Yeah, but this place leans so far to the left it's a wonder it hasn't fallen over and broke its own neck by now.
Fandom is so toxic right now
- Thread starter Dave Scarpa
- Start date
Interesting. I don't generally like modern comedy style. I prefer intelligently written comedies with good dialogue over a series of gags, although a rare thing sometimes happens where we get both. These newer comedies tend to be one-note melodies. If instead of trying hard to emulate, they were to just do their own thing as a spinoff of a different in-universe franchise, it maybe would have attracted less toxic attention. Emulating is such a double-edged sword in that if a performance is bad, you'll only end up creating resentment, but on the other hand, if it's good can be considered as an honest homage.
God knows Trek fandom has turned out to be an increasingly insular, unimaginative and defensive subculture. I pretty much dropped out of the whole convention thing nearly two decades ago and find myself identifying less and less with trekkies as the years go by.
When I joined this BBS I posted all over it. Now, to the regret of no one, I'm rarely in any Trek forum other than the STD forum. I imagine that if they ever get another movie off the ground I'll probably hang out there. What's current at least has that novelty. Otherwise I post in this forum but mainly in TNZ.
When I joined this BBS I posted all over it. Now, to the regret of no one, I'm rarely in any Trek forum other than the STD forum. I imagine that if they ever get another movie off the ground I'll probably hang out there. What's current at least has that novelty. Otherwise I post in this forum but mainly in TNZ.
That's definitely one aspect of toxic fandom that wasn't around before.
No, just a nerd/geek and socially ostracized.
Not saying the racist thing isn't worse, but let's not act like there were no social consequences.
Almost every character under discussion in this thread is a new character. Nobody changed Captain Kirk to be a gay asian woman. It was just the mere act of having an original black female character lead a (completely new) Star Trek show that somehow caused people's heads to explode. Ditto Rey, Rose, Tilly, Jaylah, the ghostbusters - hell, even Doctor Who, I think. I don't really understand how the whole regeneration thing is supposed to work, but it's at least clear to me that the Doctor periodically turns into a totally different person for some reason, right down to the personality, so I don't see how having a female doctor isn't basically just another new doctor in the exact same longstanding tradition of various different doctors.
Ghostbusters, Doctor Who - that fits right in with people not liking change. I mean, they're "new" characters but kind of not...
I guess maybe I don't dig deep enough into fandumb but I didn't think Rey, Tilly, Jaylah got too much grief. People might not like the characters but is it due to toxic reasons?
Rose and Michael Burnham are better examples but again I think there's precedent for that. Rose is seen as interrupting the existing Rey/Finn and Poe dynamic. Burnham is part of a show treading on Kirk and Spock when it really feels like it should've been set in the generation following next. Also, I think there are some legitimate complaints that could be made about the characters.
That does not by any means justify the nasty toxicity displayed but I still feel it's connected. We see female POCs in properties like The Expanse, Killjoys or The Walking Dead that don't seem to experience that. Or the Asian women of Agents of SHIELD or the LGBTQ characters of say The Magicians or Legends of Tomorrow off the top of my head.
They did and do still. Rey and Jaylah in particular have an endless chorus of mary sue shriekers who clearly don't even understand the concept of what a mary sue is. Tilly is constantly attacked for being different, to the point of repeated claims that 'someone like her' could never possibly make it in starfleet (which is factually ridiculous when compared to various different examples of other characters who already did make it in starfleet).
Also, I limited my response to the franchises which had been discussed already in this thread, but that of course does not mean these are anywhere near the limit for the phenomenon. At this moment in time, possibly the most toxic place of all in fandom is Marvel comics. And who is by far the most hated symbol of that toxic marvel fanboy movement? Hint, it's not Jane Foster as Thor or Riri Williams in her homemade Iron Man armor. It's America Chavez, a completely original character starring in completely original stories who nevertheless still gets constantly attacked for 'taking focus away from classic characters' (which she doesn't do). It is not the change which causes problems for these people. It is the mere fact that such a character is even allowed to exist in a starring role in the first place.
There was no existing Rey/Finn dynamic in the sense that people are claiming. Rey are Finn are friends who helped each other survive a bad situation.
It's not 'treading on Kirk and Spock' that people complain about, though. It's 'Burnham is a shitty, shitty character who is a travesty to the franchise'. Treading on Kirk and Spock is practically Star Trek tradition, anyway.
Also, there are legitimate complaints to be made about every character in existence. If nothing else, no individual is ever go to enjoy every single possible character equally. That doesn't justify the level of hate that is targeted at a specific few.
I'm not intimately familiar with all of those shows, but there are two important points to remember here:
1. Anonymity is a shield of sorts. The less popular something is, the fewer chances there are for toxic aholes to be exposed to it and add it to their litany of offensive things.
2. These toxic aholes never had a problem with female or minority characters as long as they 'knew their place'. They will go out of their way to praise Nichelle Nichols' Uhura (among others), not because they genuinely like characters like that but because they think characters like that should all be trapped in the background like she was (or at the very least have the deference to not be the absolute center of the story). Rey's greatest sin, based on the actual fan backlash, is not strange backstory or lack of training, or anything related to mary-sue-esque qualities. It is the simple fact that she's the main character rather than some Luke/Obi-Wan stand-in.
With that in mind, looking at your list, I'd have to say that most of those shows are either largely dominated by white men or very small niche shows with less exposure or both. And even then, I would not be entirely comfortable just assuming that they don't also experience a similar toxic response somewhere within their fandoms without actually going out to look through their specific message boards/reviews/fan communities.
Let's face it. It wasn't just people being unwilling to accept a new show. Objectively speaking, TNG simply wasn't that great when it first came out.
But they did change Sulu to make him gay....against George's own objections.
Oh really? And making her wholly unsympathetic in the pilot aired on CBS had nothing to do with it?
The problem is that, and I've said this before, but people now view casting as tantamount to appointing a political official. There is a sort of quota or score-card mentality being applied. Since so many existing IP characters are white males, this is seen as a "problem" that needs to be "solved", hence Idris Elba was at the top of the list of actors people in the UK wanted for James Bond and there was a rumor Michael B Jordon would become the next Superman. It's like, once you start the gender and race flip bandwagon (like female Starbuck in BSG) then it becomes a trend, and eventually that trend starts to feel like little more than a cheap marketing gimmick.
The reason Ghostbusters keeps coming up is that it absolutely felt like a gimmick considering the movie itself was crap. I realized it was crap right from the first joke about "female" farting. It was like "gee, we've got women now, so our punch-lines should probably revolve around the fact they have different plumbing, right?" That's reaaallly woke of them.
But no, since now women are the stars, and the casting decision alone is seen as a positive sign of cultural progress, some people MUST throw their arms around dreck like this and protect it tooth and claw.
There was far less controversy surrounding Wonder Woman because...it was a pretty good movie. * Gal Gadot being thin and flat-chested caused some initial uproar from the "manbabies" which then died down when they saw the actual movie and how she made the role her own. The main controversy over that wasn't the movie (aside from her shaven armpits) but the all-female screenings at the Alamo Drafthouse, which keeps fostering this us vs. them mentality of identity politics.
Seriously, I see a shocking lack of self-awareness over the role that the self-righteous play in throwing fuel onto these dumpster fires.
* I should mention how the "manbabies" generally hate what Snyder has done with the DCEU and agree what WW is the best DCEU movie. It's an error to believe that haters only go after diverse casting/recasting. Haters merely come from a deep attachment to canon/tradition.
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In a five second scene that didn't even make it clear he was gay. And in response to that, people raved for weeks. Sound like a reasonable reaction to you?
She isn't wholly unsympathetic, to start with. In fact she's a lot more sympathetic than half the Enterprise crew in Farpoint and half the Voyager crew in Caretaker.
And the point remains that the response is completely out of proportion. Every character has their supporters and their haters, but not every character is crucified in perpetuity the way Burnham is.
Again, Burnham takes almost as much flack as the gbs, and regardless of your opinion of the character's quality, she clearly isn't a gimmick nor does she in any way 'replace' or 'change' a traditional character. Ditto Rey. Ditto America Chavez, etc.
Refresh my memory, please. What was there in canon that established Sulu as straight? I can't seem to remember anything.
Based on my memory of the sulu is gay thread, this was the sum total of the 'evidence' presented that Sulu was supposed to be straight:
1. Takei intended it that way. (Obviously, not canon)
2. He had a daughter. (Obviously, doesn't require heterosexual marriage)
3. He took a shine to fair maiden Uhura in the Naked Time (Obviously not necessarily related to sexual attraction)
4. Mirror Sulu was attracted to Uhura in Mirror, Mirror (Obviously, not actually Sulu, and also totally unclear if it was a genuine act since MU people are all about theater and living up to expectations lest they be summarily executed)
5. In the Animated Series episode Magicks of Megas Tu, Sulu takes advantage of sudden magical powers to make a beautiful asian woman appear and then... sort of... stands close to her. The episode immediately interrupts this with the return of the magical alien guy and the identity of the woman is never given nor is Sulu's interest in her defined. It was clearly intended, at the time, to be him conjuring a beautiful woman for the same reason any man might, but it never actually says that on screen.
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Thanks for the info. None of that actually establishes that he's straight, I'm afraid.
I found her wholly sympathetic.
This is some Grade-A bullshit here. I mean epic level.
First off, Elba has been such a popular choice to play Bond because it's evident to anyone with half a clue that there's never been a more perfect A-list actor to play the character. The guy was pretty much born to play Bond.
Second of all the 'problem' here is that we're in an era of recycled IPs. And it's going to stay that way for the foreseeable future. And one can make a legitimate argument against that. However, these iPs are all overwhelmingly dominated by white men. And since that's the case we can either just keep on making movies about white men, or change the casts.
Even still, there was one $2B film in 2018. It had a really big cast. Shall we break it down?
Of the top 30 listed actors, 22 are men and eight are women. Of the 22 men, 16 are white. But I' it's the age of the women and SJWs and all that. amirite?
JFC
Going by the trend, this is evidence enough for me that good Sulu is gay.
I actually think most people do like strong and interesting female characters. To me the double standard comes through in the badly written or kind of boring characters. Burnham isn't really a great character but neither was Captain Archer but people seem to go harder on Burnham. Part of that is when a show promotes being progressive as part of it's sales pitch it does create a unfair level of hype. If the new Doctor is anything other than brilliant it's going to feel like a let down because they have her being promoted as epic progressive change that is literally breaking down glass ceilings in the add. How is a character ever going to truly live up to what people expect.
When it comes to these older shows you also have the comparisons. Nobody for example will ever top Shatner as a Kirk. Even Pine who had done a fine job will never move out of that shadow. If you cast a female Kirk she will also forever be in Shatner's shadow only kind of worst because you will have to deal with sexism tossed into the mix as well. It is possible to supplant the orginal like the modern Starbuck in "Battlestar Galatica" but it's kind of rare. I have noticed most of the best female characters in recent years have been orginal characters,characters who are famous but never really used to great effect until just now like Supergirl,Wonder Women or previously weak female characters from the past who have been enhanced with better writing for them and elevating their importance such as Uhura,the mom and daughters from Lost in Space and Moneypenny.
Jason
When it comes to these older shows you also have the comparisons. Nobody for example will ever top Shatner as a Kirk. Even Pine who had done a fine job will never move out of that shadow. If you cast a female Kirk she will also forever be in Shatner's shadow only kind of worst because you will have to deal with sexism tossed into the mix as well. It is possible to supplant the orginal like the modern Starbuck in "Battlestar Galatica" but it's kind of rare. I have noticed most of the best female characters in recent years have been orginal characters,characters who are famous but never really used to great effect until just now like Supergirl,Wonder Women or previously weak female characters from the past who have been enhanced with better writing for them and elevating their importance such as Uhura,the mom and daughters from Lost in Space and Moneypenny.
Jason
What do you mean: "Right now..." ? Star Trek, Star Wars and often Sci-Fi Fantasy fandom has always been somewhat toxic. It's just with the explosion of social media, said toxicity gains a wider audience.
I recall laughing until I pissed my panties that fans were irate Idris Elba was in the Thor movies...a movie based on fictional characters and fantasy gods. The real Heimdall must have turned in his grave....
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