My weirdest fandom break-up yet: Guardian

[schneefink]

By now there are quite a few fandoms I've lost interest in. Sometimes it was very sudden – The Magicians, for example – and sometimes it was long and drawn-out, like with hockey (RPF). Sometimes the reason is something to do with canon, sometimes I just got distracted by other things. But there usually is a reason, which is what makes "Guardian" so strange, because I don't really know what happened.

I watched Guardian in mid-2018 and enjoyed it a lot. So many beautiful tropes I love! I knew pretty much from the beginning that it'd never be a fandom I'd be very active in in terms of fic-writing, there's just too many plot holes and I'd find that too frustrating, but fortunately other people are less bothered by that. I enjoyed the pretty gifs and the amounts of great h/c fic and the discussions etc. and I was excited when more people got into the fandom. After a while I stopped seeking out new Guardian fic, and I thought I was in the cool-down phase of a fandom crush and the slow fading-out would continue as usual.

Instead, from one day to the next I completely lost interest in Guardian fic. Well, probably not literally, but that's what it felt like. People were still updating WIPs I'd loved and posting new fics with tropes I like and I had zero desire to read them. Which is very strange especially considering that I have no problem reading fics for fandoms I feel neutral about or don't even know, and if it's an author I like sometimes even for fandoms I dislike. And I don't dislike Guardian canon - I don't have strong feelings about it anymore, but I still have fond memories, I still enjoy screenshots when I happen to see them on my Tumblr dashboard, and I might even rewatch a few of my favorite episodes at some point. I just don't feel like reading fic about it. No clue why. It's weird. Not really bad – there's more than enough other stories to read, so it's not something I have a desire to "fix" somehow, and I was never deeply enough in the fandom that I miss it, though I did sometimes almost wish I was because it was nice seeing friends so excited about it. Just odd. Maybe it'll change again at some point, who knows. One of the things I've learned is that I can never predict which fandom will catch my interest next. (Makes life more exciting.)

Comments

[sholio]

That's so interesting! I'm not sure if I've lost interest in a fandom overnight like that without some external reason for it: a bad experience, unwanted canon developments, that kind of thing. But I do also drift in and out of fandoms all the time, in a gradual kind of way.

By the way, I'm catching up on last year's comment backlog (as you may notice from sudden replies to comments you left months ago XD) and it really makes me happy that you're reading and enjoying my stories even though they're in a fandom that isn't really a fandom for you; I like seeing your name in my comment notifs. <3

[schneefink]

If there was an external reason, I didn't consciously notice, though I guess it's possible. I don't generally put a lot of thought into my fandom preferences, or mostly just in hindsight.

I noticed, it was nice to be reminded of these stories :) (and I also realized that all of my comments were basically identical, heh. Accurate but not very creative.)

Yeah, I read most of your fics regardless of which fandom they're for (well, I'd have to think about it if you suddenly started writing for, idk, "Sherlock"... nah, probably even then), and I haven't regretted it yet! Not only are you a great writer, we're also interested in very similar tropes, so even if the fandom overall doesn't appeal to me it's very likely that you're focusing on those parts of it that do. I'm always excited to see a notification for a new story by you :)

[sholio]

and I also realized that all of my comments were basically identical, heh. Accurate but not very creative

Awww, please don't worry about that! I love getting comments from you. <3 I mean, my replies are also very repetitive. I think that thing isn't even noticeable unless you're dealing with a bunch of comments at once, and even then it certainly isn't a problem.

[dancing_serpent]

That feels a lot like what's going on with me right now, only I'm still in denial about it.

[schneefink]

Oh no! Falling or fading out of a fandom is always sad to some degree, I hope it's not too painful.

[dancing_serpent]

I hope it's not too painful.
I fell right into the arms of The Untamed, though, which caught me and didn't let me go again. Which might be one reason why I've not been really bothered with looking back at Guardian.

I can still appreciate picspams of Zhu Yilong, though. *g*

[schneefink]

Always appreciate pretty pictures ^^

[sheron]

That's interesting!

I feel like this is an experience similar with having too much of a certain type of food. Sometimes you really want something sour (maybe your body is missing some vitamin C) and a certain fruit is just amazing and then you just...go off it. Your body has had enough of that particular thing, it's oversaturated, and you want something else.

I've had experiences like this with things that I ostensibly Should Like (tm) but it just happened to be hitting the tropes/themes that I'm already getting from elsewhere and so my brain doesn't really care to engage with the thing because my needs for it are fulfilled already.

[schneefink]

I've had that happen with food, too. Makes sense that it could also happen with fandoms in similar ways! Not sure it was the case here, but then, like with food, it's not exactly something you're necessarily consciously aware of the reasons why.

[krait]

Sometimes it happens!

It's only happened to me once, but it was almost exactly like you described. I quite literally went from "bought the S2 DVD and devoured two episodes, eagerly looking forward to watching the third as soon as I have time" to, well, I still haven't actually watched that third episode...

There was no definable trigger, there was still plenty of fandom activity, I was following WIPs and fic series, people were still discussing it, but somehow every ounce of interest evaporated almost overnight. All I've got is *shrug emoji*, though given how things unfolded over the following seasons I now joke that my fannish guardian angel was behind it. :D

[schneefink]

Good to hear it's not just me!

Now I'm thinking about fannish guardian angels: "Don't start this WIP, it'll never be finished," "don't engage with this topic, it'll soon turn extremely wanky," "don't forget to start your fic for this exchange on time"... Would be very convenient :D

[krait]

Ha! It would be nice. But it would also be frustrating, because your Fannish Guardian Angel doesn't just tell you stuff; they steer you around it by other means. I woke up without any interest in that fandom one morning, which kept me out of its eventual devolution, but I still had all my fic subscriptions (come on, FGA, can't you unsubscribe me from WIPs at the same time you deleted my interest?), not to mention I'd already bought two seasons on DVD, and I didn't have a replacement fandom ready to divert my interest to so I ended up bored for a while.

So your fannish angel would probably keep you from starting a WIP by crashing your word processors, keep you from commenting on a post that will turn wanky by making you get home too late from work to see it, and remind you to start your exchange fic by making it the exchange the absolute only thing anybody on your flist is talking about, or something. :D Convenient in the long run, but annoying in the moment!

[schneefink]

At least every time something annoying happened you could tell yourself that surely it's your fannish guardian angel, guarding you from something worse that would otherwise have happened? might make me paranoid very quickly ^^

[krait]

There we go! It might make disappointments easier to bear. "Too bad I never got around to jotting down that great plot bunny... but that was probably my fannish guardian angel protecting me from an outraged anti trying to doxx me over the pairing." "Sure wish I'd done that popular posting meme that was going around the week I was working overtime! Bet my fannish guardian angel was saving me from embarrassment because it will turn out to be horribly cringey in a couple years."

[extempore]

Interessanterweise ging es mir ähnlich. Von einem Tag auf den anderen: Puff, Interesse weg. Keine Ahnung, weshalb, aber ich denke, die Plotlöcher waren mit Schuld.

[schneefink]

Es ist ja nicht nur der Plot - das könnt ich eher noch ignorieren - sondern dass so viel vom Aufbau der Welt(en) und Geschichte etc. keinen Sinn ergibt...

[extempore]

Naja, das hängt ziemlich sicher mit der chinesischen Zensur zusammen. Allein, dass das Original mit spirtuellen Elementen zu tun hatte, was ja unter der Zensur nicht sein darf (alles Religion = igitt). Daher wurden plötzlich Aliens daraus, usw.

[schneefink]

Ich weiß schon warum es dazu gekommen ist, leider stört´s mich deswegen nicht weniger, zumindest wenn ich dann im Detail drüber nachdenke und Ideen für Fics hab etc.

[moonvoice]

Oh this is such a strange phenomenon. I've only had it happen to me once, and that was with Dorian/Iron Bull fics in the Dragon Age: Inquisition fandom. I haven't been able to read a single one since, which leaves about 70 useless bookmarks in my AO3 line up, and me convinced that maybe one day I might want to read them again? But it's been *literally years* and my 'nope' point was like - one night I was reading them, the next morning I never wanted anything to do with it. I'm not squicked, I don't dislike it, I just *nothing* it on a profound level it was like I was never there in the first place?

Maybe it won't change? But at least there are all the old fandoms where it's possible to make forays back in and enjoy the old fics etc. I'm glad you don't have a desire to fix it or anything, I think it just happens sometimes? But it is so strange!

[schneefink]

I too still have surely dozens of Guardian fics bookmarked in case I find myself interested again, who knows... Maybe it'll be next week, or maybe never, tastes are strange things.