Fandom pondering
May. 23rd, 2025 06:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
artemisdartIt's been about two years since I fell down the rabbit hole of Armitage Hux / Poe Dameron, and I'm finally coming up for air. At this point I've read millions of words of Gingerpilot fanfic and written over half a million words of Gingerpilot myself. I love this ship; I love Hux; I love the whole thing...
... but at this point, I'm feeling that it's time to start branching out into newer pastures.
It's true that I did all of Kinktober last year, but pretty much all of those stories were things that were already swirling around in my head from years and decades of consuming media and making up stories in my head about them. When called upon, I just brought up some of those stories and wrote them down. Only one of them was Gingerpilot, and that wasn't "really" Gingerpilot 'as such.' But none of my Kinktober adventures captured my interest for the long term.
Here are the ships that have turned my head recently, along with how "viable" the fandom for each seems to be to me, in ascending order.
* CT-9901 | Hunter/Baylan Skoll -- As I mentioned yesterday, this "ship" has maybe two fans in the world... InkyCloneJoestar and me. Hahahaha. I don't think I'll be getting a lot of traction if I start writing for this more. 5 kudos total... yeah. There are only two fics for this ship on AO3 -- one by me, and the other by InkyCloneJoestar. (There's a third work, but it's fanart... that was made for InkyCloneJoestar. Yeah. They're the only nexus of interest in this ship, hahaha.)
* Merek Grimaldus/Andrej Valatok (from Warhammer 40K) -- Similar situation, but at least this has Warhammer fans clicking on it, so I have 33 kudos on my story for this pairing, which is one of just three on AO3.
* Merlin/Uther Pendragon (Cursed) -- This show from 2021 is one of the properties that I was blogging about the other day, related to actor Sebastian Armesto, who plays Uther Pendragon. The Discord server I'm on has many elaborate and overheated fantasies regarding these two and their twisted stepfather/son / ?? relationship... So I know that all those people would be excited if I wrote for the ship, haha. There are only four stories on AO3 in English about these two.
* Cardinal | Archex/Armitage Hux -- Cardinal is a character from the novel "Phasma" by Delilah Dawson. That fact makes this ship more obscure than other Star Wars Sequel Trilogy ships, but Hux's involvement means there's more of an audience. I only have 14 kudos on the story I started about these two, but I feel like there's more scope here than for the Warhammer one, just because I'm more comfortable in the Star Wars universe than in the Warhammer one. There are only 22 works for this pairing on AO3 in English.
* Mizrak/Olrox (Castlevania) -- Castlevania Nocturne is the sequel to Castlevania, and these two have an on-screen romance, rather than it being merely hinted at. How refreshing! My husband suggested I would love this ship, and he is not wrong! It's great that he knows me so well. <3 There are currently only 261 works for this ship on AO3 in English, which is not a lot.
* Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova (The Old Guard) -- these two. These two! This ship has sooooo many of the things I love... and it's quite popular, with 8,977 works in English on AO3 currently. I contributed one short thing to this ship during Kinktober (on October 9), and it has garnered 22 kudos, although not a single comment. :'(
You'll notice that each and every one of these ships is super gay! Where are the heterosexual and lesbian ships, hmmmmmmm? Well, my head hasn't been fully turned by anything in those categories recently. The closest is probably Haruno Sakura/Karin from Naruto; I wrote a fic for those two for an exchange, and found myself converted over to believing in this ship as a possibility. But I haven't gone and consumed all the other fics for it yet, and I think that's the missing ingredient.
Sakura and Karin each garner a lot of hate from the fandom, which is annoying. I shouldn't let that stop me. It is a consideration, though... it's hard to write for characters whom a large part of the fandom hates.
At this point I have plenty of things to write about, including several fics that are due quite soon, as well as the five WIPs I have on AO3, but no new ship has fully captured my interest.
Maybe I'm reaching towards the point where I... don't have an all-consuming interest in a specific ship?? Is this personal growth?? _pondering_
... but at this point, I'm feeling that it's time to start branching out into newer pastures.
It's true that I did all of Kinktober last year, but pretty much all of those stories were things that were already swirling around in my head from years and decades of consuming media and making up stories in my head about them. When called upon, I just brought up some of those stories and wrote them down. Only one of them was Gingerpilot, and that wasn't "really" Gingerpilot 'as such.' But none of my Kinktober adventures captured my interest for the long term.
Here are the ships that have turned my head recently, along with how "viable" the fandom for each seems to be to me, in ascending order.
* CT-9901 | Hunter/Baylan Skoll -- As I mentioned yesterday, this "ship" has maybe two fans in the world... InkyCloneJoestar and me. Hahahaha. I don't think I'll be getting a lot of traction if I start writing for this more. 5 kudos total... yeah. There are only two fics for this ship on AO3 -- one by me, and the other by InkyCloneJoestar. (There's a third work, but it's fanart... that was made for InkyCloneJoestar. Yeah. They're the only nexus of interest in this ship, hahaha.)
* Merek Grimaldus/Andrej Valatok (from Warhammer 40K) -- Similar situation, but at least this has Warhammer fans clicking on it, so I have 33 kudos on my story for this pairing, which is one of just three on AO3.
* Merlin/Uther Pendragon (Cursed) -- This show from 2021 is one of the properties that I was blogging about the other day, related to actor Sebastian Armesto, who plays Uther Pendragon. The Discord server I'm on has many elaborate and overheated fantasies regarding these two and their twisted stepfather/son / ?? relationship... So I know that all those people would be excited if I wrote for the ship, haha. There are only four stories on AO3 in English about these two.
* Cardinal | Archex/Armitage Hux -- Cardinal is a character from the novel "Phasma" by Delilah Dawson. That fact makes this ship more obscure than other Star Wars Sequel Trilogy ships, but Hux's involvement means there's more of an audience. I only have 14 kudos on the story I started about these two, but I feel like there's more scope here than for the Warhammer one, just because I'm more comfortable in the Star Wars universe than in the Warhammer one. There are only 22 works for this pairing on AO3 in English.
* Mizrak/Olrox (Castlevania) -- Castlevania Nocturne is the sequel to Castlevania, and these two have an on-screen romance, rather than it being merely hinted at. How refreshing! My husband suggested I would love this ship, and he is not wrong! It's great that he knows me so well. <3 There are currently only 261 works for this ship on AO3 in English, which is not a lot.
* Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova (The Old Guard) -- these two. These two! This ship has sooooo many of the things I love... and it's quite popular, with 8,977 works in English on AO3 currently. I contributed one short thing to this ship during Kinktober (on October 9), and it has garnered 22 kudos, although not a single comment. :'(
You'll notice that each and every one of these ships is super gay! Where are the heterosexual and lesbian ships, hmmmmmmm? Well, my head hasn't been fully turned by anything in those categories recently. The closest is probably Haruno Sakura/Karin from Naruto; I wrote a fic for those two for an exchange, and found myself converted over to believing in this ship as a possibility. But I haven't gone and consumed all the other fics for it yet, and I think that's the missing ingredient.
Sakura and Karin each garner a lot of hate from the fandom, which is annoying. I shouldn't let that stop me. It is a consideration, though... it's hard to write for characters whom a large part of the fandom hates.
At this point I have plenty of things to write about, including several fics that are due quite soon, as well as the five WIPs I have on AO3, but no new ship has fully captured my interest.
Maybe I'm reaching towards the point where I... don't have an all-consuming interest in a specific ship?? Is this personal growth?? _pondering_
