Fandom Disrespect is Real
It's Time to Stop Fandom Mistreatment!
Over the past couple of years, old-school franchises have gotten the new-school treatment. From Halo to Scooby-Doo, classic favorites have been picked up and rebooted by HBO, Paramount, and other big-time studios. With millions upon millions in budget and vastly different universes to bring to life, these studios have proudly focused on only one thing-disrespecting the communities that love them.
I’m incapable of understanding why this trend has continued (aside from the obvious monetary incentive). The amount of outrage displayed over the mistreatment of IPs like The Witcher and Halo has done nothing but encourage those who refuse to see these universes for what they are: places filled with soul, strife, joy, and history.
The writers and producers of these shows loudly boast that they’ve never played the games or read the source material that these shows are based on; adding insult to injury, they claim that they know better and have no desire to become engrossed in the universe they’re in charge of bringing to life.
Halo showrunner Steven Kane proudly mentioned in an interview…
“We didn’t look at the game. We didn’t talk about the game. We talked about the characters and the world.”
So…did y’all just read the Wikipedia page or what? What does this even mean? How can you know shit about anything in the universe if you don’t even care to understand the lore surrounding it? This glorious piece of word vomit has been echoed by every other showrunner on these reboots, almost like Paramount and Kane paved the way to failure in desperate mediocrity.
Netflix producers later mentioned that the writers behind The Witcher “actively disliked” the books and games. We all saw that on full display with Blood Origin and the sloppy disaster that turned out to be. What is it with these studios and placing people on the job that openly hate the source material? Is it to spit in the face of the nerds they view as lesser? Is it the evolution of high school bullying? Who can know?
While you have fans like myself who want their beloved universes respected for what they are, you’ve got braindead Neanderthals out here that lash out at the tiniest criticisms against these shows and the people running them. Oh, you don’t like that Scooby isn’t in Velma? You must be a racist. Concerned that Henry Cavill isn’t starring in The Witcher? You’re a misogynistic pig.
When did it become socially unacceptable to express concerns over how a storied franchise has been treated? Should we be lucky that these games and books have been converted to a medium that never needed to be portrayed in the first place? The degree Twitter liberals will fabricate the need to self-insert their own ridiculous sense of social justice never ceases to amaze me.
Look, I’m all for new stories and characters being made in these universes. I don’t think any fans want a regurgitation of things we’ve already read/watched/played through just in live-action. No, we simply want these universes that have given us so much happiness and wonder to be respected. It can be done; Cyberpunk Edgerunners is a prime example of an extension of that universe and how great it can be when these universes are handled in a new medium by people who love and care for the source material.
How hard can it be? These studios have all the talent and money in the world at their disposal, and they can’t take the time to pay homage to the fans and universes on which these stories are based on. It’s disrespectful and a slap in the face to fandoms everywhere. Yet, we keep watching. We hate it, but we watch these shows and give these studios an excuse to keep butchering the stories we love.
It’s time to stop. It’s time to stop watching these shows just to meme on them. It’s time for networks to pay attention to the universes people love and stop seeing them as simply cash cows. We can do better, and we, as fans, deserve better.
About the Creator
Colin Wray
Writing nerdy stuff for nerdy people.
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Comments (1)
I total agree with what you're saying here! It is an abject failure on some of these producers and creators parts to try and build new material and content out of previously existing fandoms and not actually care about the IP itself. Then they try to placate the fanbase by putting in cameos or references that are just nods rather than anything of real substance or adding to the new story. It's infuriating and makes me despair about upcoming adaptations and reboots coming out of Hollywood.