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# "I'm a Fan, I Just Don't Like Fandoms"
- URL: https://elder-nerd-press.ghost.io/im-a-fan-i-just-dont-like-fandoms/
- Published: 2026-08-01T15:00:09.000Z
- Updated: 2026-08-01T15:00:09.000Z
- Description: Fandom isn't what it used to be. Or is it?
- Author: The Dice Guru

Being in my 30s, or an Old Man in "internet years," I have seen many different eras of pop culture and internet discourse. I recognize that the stuff I grew up with, hell the very environment in which I enjoyed that stuff, is completely alien to the younger generation.

As such, my perspective and takes on more recent creative works and how they are discussed and dissected can be unusual to the more online generation.

Case in point, I have begun to adopt a simple phrase when it comes to getting into any more recent work, be it a movie, TV show, or videogame.

"I'm a fan, I just don't like fandoms."

It's a phrase that has confused some people. In fact, I have gone through at least three drafts of this essay trying to articulate it.

Most of them started the same way. I qualified the statement that I was once proud to be in certain fandoms. Reading way too much Star Wars expanded universe novels. Living on Nintendo web forums. Getting into reading through Harry Potter. Trawling the early web animation underbelly of the 2000s that was Newgrounds. 

Like all nerds of a certain persuasion, I liked nerdy stuff, got wrapped up in the minutia of sci-fi technology, and got really weird and edgy during my adolescence. 

Then, the tone would shift to the way fandoms had changed, recontextualizing my assumption. That nerd culture had gone mainstream. An entire cottage industry of video essayists going into the weeds of a certain work. Hollywood's adaptation of nerd properties, Marvel, Star Wars, videogames, etc., leading to internalized knowledge of lore being seen as commodities than a passionate hyperfixation.

This was where I would add an implication that the start of my problem began here. People learning in seconds what took me and others years of watching and reading to do. Pretenders and tourists that knew, but didn't understand the greater context of what they were talking about. The spectacle of seeing a certain scene, character, or moment eclipsing the substance and context to which they originally appeared.

But...that kind of thought is frowned upon. It is Gatekeeping: the idea of keeping certain fanbases "pure" by way of questioning their experience with the work. The No True Scotsman argument for people who know the Konami code by heart.

Those thoughts would be tempered by how this has lead to genuinely elevated insight and criticism. Writers talking with authority on comic book movies in places like Variety and New York Times. The rise of original creative works fueled by what came before; a natural progression of all forms of art.

Then, the silver bullet would come with what fandom has become now. The corporatization of franchises and intellectual property. How companies focus-test and polish everything for the express purpose of not pissing off their fans by not challenging their tastes, beliefs, or stances in any way, leading to a calcification of work doing anything creatively new and instead bolting on meaningless fluff. 

The modern state of Star Wars just being a glorified Greatest Hits album. Disney doing live-action remakes of beloved animated classics in a cynical pursuit of more money and from the creatively bankrupt notion that animation is a lesser art. The Marvel Cinematic Universe turning into a hot mess of generic comic storyline retreads, walk-on cameos, and marketing gimmicks.The push for generative AI to just recycle and regurgitate the past.

This would expand to how modern fandoms even consume media. That massive communities that don't watch, read, or play anything, but listen to other people experience that work and take their opinions as fact. The culture war commentators saying the newest blockbuster is a psyop by Liberal Hollywood to destroy traditional masculinity. How an experimental videogame praised by the press is actually the worst thing ever and that everyone who says otherwise are actually paid actors. How a certain web series is a full on adaptation of an older sci-fi book because the creator cited it as an inspiration, therefore everything in the story that doesn't automatically come to that exact conclusion is wrong and must be shouted down.

And that would have been my definitive statement on modern fandom. I love being a fan. But modern fandom is too full of corporate creative cowardice, extremely insecure culture war grifters, loud aggressive conspiracy theorists who will send death threats to anyone who dares to get the color of a certain character's armor off by a single semitone, or younger people mindlessly consuming homogenized AI summaries who have never heard of seeking extra sources, asking a follow-up question. 

That would have been the conclusion. For my own sanity, I wash my hands of fandom. I'll talk to you face-to-face about something I like, but will completely stay away from Reddit, Tumblr, and Facebook about sharing those thoughts to avoid being piled on by a deluge of aggressive accusations, stupid memes, or the same five jokes repeated on loop.

Yet here we are. Why didn't I commit to writing that? Because the more I refined that script, the more judgmental it read. That, and the infamous "Old Man Yells at Cloud" image from *The Simpsons* started flashing across my mind's eye. Generally, when that happens, it's a sign that I need to take some perspective.

I was comparing my experiences of the world, and nerd spaces, to the experiences of a younger generation. I'm a Millennial, a generation that grew up as the Internet grew to prominence. A generation that still had to consult physical books and navigate libraries for research papers and navigated the internet through personas and healthy skepticism. A generation that was told the promise of prosperity and potential, only to see the world fall apart by financial collapse, economic recession, unnecessary wars, the gutting of the public education system, the absolute devastation of the job market, the enshitification of consumer and commercial goods, and persistant, blatant institutional corruption. All of that...and the people in charge aggressively gaslighting the world into thinking we were the problem for being entitled.

That friction doesn't exist with younger generations. Social media and the internet is synonymous with personal identity. Entertainment and engagement through shorts, social media posts, and fan compendia is just how online communication works now. Furthermore, as certain pundits have observed, Gen Z are deeply afraid, and in some cases [completely dissasociated](https://medium.com/@reactjsbd/the-heartbreaking-reason-why-gen-z-is-checking-out-of-life-a585801cd1a8?ref=elder-nerd-press.ghost.io) from, the fact they have inherented a dying world and a broken economy. With that fear comes a variety of coping mechanisms, including diving deep into fandom and defending it like it's the final bastion of a sane world from any hostile outsiders.

The sad truth of the matter is most nerd entertainment, the pulpy and the profound, are aimed at a younger demographic; teenagers to young adults. Kids who have not gained the same breadth of knowledge and experience of the arts, humanities, and critical analysis as I do. What they see as novel or rebellious, I may see as quaint or merely amusing. What I have learned to temper with learned wisdom and academic knowledge, they lash out at with passionate invective.

I know this...because I was once like them. Ignorant to the world's various obtuse, institutional injustices. Unaware of storytelling tropes or the influence of classical plays, how they echo through every work. Oblivious to the very idea of artwork being more than just crowd-pleasing blockbusters. Clinging to the idea that if I completely internalized every single piece of obscure trivia about a comic book world, I would inherently be better than others talking about it...without realizing the vast majority of comic book nonsense was created by a mix of editorial mandates, utterly asanine creative choices, and a revolving door of writers of inconsistent quality.

Once that thought came, a lot of my other biases fell away. Despite the media landscape changing, fandom hasn't changed that much. 

Diehard gamers harrassing the makers of the *Sonic The Hedgehog* movie until they redesigned his appearance to be less nightmarish? Childish...until I remember that change lead to a trilogy of movies and a TV show spin off, and that it was collective fan outrage that kept *Star Trek* on the air. 

The *Amazing Digital Circus* community harrassing the creator on social media for her creative choices and lack of resolution behind various tertiary elements? Sounds a lot like how the fanbase of acclaimed anime, *Neon Genesis Evangelion* acted back in the day.

Which brings me back to the statement. "I'm a fan, I just don't like fandoms." I still use the term, but now with a bit more emotional honesty on my part.

It's not that fandom has changed; I've just gotten older.

But I'm still a fan.