Aug. 26th, 2010 06:44 pm
Pop culture purgatory
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textualdevianceI'm apparently a Very Bad Fan.
And for more reasons than just the whole pervy fangirl thing.
To wit:
So, the Primeval world just kind of turned inside out today with the revelation that there's a spinoff series in development.
Or, maybe that was just my world that turned inside out, as once I heard this, I proceeded to babble my pathetic ass off about it, trying to figure out exactly how they were going to approach the new series given some of the limitations of the canon and the fact that there's an entirely different production company doing the spinoff.
(Go here for the carnage. Yes, I write too damned much.)
This all made me come to a rather embarassing/frustrating realization: I'm increasingly finding myself far more fascinated with the process of putting together TV & movies (and other things) than the end results themselves.
Exhibit A: About half of the people I follow on Twitter are writers or directors of some sort: Fellow media wonks, partially, but also a flood of script writers, producers, directors, etc. And even most of the actors I follow are involved on a creative level, too: They do their own writing or directing or whatever on the side.
Exhibit B: I think I've watched the LOTR behind the scenes stuff more than the movies themselves. And I think I gravitated to writing RPS instead of FPS simply because I felt there was more opportunity for interesting drama with the showbiz/filming setting than what was happening in canon.
I am not, and never have been content to just be a passive consumer of entertainment. I have to be involved in it somehow. I have to at least be watching it with an eye for how the writers work through story arcs and what shots the director chooses, and how the editing works. I can't just sit there and watch pretty people do pretty things and blow shit up. Hell, I can't even really get into a story for its own sake these days. I'm too focused on how it was probably plotted and edited (and, if I'm honest, picking out which TV Tropes it has. Heh.)
Dirty secret? I actually can't stand being in the audience for live entertainment. I'm usually drowning in jealousy, wishing I were on the stage or at least behind the curtain doing something. (I also have a huge problem with secondhand embarassment, so I get very nervous about the possibility of something going wrong during a show.)
I don't think I can fool myself anymore: I am a creator. I can't get past that. I can't breathe if I'm not making something regularly, even if that's just trashy fanfic or animated .gifs. I went into journalism--and entertainment media, specifically--in part because it was the closest I could come, given various limitations, to being on the creative side of things.
Which, of course, makes me a bad fan. I can't just sit out there in the audience like I'm supposed to. I want to go see what's happening backstage. I'm in this really weird hybrid place--a sort of purgatory, maybe--where I'm not actually working in production, but I'm also not just a consumer of what they produce. I suspect this makes me annoying to both fellow fans (might even explain a lot of my LOTR fandom disconnect) and to the people whose work fascinates me so much.
It's one thing to be a groupie for an actor because he's cute and plays fun characters well. Quite another to be a groupie for him because you're impressed with the way he works and how he approaches his career. I think I've spent equal amounts of time wishing I could write a script for Andrew to work on as wishing I could get into his pants. If I ever got the chance to talk to him for any length of time, I'd probably talk his ear off about editing software or something.
I think I could manage just being a dorky fangirl. This? This is so much weirder. And I have no idea what to do about it, save for just pushing on, doing my own creating whenever I can, and trying not to drown in frustration and envy when I see other people doing what I really wish I could be.
And for more reasons than just the whole pervy fangirl thing.
To wit:
So, the Primeval world just kind of turned inside out today with the revelation that there's a spinoff series in development.
Or, maybe that was just my world that turned inside out, as once I heard this, I proceeded to babble my pathetic ass off about it, trying to figure out exactly how they were going to approach the new series given some of the limitations of the canon and the fact that there's an entirely different production company doing the spinoff.
(Go here for the carnage. Yes, I write too damned much.)
This all made me come to a rather embarassing/frustrating realization: I'm increasingly finding myself far more fascinated with the process of putting together TV & movies (and other things) than the end results themselves.
Exhibit A: About half of the people I follow on Twitter are writers or directors of some sort: Fellow media wonks, partially, but also a flood of script writers, producers, directors, etc. And even most of the actors I follow are involved on a creative level, too: They do their own writing or directing or whatever on the side.
Exhibit B: I think I've watched the LOTR behind the scenes stuff more than the movies themselves. And I think I gravitated to writing RPS instead of FPS simply because I felt there was more opportunity for interesting drama with the showbiz/filming setting than what was happening in canon.
I am not, and never have been content to just be a passive consumer of entertainment. I have to be involved in it somehow. I have to at least be watching it with an eye for how the writers work through story arcs and what shots the director chooses, and how the editing works. I can't just sit there and watch pretty people do pretty things and blow shit up. Hell, I can't even really get into a story for its own sake these days. I'm too focused on how it was probably plotted and edited (and, if I'm honest, picking out which TV Tropes it has. Heh.)
Dirty secret? I actually can't stand being in the audience for live entertainment. I'm usually drowning in jealousy, wishing I were on the stage or at least behind the curtain doing something. (I also have a huge problem with secondhand embarassment, so I get very nervous about the possibility of something going wrong during a show.)
I don't think I can fool myself anymore: I am a creator. I can't get past that. I can't breathe if I'm not making something regularly, even if that's just trashy fanfic or animated .gifs. I went into journalism--and entertainment media, specifically--in part because it was the closest I could come, given various limitations, to being on the creative side of things.
Which, of course, makes me a bad fan. I can't just sit out there in the audience like I'm supposed to. I want to go see what's happening backstage. I'm in this really weird hybrid place--a sort of purgatory, maybe--where I'm not actually working in production, but I'm also not just a consumer of what they produce. I suspect this makes me annoying to both fellow fans (might even explain a lot of my LOTR fandom disconnect) and to the people whose work fascinates me so much.
It's one thing to be a groupie for an actor because he's cute and plays fun characters well. Quite another to be a groupie for him because you're impressed with the way he works and how he approaches his career. I think I've spent equal amounts of time wishing I could write a script for Andrew to work on as wishing I could get into his pants. If I ever got the chance to talk to him for any length of time, I'd probably talk his ear off about editing software or something.
I think I could manage just being a dorky fangirl. This? This is so much weirder. And I have no idea what to do about it, save for just pushing on, doing my own creating whenever I can, and trying not to drown in frustration and envy when I see other people doing what I really wish I could be.
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no subject
It's always difficult for me to see if that's the case, but I figure it out eventually - hopefully before I make everyone else uncomfortable.