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shadowscastI got talking with yourlibrarian today about the hugeness of Star Wars, Star Trek and Marvel, and I decided it might be fun to make a post about my own relationship with each of them. All of them are fandoms that I'd say I'm into; I've seen quite a lot of the source material for each of them, but I haven't seen all of any of them and I doubt I ever will (since they're so huge)! Mostly this will just be a list of what I've seen, but I'm throwing in some personal anecdotes too. :D
Star Wars
My parents saw A New Hope in theatre while my mom was pregnant with me, in 1977. If I count that as my first interaction with the Star Wars universe, it was very early indeed.
My first conscious interaction with the Star Wars universe was after Return of the Jedi came out, in 1983. I didn't see it, but my best friend did, and afterward she wanted to play "light-saber battle" with me in her backyard. She was Luke Skywalker, I had to be Darth Vader, and we pantomimed the battle while balancing on the railway ties that lined her parents' vegetable garden.
I think I saw bits and pieces of the movies in her basement, later; I have scattered memories of droids. But I didn't see the original trilogy properly until I was an adult.
However, I did watch a movie about Ewoks with my friend. Was it The Ewok Adventure? Ewoks: The Battle for Edor? I have no idea. I was a child and there were Ewoks.
When I did finally see the original trilogy properly, I think I was in my 20s. And it somehow already felt comfortably familiar by the time I saw it.
I've seen episodes 4, 5 and 6 a handful of times each. Episodes 1, 2 and 3, and 7, 8 and 9, I think I've seen just twice each: once in theatre, and once later on video.
There's a Lego video game that covers the stories of episodes 1 through 6, and I've played that through a whole bunch of times, because when my kid was around five years old he was really into it. So my clearest memories of all of those movies are at least partly in Lego form. When I was watching The Book of Boba Fett last night, I recognized Jabba's palace mostly from playing through it over and over again in the video game.
I haven't read many of the tie-in novels (of which I know there are many), although I think I read a few when I was a teenager, and I read the first Thrawn book more recently.
I watched and enjoyed Rogue One and Solo.
I haven't seen Clone Wars, although I've heard good things about it. I tried watching Bad Batch, but after a few episodes I just couldn't get into it.
Most recently, I watched and loved The Mandalorian (I resisted watching it for a while because I thought it looked silly, but then I finally did and it was so good!) and as of last night I've seen the first three episodes of The Book of Boba Fett, which I'm also liking a lot! I'm loving how faithful they are to the aesthetic of the original trilogy.
Star Trek
I saw a few scattered episodes of the original series when my parents were watching it in reruns during my childhood, but I didn't really pay attention or take much in. Oh, and we only had a black-and-white TV at the time, so I didn't get the full-colour TOS experience until much later!
I've now seen some full episodes in colour, but I actually still have never seen a lot of TOS episodes. But my parents had a set of novelizations of the original series episodes, and I read those at some point when I was a teenager, so I'm familiar with the plots of many of the episodes without having seen them.
But my main intro to Star Trek was The Next Generation. My family started watching it together when it first became available on a channel that we got (we didn't have cable, and we only had three channels!). I think it was in season 3 at the time; I remember that I saw the episode "Yesterday's Enterprise" before I knew who Tasha Yar was. Then we got caught up on seasons 1 and 2 via summer reruns, and we watched TNG faithfully for the rest of its run; my parents actually bought our first VCR so that we could tape episodes and not miss them if we were out. When Deep Space Nine came out, we started watching that too, and the same thing with Voyager. I loved that they were all in the same universe.
I've seen every episode of TNG; many of them more than once. And it remains the only Star Trek show that I've seen all of. I would have happily watched all of DS9 as it came out, except that at the end of season 6, it moved to airing on a different local channel that I didn't have access to. I could get access to it now; maybe someday I'll get around to finishing it! As for Voyager, I watched maybe 4? seasons, and then just lost interest in it.
I've seen all the Star Trek movies, including the reboot ones. I read a bunch of tie-in novels when I was a teenager; I don't remember most of them now, but I do remember Imzadi by Peter David and Uhura's Song by Janet Kagen.
I watched a few episodes of Enterprise and didn't get into it. And when Discovery came out, I was so excited and I really wanted to like it, but overall I really didn't. I liked some of the main characters, Michael and Tilly and Paul, but liked very little else about the show. I watched seasons 1 and 2 and haven't watched season 3.
I haven't seen any of Picard, or Lower Decks.
Marvel Cinematic Universe
I think I've managed to see all of the MCU movies, although it's getting a little hard to keep track. I didn't see the Captain America ones until after I saw Avengers.
I haven't seen Agent Carter or Agents of Shield. I have seen the Loki series, and Wandavision, and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, and Hawkeye. And also What If...? which was fun but I guess not exactly canonical.
Oh, I almost forgot! I watched the first seasons of Jessica Jones and Luke Cage and Daredevil, but I don't think I watched through their later seasons. There was a team-up show ... I forget what it was called? (::quick googling::) Defenders. I watched that too. I didn't watch Iron Fist, because I heard it was terrible, and the character was really annoying in the team-up show.
Whew. That was a lot! LOL, I don't think I want to calculate how many hours of my life this list represents.
But I have no regrets; these were all stories that I've enjoyed, and that I've enjoyed sharing with friends and loved ones, and talking about and theorizing about, and reading fanfic about in many cases (although never writing fanfic; these universes all feel much too big for me to tackle, somehow!).
And what about you, if you feel like sharing? How many of these things have you seen, and how have they been woven into the fabric of your life?
yourlibrarian today about the hugeness of Star Wars, Star Trek and Marvel, and I decided it might be fun to make a post about my own relationship with each of them. All of them are fandoms that I'd say I'm into; I've seen quite a lot of the source material for each of them, but I haven't seen all of any of them and I doubt I ever will (since they're so huge)! Mostly this will just be a list of what I've seen, but I'm throwing in some personal anecdotes too. :DStar Wars
My parents saw A New Hope in theatre while my mom was pregnant with me, in 1977. If I count that as my first interaction with the Star Wars universe, it was very early indeed.
My first conscious interaction with the Star Wars universe was after Return of the Jedi came out, in 1983. I didn't see it, but my best friend did, and afterward she wanted to play "light-saber battle" with me in her backyard. She was Luke Skywalker, I had to be Darth Vader, and we pantomimed the battle while balancing on the railway ties that lined her parents' vegetable garden.
I think I saw bits and pieces of the movies in her basement, later; I have scattered memories of droids. But I didn't see the original trilogy properly until I was an adult.
However, I did watch a movie about Ewoks with my friend. Was it The Ewok Adventure? Ewoks: The Battle for Edor? I have no idea. I was a child and there were Ewoks.
When I did finally see the original trilogy properly, I think I was in my 20s. And it somehow already felt comfortably familiar by the time I saw it.
I've seen episodes 4, 5 and 6 a handful of times each. Episodes 1, 2 and 3, and 7, 8 and 9, I think I've seen just twice each: once in theatre, and once later on video.
There's a Lego video game that covers the stories of episodes 1 through 6, and I've played that through a whole bunch of times, because when my kid was around five years old he was really into it. So my clearest memories of all of those movies are at least partly in Lego form. When I was watching The Book of Boba Fett last night, I recognized Jabba's palace mostly from playing through it over and over again in the video game.
I haven't read many of the tie-in novels (of which I know there are many), although I think I read a few when I was a teenager, and I read the first Thrawn book more recently.
I watched and enjoyed Rogue One and Solo.
I haven't seen Clone Wars, although I've heard good things about it. I tried watching Bad Batch, but after a few episodes I just couldn't get into it.
Most recently, I watched and loved The Mandalorian (I resisted watching it for a while because I thought it looked silly, but then I finally did and it was so good!) and as of last night I've seen the first three episodes of The Book of Boba Fett, which I'm also liking a lot! I'm loving how faithful they are to the aesthetic of the original trilogy.
Star Trek
I saw a few scattered episodes of the original series when my parents were watching it in reruns during my childhood, but I didn't really pay attention or take much in. Oh, and we only had a black-and-white TV at the time, so I didn't get the full-colour TOS experience until much later!
I've now seen some full episodes in colour, but I actually still have never seen a lot of TOS episodes. But my parents had a set of novelizations of the original series episodes, and I read those at some point when I was a teenager, so I'm familiar with the plots of many of the episodes without having seen them.
But my main intro to Star Trek was The Next Generation. My family started watching it together when it first became available on a channel that we got (we didn't have cable, and we only had three channels!). I think it was in season 3 at the time; I remember that I saw the episode "Yesterday's Enterprise" before I knew who Tasha Yar was. Then we got caught up on seasons 1 and 2 via summer reruns, and we watched TNG faithfully for the rest of its run; my parents actually bought our first VCR so that we could tape episodes and not miss them if we were out. When Deep Space Nine came out, we started watching that too, and the same thing with Voyager. I loved that they were all in the same universe.
I've seen every episode of TNG; many of them more than once. And it remains the only Star Trek show that I've seen all of. I would have happily watched all of DS9 as it came out, except that at the end of season 6, it moved to airing on a different local channel that I didn't have access to. I could get access to it now; maybe someday I'll get around to finishing it! As for Voyager, I watched maybe 4? seasons, and then just lost interest in it.
I've seen all the Star Trek movies, including the reboot ones. I read a bunch of tie-in novels when I was a teenager; I don't remember most of them now, but I do remember Imzadi by Peter David and Uhura's Song by Janet Kagen.
I watched a few episodes of Enterprise and didn't get into it. And when Discovery came out, I was so excited and I really wanted to like it, but overall I really didn't. I liked some of the main characters, Michael and Tilly and Paul, but liked very little else about the show. I watched seasons 1 and 2 and haven't watched season 3.
I haven't seen any of Picard, or Lower Decks.
Marvel Cinematic Universe
I think I've managed to see all of the MCU movies, although it's getting a little hard to keep track. I didn't see the Captain America ones until after I saw Avengers.
I haven't seen Agent Carter or Agents of Shield. I have seen the Loki series, and Wandavision, and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, and Hawkeye. And also What If...? which was fun but I guess not exactly canonical.
Oh, I almost forgot! I watched the first seasons of Jessica Jones and Luke Cage and Daredevil, but I don't think I watched through their later seasons. There was a team-up show ... I forget what it was called? (::quick googling::) Defenders. I watched that too. I didn't watch Iron Fist, because I heard it was terrible, and the character was really annoying in the team-up show.
Whew. That was a lot! LOL, I don't think I want to calculate how many hours of my life this list represents.
But I have no regrets; these were all stories that I've enjoyed, and that I've enjoyed sharing with friends and loved ones, and talking about and theorizing about, and reading fanfic about in many cases (although never writing fanfic; these universes all feel much too big for me to tackle, somehow!).
And what about you, if you feel like sharing? How many of these things have you seen, and how have they been woven into the fabric of your life?
(no subject)
Date: 2022-01-23 05:28 pm (UTC)I was very excited about ST:TNG, but didn't actually connect with it when it finally aired. I think I saw all of the first season and a handful of others. I haven't seen much of any of the others. I watched a few episodes of Discovery when it first aired, then stopped in boredom.
I saw A New Hope in 1977, back when it was just Star Wars. I've seen all of 4, 5, and 6 a few times. I saw the redone version in a movie theater with
I saw #1 once and had mixed feelings about it. It gave rise to the entire Master/Apprentice fandom and was one of the slashiest things I'd ever seen on screen, but baby Darth Vader and Jar-Jar Binks caused much eye-rolling. Even more eye-rolling for #2. I haven't seen any other SW works.
Mostly I've ignored the entire MCU phenomenon. I watched Iron Man because I was curious, and fell down on my inability to believe comic book physics. I saw Black Panther in a movie theater because of the hype, and it was almost as good as I expected. Still comic book physics, though.
There's a Harry Potter series I really like that's a crossover with MCU (Harry prays to Loki, who adopts him), but that's mostly HP rather than MCU.
(no subject)
Date: 2022-01-23 05:57 pm (UTC)Oh, that sounds intriguing! Care to share a link?
Still comic book physics, though.
LOL, yes. That certainly is a thing.
(no subject)
Date: 2022-01-23 06:13 pm (UTC)https://archiveofourown.org/series/309447
Almost all of her HP writing is crossovers -- most of the others are with Naruto.
Her first HP work is a standalone AU entitled A Different Beginning, and I'm very fond it. That's what drew me into Mischief's Heir, despite my lack of love for MCU.
https://archiveofourown.org/works/4584735
(no subject)
Date: 2022-01-23 06:23 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2022-01-23 07:53 pm (UTC)Your early experience with Trek is very much like Mike's. And yeah, I read all the tie-ins for TOS and quite a lot of TNG, DS9 and some Voyager until 1998 or so. But I also couldn't see certain shows (including Buffy!) because it simply wasn't carried locally at the time.
Love your early SW memories! As it happens I just saw those Ewok shows last year. It's good your memory is fuzzy. They were ... not good.
Haha, my first knowledge of films 2 and 3 were also from the LEGO game! I have been waiting for the release of an all-9 films LEGO game set. It was due last month and has been postponed to this December.
Yeah Bad Batch is disappointing and even less interesting if you haven't seen Clone Wars, because there's continuity there if you've seen it.
(no subject)
Date: 2022-01-23 08:20 pm (UTC)LOL, I think I enjoyed it (them?) just fine when I was 10-ish years old. But I deeply suspect they would not stand up to a rewatch.
I have been waiting for the release of an all-9 films LEGO game set. It was due last month and has been postponed to this December.
Oh, I wonder if it will come out for the Nintendo switch? If it does, we just might get it for next Christmas; we did enjoy the episodes 1 - 6 game a lot. ("We" in this case being all three of us, me + spouse + kid.)
(no subject)
Date: 2022-01-23 09:00 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2022-01-23 09:16 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2022-01-24 01:21 am (UTC)