On Fanboys

This is a rant that's been building for a little while.

I hate fanboys. I absolutely can't stand the lording over such aweful movies such as Terminator 3, Transformers and every other Sci-Fi Genre movie, especially the blockbusters, with the sense that it's the absolute best thing to ever happen to cinema. Same thing goes for books, although to less of an extent. Television seems to be really untouched by this at times. To clarify, here's the wikipedia definition: "Fanboy is a term used to describe an individual (usually male; the feminine version fangirl may be used for females) who is utterly devoted to a single fannish subject, or to a single point of view within that subject, often to the point where it is considered an obsession. Fanboys remain loyal to their particular obsession, disregarding any factors (often including logic) that differ from their point of view." Now, there are various degrees to this, and I think that I personally avoid most of this.Star Wars is a big thing for this, and I mainly come across this sort of thing at discussion forums. I love Star Wars, I really do, but it's certainly not above critism, and has plenty of flaws throughout the broad range of movies, books and comics. The big thing is that Star Wars and now Lord of the Rings are essentially the fanboy's epitomy of Science Fiction and Fantasy movies, and it's almost like there's nothing better in the world, and critism of said movies is non-existant. Granted, I was like that for a long time. But those movies do deserve a bit of that to some extent. But it's the really bad movies that really get this sort of treatment. I can understand enjoying a blockbuster, but those are complete fluff when it comes to films.

Last year was a fantastic year for genre films - We had the Fountain, Children of Men and Pan's Labyrinth, all absolutely brilliant works. This Summer, we had Transformers, Spiderman 3 and Fantastic Four, which not only gross more money but have the bigger budgets, cookie-cutter dialogue and screenwriting and CGI. These films get all the attention.

Fortunently, books and television, as mentioned, seem to really avoid this - maybe because it takes a little more effort to go through and it's not as visual at times, but there is the fanboy reaction for some of the larger books, such as Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings and certainly with Star Trek and Star Wars books. Television series such as Battlestar Galactica and Heroes get a little of the attention, as does Firefly (that's a big one) as well as Star Trek, Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis. These are certainly worthy of some attention though, and it's not nearly to the same extent.

I just don't really understand it, and I can't really remember any reasons for completely adoring Star Wars when I did. I still read the books, but really look and read in the universe with a much more critical eye. I finished Death Star in a couple of days and really was let down by the story and quality, but the book gets high marks on the Literature section at the boards.theforce.net forums. On a happier note, Karen Traviss's books, which deserve more fanboy-ing, got higher marks.

I think what bothers me the most is the extreme close-mindedness of some of the people. I remember reading in near disbelief at someone writing in that there should be tie-in novels for Lord of the Rings in prose that's much more readable and with more action, something along the lines of what we see with the Star Wars and Star Trek books out there. Some things just shouldn't have that happen to them.

Okay, rant over.