#escapade con

hi hey hello darlings so i am leaving bright and early tomorrow for this glorious event, to which i try to go every year. @escapadecon is the only con i've ever gone to and i don't need any other, for it is my happiest place. also even though i am a poor they have given me a scholarship, so i will be delightedly volunteering and helping out any way possible. i'm modding three panels and sitting in the laps of all my favorite fangirls (gender neutral) so you know who you are, prepare for your lap to be occupied. anyway here are the 3 panels at which i'll be babbling nervously and begging people to talk.

(yes i'm sure that last one SHOCKS YOU DEEPLY lmaoooo.) anyway you should come next year bc it really is a four-day yaoi slumber party. there's also a virtual/online con in june! and while last year the hotel had a waffle breakfast, even that is not as exciting as the vid show and the dance party (which is also vids). anyway i will be uncharacteristically extroverted and therefore not shitposting about luo wenzhou at 3 am so i thought you might worry if i didn't explain where i am. love you madly and see you in about a week, xoxox sam

I was going to wait on Stargate Atlantis since I just posted about SG1, but it turns out I have more bad news to share.

Wraithbait is gone.

Both Area 52 and Wraithbait. Jesus. So much for early Stargate fic!

SGA, as it is often abbreviated, followed SG1 in the Stargate franchise. Slash fandom’s focus was largely on John Sheppard and Rodney McKay. John is an ace pilot. Rodney is a hypochondriac scientist. They’re both total dorks.

As cheesy sci-fi, SG1 and SGA are pretty similar. As fandoms, however, there’s quite a difference:

SGA hit just enough later that it attracted tons of livejournal-based fans I knew who had never dipped a toe in SG1 fandom. It was a Fandom That Ate Fandom, draining the BNF writers from all over slash-dom.

Being a little later also meant that it has exponentially more good vids online. I always kind of resented SGA fandom for eclipsing my beloved SG1, but I sure do love the vids!

One of the more famous ones to show at Vividcon is Another Sunday by Jescaflowne. Youtube has it region-blocked all to hell, but it’s still up and probably viewable through the usual sketchy means.

And how could I not share the glorious crack of Soccer Practice by bironic, a rare slash vid showing off hottie Jason Momoa as Ronon Dex. On AO3 here.

For the juggernaut ship, no vid could be more in-character for melodramatic Rodney than Grace Kelly by Diana Williams:

SGA was squarely in the Livejournal era, and a lot of fans from back then have migrated to AO3. Its influence on modern AO3-ish fandom is tremendous, as I’m sure half of you reading this can attest better than I.

One effect on a more meta level was to make female fandom more irate than ever over TPTB being sexist little shits. Reportedly, SGA attracted too many female fans for the showrunners’ comfort, and they wanted to retool their franchise as SGU, a darker and edgier version designed to attract a more BSG reboot-like audience.

Needless to say, when you’re a franchise that’s good at putting aliens in gold lamé bikinis rather than at coherent writing, going darker and edgier does not work.

SGU was a miserable flop, the entire Stargate franchise stalled, and SGA slash fandom developed an enduring hateboner for TPTB.

At Escapade, SGA has had a steady presence from 2005 through to the present. Past panels include:

2006 - First Marriage of Classic and Postmodern Fandoms? (Are we writing fanfic for the show, or are most stories just meta versions of stories from older fandoms, and commenting on each other comments? Remember when people complained all we had was hummus? All SGA has is crack(fic).)

2007 - John Sheppard: Psychokiller or Pretty, Pretty Princess (From mild-mannered sci-fi geek to special-ops xenocide, John Sheppard is one of the prettiest psychopaths in two galaxies. Which is the 'real' Sheppard? Can these two personalities be reconciled? How does this dichotomy in canon affect how we choose to portray him in fanfic?)

2008 - Crackfic, AUs, and Characterization, Oh My! (SGA canon is full of AUs and crack. Do the show's wacky plot twists encourage us to boldly go further out than other fandoms have gone before? And what happens when we go AU: why are John, Rodney, Ronon, and Teyla so recognizable even when they're planted in Harlequin romance, NASCAR, a symphony orchestra, or a diner in Maine?)

2009 - On a Clear Day, I Can See the Pegasus Galaxy (How are you feeling about the end of SGA-relief or regret? Are you looking forward to the rumored film(s), or planning to be snuggled up with your favorite fic that night? Have you ever been part of an active fandom whose canon closed, and do you have any thoughts (or advice!) about how to keep the fannish energy going? Let's discuss our hopes, fears and fondest dreams for the future of the fandom.)

2011 - Stargate: The End? (We were charmed by the original movie concept, many of us were fannishly enslaved by the first television series, others were entranced by Atlantis and some of us even tuned in for Universe. Are we ready to let the Stargate concept go or are we sitting on the edges of our seats, anxiously awaiting the next incarnation?)

2012 - SGA: Rodney and John: What We See is Not What We Get (We know we're adding slash to whatever's on the screen. With McShep, we really know. John the MENSA/slacker who knows how to fit in chasing brilliant yet obnoxious Rodney? How the Hell did we ever think they wouldn't kill each other, John with his P-90 or Rodney with his brain? Come prepared to argue the pros and cons of Sheppard and McKay, support your favorite character, and argue why Ronon is/isn't damned hotter than either of them.)

2013 - The Cool Kid and the Geek (Rodney loves John because John is sexy-handsome, lithe-and-cat-like, athletic, brave, and ridiculously pretty. He's also one of the Cool Kids, so, yeah, Rodney might fall hard. But Rodney is not sexy-handsome, lithe-and-cat-like, athletic, brave, nor ridiculously pretty. He’s the Geek, so why is John drawn to him? Come argue your point!)

2017 - Stargate: Classic Fandom Flashback

2018 - Stargate: Ten Years On

SGA on Fanlore

SGA on AO3

Belated Escapade 2019 post! As always, a fabulous time was to be had at Escapade this year. If you didn't come, you should come next time. :)  

Alas, life was complicated and I didn't get a vid together in time for this year's vid show. However, there was an ABUNDANCE of vids this year. They coudn't fit all of them into the main vid show! That was awsoeme.

I was a co-mod on three panels this year. As per usual, I'm on a campaign to get everyone to take panel notes in sharable Google Docs and used my modding powers to make this happen! So, instead of trying to write a con report (which my brain is incapable of), I'm going to list the panel descriptions below and link to the Google Docs with the panel notes in them.

Panel Notes Escapade 2019:* Fandom Post-Slash? Mods: Aral & k8 In an era of "ships" and #pairing #tags on Tumblr and AO3, has the "slash" label lost its meaning? Same-gender pairings are as popular as ever and fans still ID pairings with a virgule between the names, but how many fans still call m/m and f/f slash or femslash? How many fans still identify as "slashers?" Traditionally, Het and slash were opposing binaries which few fans crossed. Are these barriers breaking down? What purpose has the term "slash" served? Has fandom moved past it and, if so, what does that mean? Is the Fannish Gift Economy Passé? Mods: Aral, k8, & Megan One component of the recent AO3 wank involved the idea that fanfiction authors should be allowed to solicit financial compensation through their fanwork pages. The idea of fandom as a gift economy has shaped fan activity and fandom communities for decades, and has been used as part of a justification for fanfiction's legality. But fan artists have also routinely sought compensation for their work during that same period of time, and the internet has only made that easier. Will more and more fanfiction writers also begin writing for commission, or setting up financial support subscriptions? Is the idea of the fannish gift economy becoming passé? Representation Matters But Purity Wank Sucks Mods: Aral & k8 The months of discussion during Racefail 2009 helped fandom come to a more nuanced understanding of the politics of representation. We know representation matters, we argue continually for better representation of marginalized identities in our tv shows and movies because we know that the images and stories we consume do affect us and do impact society. But calls to ban underage fic and redefining it as "pedophilia" are the worst kind of purity wank. So can we have a more nuanced conversation about underage and age differences and power imbalances that doesn't rely on denying that art can possibly affect us personally or affect society politically?

Feel free to share these notes and/or leave comments on them. (Particularly if something got mangled in translation.)

Oh man, The Sentinel.

The Sentinel was on the program at Escapade every year from 1997 to 2003 with sporadic resurgences since.

It is most famous for giving fandom the sentinel trope... and least famous for how guides do not exist.

No, seriously. There’s like one brief mention of the word ‘guide’ in canon. Blair helps Jim get a handle on things at the beginning. After that, the entire rest of the guide part of “Sentinel AUs” is pure fanon, much like Blair’s vegetarianism.

But don’t worry, it was still super soul mate-y and bonkers. Remember that time Blair died, Jim’s angst made their spirit animals merge in midair, and then Blair came back to life?

If you like size difference or just binging on old slashfic, Sentinel is the fandom for you! Once upon a time, The Sentinel had its own big archive, 852 Prospect. It has been, you guessed it, imported to AO3.

Escapade panels included:

1997 - Two Guys, One Loft... Where's the Bathroom? (Can a bright, young anthropologist teach a hard-body cop how to use his hyper senses? For work-related purposes, of course!)

1998 - Is the Fanfic Better Than the Show? (What does it say about a fandom, when there are no episodes outstanding enough to draw new fans? Why does a show so determinedly mediocre draw such a loyal (and prolific) fan base? Can a show survive on fanfic alone?) [APPARENTLY IT CAN.]

1999 - What's With All the Mush? (When fanfic seems to come in only one flavor. Given the cozy living conditions and the on screen interactions, it was perhaps inevitable that Sentinel fanfic would tend towards the mushy. But are Jim and Blair only about Shopping for Curtains? Where's the angst? Where's the torture? Is there room for variety? And where is it? )

2000 - The Sentinel by Blair Sandburg: Is there Life After Dissertation? [THERE WAS AND IT WAS CALLED HAIRCUT WANK!]

2001 - Why Can't They Do Blair Right?

2002 - Sentinel (How and why Blair Sandburg is often depicted in feminine-seeming stereotypes.) [YOU KNOW WHY]

2003 - Realism (Given the fact that The Sentinel's protagonist has canonically raised someone from the dead, what, if anything, would reasonably be considered unrealistic in TS fan fiction? Are there any plotlines that are beyond the pale, or is it open season on the laws of the universe?)

2008 - J/B Ten Years Later—Old Married Couple or Just Old News (Will The Sentinel enter the pantheon of old shows with enduring core fandoms, or will it fade away? With only one season on DVD and so many new fans saying "huh?," what can we do to keep the show's memory alive? And if you're tired of the meta, let's discuss what Jim and Blair might be doing today...)

2016 - Celebrating the Senses: The Sentinel's 20th Anniversary. Sentinel and Guide. Jaguar and Wolf. Jim and Blair. We still love 'em after 20 years, and the recent DVD release could mean a whole new wave of fans. What is it that has made this such an enduring fandom? What about the popularity of the Sentinel/Guide element in fusions? Here's a chance to revisit a perennial favorite.

2018 - Is it still the fandom you knew?

2019 - Sentinels, Sentinels Everywhere (Sentinels fusions and cross-overs. Let’s talk about the original show and how the concept lives on in almost every other TV show and Movie verse. Why does it integrate so well and are there any universes that it doesn't? How has the concept changed, grown, but it is still so easily recognizable? Is it because a major part of the Friday Programming 8 world building is done and recognizable? Or that it’s such a great spring board that the places it can take you to seem limitless?)

The Sentinel on Fanlore

The Sentinel on AO3

The Wild Wild West is an itty-bitty fandom dear to my heart. WWW is a 60s spy-fi show and a steampunk Western. If you’ve seen any Westerns with souped-up trains or ridiculous technology, they were likely inspired by this one. In particular, The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr. riffs heavily off of it.

Jim West and Artemus Gordon are two secret agents who travel the country in their steampunk train. Artemus is a master of disguise. Jim is the hottie who engages in fisticuffs.

It was later remade as that movie with Will Smith, which I very much enjoyed in the theater, not knowing it was based on anything. I suspect I wouldn’t like it as much now, but for the person who once announced at Escapade that it would be unrealistic to have a black federal agent, allow me to remind you of that time they tried to hire Sammy Davis Jr. to be their federal agent coworker:

Yeah, a real fan would have remembered that. ;P

Anyway, WWW has cropped up a few times in Escapade panels:

1994 - Outdumbing James Bond: Spy Shows of the 60s, led by Colleen and Nicole, "Man from U.N.C.L.E., Wild Wild West, I Spy, Get Smart: Are silly action plots easier to write? Less fun to read?"

1995 - Wild Wild West minipanel (aka Deejay pimps WWW)

1996 - The Wild Wild West (A TV series that could never have been made without modern, stretch fabric and Bob Conrad's butt! And there were other things to like, too!)

Never has there been a more trenchant description of WWW!

Will Smith actually is a terrible casting choice, but not because he’s black: While very pretty, he does not have the bubble butt of his generation, and thus is no James West.

The true star of the show was not Jim or Arte: it was Jim West’s ass.

That’s what happens when stuntmen become leading men, I guess!

The movie is also The Literal Worst for using a boring one-episode villain from the show (the disabled Confederate colonel) but naming him after the show’s recurring villain, Dr. Loveless, a dwarf who wants to turn California into a preserve for animals and abused children... by murdering the shit out of everyone with mad science! He enjoys Robin Hood cosplay, singing duets with his girlfriend Antoinette, and obsessing over Jim West.

Loveless is not only one of the iconic TV villains of the 60s but also a landmark roll for dwarf actors. I like him best for how he leered at Jim. And kidnapped him. And locked him in a cage.

WWW has a small amount of fic online, some of it best accessed via the Wayback Machine, and a few vids. Most representative of the series is Jackie Kjono’s Stand By Your Man. It’s about... well... bondage.

Look, I know everyone thinks that that old 1960s Batman is hilariously kinky, and they’re not wrong, but it’s not because Batman itself is like that: a lot of 60s shows are just really, really, really kinky. Wild Wild West leaves Batman in the dust.

I have also made a vid of WWW. Talitha saw this at Vividcon and was like: “It’s weird: you don’t normally make sad vids.” And I was like: “No, no, those are the same two guys. Every single part is the same two guys.” Because if there’s one thing the show does almost as often as having Jim get tied to a bed by villains, it’s “killing” either Jim or Arte!

Badtouch and fake death! My kinda show!

More recent, online WWW slash fandom was on Sin and Salvation, a yahoo group. (Thanks for nothing, Verizon!) I enjoyed some of the fics on their now defunct website, available via wayback machine.

WWW on Fanlore

WWW on AO3

WWW on FFN

Smallville is a show so gay that its Television Without Pity recapper popularized the term hoyay.*

Even in the sea of accidentally homoerotic superhero media, this show is a shining beacon of No, really, guys, what did you think you were filming?!

Look: this is not fandom’s fault. Check out this kinky shit they used for the season 1 poster:

With an ad campaign out of softcore bondage porn, it’s no surprise that Smallville instantly gained a huge and kinky slash fandom. Season 1 really was The Good Shit.

Early Smallville was also a classic example of the dangers of rule of cool plotting and of casting a guy who has chemistry with a wall as your villain.

Wouldn’t it be cool if Clark and Lex used to be best friends?

Of course it would! And look how sad Lex is and how hard he’s trying in season 1... And how much of a complete choad Jonathan Kent is being... And how much it makes no goddamn sense that this Lex would end up like normal Superman canon Lex. Would Clark really have a future “rift” with this Lex? Who even wants to see that? Boo!

Look, they cast the model with one facial expression as the hero and the super charismatic guy as the villain.

They have only themselves to blame.

Early in the show’s run, this led to an epic mountain of Clex fic. (Also the acceptance of a ship smooshname in a part of fandom that normally disliked them at the time!)

Later it led to the single greatest vid in the history of fanvidding...

Nay, the single greatest piece of video art ever produced by humanity!

As we said at Vividcon vid review: “I think I read that fic!”

Luckily, today, you can go hunting for your mpreg and Rift, What Rift fics on AO3 because the Smallville Slash Archive was imported in 2012.

Past Escapade panels include:

2002 - Smallville Episodes

2003 - Secrets and Superpowers (Metaphors for closeted homosexuality? Is X-ray vision a metaphor for gaydar? Is Roger Nixon of The Inquisitor really threatening to "out' Clark Kent? Is (he emergence of the heroic secret identity over the last century or two a barometer for public tolerance of gays? Secrets and power and superpowers: who's got what, who knows what, who's trying to figure it all out. Come chat about weaknesses and strengths and confidences: the ins and outs of the gayest little town in Kansas.)

2004 - Too Good to Be True: Meaning of Lies in Smallville (Clark's every gesture is a lie, yet he is the ideal of goodness. How much do we distrust our own ability to tell good from bad? The Christ symbolism of Superboy was introduced in episode one; are we convinced our saviors are doomed if they reveal themselves to us?)

2005 - Turning the Myth on Its Head (Are the writers turning the Superman Myth on its head? Is there a chance for Lex and Clark to retain their friendship and/or for Lex to be the hero?)

Smallville on Fanlore

Smallville on AO3 for Clex, Clex, and more Clex

Smallville on FFN for all your late-seasons Clark/Lois needs

Probably second most popular in the history of Escapade slash con is that staple of 90s slash fandom, Highlander: The Series.

Highlander was, in many ways, the perfect fandom: tons of fodder for a couple of big ships that kept it active but also lots of other characters and worldbuilding to explore when you wanted variety.

It shot half the year in Vancouver and half in Paris where gorgeous historical monuments added a shitton of production value you won’t find in most genre shows of the era. The combat was also a cut above: most of these actors know what they’re doing with a sword, and it really shows.

The soundtrack is by Queen, guys, oh my god.

Seriously, if you ever think about checking out oldschool fandoms, Highlander is the one to pick!

All those hot men menacing each other with the cutlery launched a thousand slash fics. Once Methos, sometime wimpy researcher, sometime suuuuper evil world conqueror, was introduced, you could hear the sucking vacuum sound as slash fans vacated every other fandom of the day. There’s a Lord Byron episode where he takes Polidori’s role and lounges in frilly period clothing, for fuck sake! 

There are a million rarer character ships too, including one with that guy who played Krycek on the X-Files. (Shut up: he’s great!)

You wouldn’t know it from looking at AO3 today, but this was also a huge fandom for het, both with canon women and OFCs. Amanda, immortal thief and all around pain in the ass (Cf. that photo above of her pulling an arrow out of MacLeod’s butt) was a particular favorite even within slash fandom, inspiring the lulzy comment: “That’s not het: that’s Amanda”.

If you think I maybe ship the Duncan/Methos/Amanda OT3, you’d be exactly right. This was one of the earliest big OT3s I saw in fandom and one that set the classic pattern of slightly uptight cinnamon roll moral center/2 morally gray troublemakers that I’ve seen repeated a thousand times since.

(A pause for all of the Duncan fans to hotly contest the idea that he was ever uptight.)

I can think of no better introduction to the series than Killa’s awesome vid from Escapade 2015, Let the Day Begin.

On AO3 here.

I too tried my hand at vidding it a while back, though in a more... um... irreverent vein.

Another interesting thing about Highlander is that it’s one of the only (and earliest) times I can remember fandom thirsting for a visibly disabled character. Silver fox Joe Dawson is a double amputee and subject of a lot of horny fics.

The actor lost his legs in a car accident, the character in a suitably melodramatic war experience that led him to being a Watcher--yes, this is the same cheesy fun as Anne Rice or Buffy Watchers, and MacLeod becoming besties with his stalker is one of my favorite parts of the series.

The fact that Methos, world’s oldest immortal and super badass warrior, is currently hiding out as a dorky researcher for them and is also Joe’s buddy makes it even better. Joe runs a cool bookstore in Paris as his cover, as if we needed more reasons to lust after him! 

Unlike many fandoms of yore, Highlander is still going strong. Its holiday exchange, HLH Shortcuts still runs every year. It’s nothing like the juggernaut it once was, but new fanworks still regularly appear on AO3.

Highlander on Fanlore

Highlander on AO3

I watched Babylon 5 starting with the pilot film and all those goofy actor interviews that accompanied it. I loved the pilot and was sorry the further the show strayed from it. I was so pissed about Michael O'Hare leaving that I quit the show after season 1. Joke’s on me because, for once, it wasn’t executive meddling or even an actor getting too big for their britches and wanting to do film: O’Hare had serious mental health problems he asked be kept private until after his death. Fans finally found out the real story in 2013.

My fondest memories are of Susan Ivanova, who would be serious queer girl bait anyway, but who also turned out to be in a canon relationship with Talia Winters.

Post series, the pairing of rival diplomats Londo and G’Kar also saw some fannish interest. They were bickering rivals at the beginning of the show, but the subjects of epic, galactic tragedy by the end. Also, Londo has six prehensile penises, which he uses to cheat at cards.

I am not making this up.

Six prehensile penises.

Uses dick to cheat at cards.

Xeno fans take note: Babylon 5 really went all out on the worldbuilding, and that includes wacky alien junk--but also religions, philosophy, wonderful costumes, and the kind of arc plots that wouldn’t become the norm until at least a decade later. (Overall, I think the epicness of canon was of more interest to B5 fans than shipping was, much of the time, but these are posts about Escapade and slash, so...)

The show’s fandom was interesting because it was an early one to be hugely active online. This was an era when showrunners were intrigued by the possibilities of online engagement and some made themselves available in a way we wouldn’t see again until the Twitter era. JMS, the creator of B5, was all over the fan spaces, which meant that fanfic was often suppressed due to the then popular belief that to see it risked a lawsuit for the showrunner. I do not regard this as a positive thing myself, but it’s certainly interesting from a fandom history perspective.

I’ve never read any B5 fic myself, not knowing like 90% of the canon it would be based on, but I very much enjoyed the festivid by thingswithwings, available on AO3 here. It follows Londo and G’Kar’s epic arcs. Heavy stuff!

The pilot movie aired a couple of weeks after Escapade 1993, so it wasn’t until the next year that it got a panel. It would continue to be popular for the run of the show:

1994 - New SF/Adventure Shows, Open Discussion: Babylon 5, Viper, The New Knight Rider, Tek Wars, Time Trax, SeaQuest DSV. (Programmers are putting a bunch of new shows out there with a stunning variation in quality. Let's gab, shout, pimp for your favorite show.)

1995 - Resurgence of SF on TV (X-Files, Lois & Clark, Highlander, Babylon 5, TekWar, Earth 2, ST: Deep Space 9 & Voyager and gobs more. Where are they all coming from? Are they giving us what we want?)

1996 - Babylon 5 (With all that's going on, is slash irrelevant?)

1997 - Babylon 5: Spider Queen or Cinderella (Is there more to the Delenn-Sheridan relationship than meets the eye? B5 is one of the best plotted shows on TV and JMS can be very guilty of misdirection. Are there some dark sides to our heroic characters that we haven't thought about? Do some of the dark characters have silver linings?)

1998 - Babylon 5: Narrative Truth and Chances for Slash (B5 gave us slash. But was it the slash we wanted? Or are we still bending a universe that prides itself on its own self-awareness?)

1999 - Homoerotic Subtext in Popular Action Adventure TV Show (This Celluloid Closet style academic paper examines the subtext in Babylon 5, The Sentinel, and Highlander the Series. Shows like Will and Grace think they're blazing a trail, but B5, TS and HL deliver the goodies (if you know what to look for.) Highlights and analysis of some of great slashy moments.)

B5 on Fanlore

Susan/Talia on Fanlore

B5 on Pink Rabbit Consortium

B5 on Passion & Perfection

B5 on AO3