this content which is nowhere to be found in popular media except in certain pieces of fanfiction and “analysis”, but I suspect it doesn’t have as much to do with complexity or quality as it does with recognition, with finding a shared point of view which is otherwise shut out by mass culture gatekeeping.
Don’t say that fanart is better executed or smarter – it’s not, in the vast majority of cases. Say that it’s honest. Say that it’s real. Say that it exceeds commercial art because it does effortlessly what learned craft only achieves at the highest level, which is to reflect the soul as it is. But remember that the animating spirit that makes it all work – the relationship the fanartist has with the setting and characters – is only there because some poor striving fucker made those up.
(via some-triangles)
just moving along like everyone else 