Fannish End of the Year Meme 2024
9 Jan 2025 06:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thisbluespiritI actually managed to do this meme this year! I haven't got more than partway through it since about 2021, which I do regret, but here we are, I've been chipping away at this for a week or so:
Your main fandom of the year?:
Doctor Who, as ever. Not that I don't run off to flail at least briefly about many other deeply obscure things every other day, communicating my enthusiasms to the distant and patient sympathy of the flist by means of semaphore or something, but that only feels fannish if someone responds, and that can't be expected very often.
Your favorite film watched this year?:
Out of those I watched for the first time - Dean Spanley (2008). I watched quite a few that were also very good, but retrospectively, this was the one that stayed in my mind the most, and it was such a mix of grieving and whimsy and so beautifully observed. Sometimes working your way through someone's CV throws up a gem you'd never have found otherwise, and this was absolutely one of those instances.
Other highlights were Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Amongst Thieves (2023) which was great fun and actually from this decade, amazing, look at me; Amistad (1997), Happy, Texas (1999), & Stardust (2007) - all excellent in mostly very different ways.
With honorable mentions to Mimic (1997), Little Shop Around the Corner (1940), The Cruel Sea (1953) & The Statement (2003)
Your favorite book read this year?
Golden Witchbreed by Mary Gentle. I also then read Ash by her, which was in many ways even more of a feat, but GW was pretty much everything I wanted in a SF novel and I enjoyed it so much and it was so beautifully written and weird.
Plus, The Empire of Sand by Tasha Suri, another SFF book I also really enjoyed.
Plus, I got to a point in the Chronicles of St Mary series, where I could obtain the first short story collection, The Long and the Short of It by Jodi Taylor, which was great fun.
Your favorite TV show of the year?
Doctor Who came back! And it was good! \o/
Plus, The Traitors (UK S2) gripped me ridiculously while it was on. I discovered another cosy crime series, McDonald & Dodds, which I enjoyed, although obv not as much as Sister Boniface Mysteries S3.
A House Through Time came back at last, and I watched it too fast.
And while I haven't finished it yet, I'm 3/4s of the way through, so also the v impressive (so far) Jewel in the Crown.
Oh, and in the summer when I was awful, I had a month of Netflix, so I finally watched Bridgerton s1-3, Queen Charlotte & S6 of Lucifer which were all fun in different ways. (Probably s2 of Bridgerton was my favourite out of all four of those.)
And panel shows, like Taskmaster and HIGNFY, which I forget to say. HIGNFY probably outdid TM this year, though, although Junior TM and the New Year's Treat were pretty great.
I've watched less TV this year - a bit less watching overall - with a fair bit of NF in the mix, and more films. It just has seemed to switch over a bit lately, but I think I'm back into TV working better again, which is always good.
Your favourite audio drama of the year? <-- I added this in!
Not quite as stellar as 2023, where I continued to work my way through an amazing abundance of Martin Jarvis Saturday Night Theatre plays, Craddock & Co and the amazing Vivat Rex and then finished up with the Christmas at the Wells plays, but it was definitely more exciting than most of my TV.
Probably Hamlet (1971) & its paired 1978 Rosencrantz & Guildernstern Are Dead, which was Martin Jarvis's fault again, but it was pretty awesome. I must listen to more radio Shakespeare sometime, because it does seem to work very well for me - if I know the play, and if it's good. If it also has a favourite actor in, even better, of course!
Then Dangerous Corner (SNT 1980, Martin Jarvis again) really ate my brain and I had to go find a version of Time and the Conways to listen to as well, but more about that below.
The Twelve Maidens (1971) suddenly turning up on BBC Sounds was amazing and I enjoyed it very much. I'll have to relisten to it sometime.
Guards! Guards! was a really lovely adaptation. I ended up listening to bits of it all over again when somebody repeated it in the slot after The Twelve Maidens, because evidently the BBC had been missing having a solid hour of Martin Jarvis on once a week or something.
I also listened to some other really nice things - The Warden, which had Alec McCowen as the titular character (and David Collings in the mix), Pilgrim, which I'm still working my way through and enjoying in a quieter way - The Flare Path as my favourite radio Rattigan so far, despite starring nobody I know at all (although I also did enjoy While the Sun Shines!)
BFA's The Five Companions was fun, and I finished up the year by relistening to the Christmas at the Wells play The Schoolmistress which still made me laugh all the way through. And, of course, I was relistening to Bleak Expectations, which remains amazing, talking of things that make me laugh all the way through. <3
Honourable mention to Crown House which was maybe not exactly good, but it had a wonderful cast and I was entertained waiting for it to sort itself out and allow Richard Pasco to do something that wasn't gardening. Martin Jarvis was a bounder and Jane Asher gave him what for. It & Crown Papers are now up on the Internet Archive and I'm almost tempted to listen to CP a bit, at least to hear Richard (Martin Jarvis's character) get murdered, but also they recast almost every single person, because clearly the cast were with me on it not being the best radio serial in the world. So, yeah. I think I should continue to resist that temptation.
Your best new fandom discovery of the year?
I mean, I don't think that I did really get into anything fannishly, not that much, not that was new as such. I suppose I did write for Dean Spanley?
Oh, and, actually, yes Dangerous Corner (BBC Radio 1980) which led me into J. B. Priestley's Time Plays and their relationship to Sapphire & Steel, except I then only did Time and the Conways after and got distracted, so I still need to hunt down some of the others. Dangerous Corner did get into my head, though, more than T&tC, but T&tC had the OMG this is where S&S came from quote that I picked out even before I stumbled over the PJ Hammond interview than confirmed it was a big influence on the show.
(There is, btw, a BBC TV play of Dangerous Corner from 1983 on YT, which has Anthony Valentine in it. I haven't finished watching that one, because I mostly just marked it so I could go back after it'd had been a while since the radio one, but the play is very cool! And there are two different BBC radio versions up all over the place, too.)
Oh, and I am still pursuing more Rattigan plays, because it was really about time. But I can't claim to have discovered him in 2024. More like 1993. I'm just slow sometimes.
Your biggest fandom disappointment of the year?
I think that I do get further and further out of touch with the new things - I did get Netflix, but with streaming, you have it for one month, and that's fine for watching, but it's no good for being fannish about things, and so much else is just out of reach entirely for one reason or another, either because of my limitations with the illness, or the platform or medium or whatever.
But. Let's not be gloomy. There is Doctor Who! \o/
Your fandom girlfriend of the year?
There does seem to have been a lot of Shelley Conn in my viewing*, and even in one radio thing (Body Horror, in which she was doing her past to make herself immortal by body transplants), but I don't think any of it crept into anything fandom related.
* I don't know why I say this as if it was an accident, when it was absolutely on purpose.
Your fandom boyfriend of the year?
Look, it's always James Maxwell now. No other man will do, none have such unique pointy noses! He is best blorbo. But in terms of 2024, even though I did scrounge one new-to-me remaining fragment of JM via YT, it was Jeremy Northam if it was anyone, which, if we take my Yuletide efforts into account, I suppose it must have been.
Although, I hadn't realised I was still listening to quite so much Martin Jarvis on the radio for the first part of this year, so maybe he was a contender too.
Your biggest squee moment of the year?
When I fell off my bed in the middle of my afternoon rest because I looked at BBC Sounds and found The Twelve Maidens on it, just, like casually, right then somehow, even though last I knew it was probably part missing and had never been repeated since 1971. (Asksovay because I was so excited I tried to comment on Dreamwidth at them using my phone.)
A whole new season of Doctor Who and I really enjoyed it, and not just very isolated bits of itthat weren't written by Chris Chibnall and that's lovely to be able to say again. I remain wary of RTD, but I do love Fifteen, loved Ruby Sunday, and I hope I'll love the new companion.
The most missed of your old fandoms?
I still pine for Spooks. There's been a minor uptake on tumblr, perhaps because it's now on the BBC iPlayer, so every so often my Ruth gifsets are reblogged by new people who have discovered it and then fall in love with her like everyone else. And then I pine.
The fandom you haven't tried yet, but want to?
idk, every time I hear about something that sounds good it's on a platform I can't have, available by no method I can manage, and it's been cancelled already anyway. Or it was actually on TV, but not on the BBC and I missed it and the catch up services has unskippable ads or whatever. I am intrigued by the sound of Slow Horses and Kaos, but well. Do not hold your breath. I am entitled to a free month of Amazon Prime again, so if I can work myself up to it, I might be able to watch The Rings of Power, possibly. But idk if I can work myself up to it. It depends how the year goes. Maybe in summer.
Your biggest fan anticipations for the coming year?
Next season of Doctor Who!
And, who knows, maybe Talking Pictures TV will decide to show some exciting archive TV or something. (They haven't found any more of The Hidden Truth yet, unsurprisingly, but since I don't think I did this meme for that year, I should record that that was my fannish event of this decade so far, and I think the only thing that could beat it would be similar unexpected James Maxwell findings. So I can't really complain about being out of touch, I'm just wilfully going in the wrong direction for my entertainment.)
And maybe BBC Sounds will just magically repeat that version of Lord Savile's Crime from 1992 that stars Jeremy Northam, or whatever it was that I was curious about that somehow starred Honor Blackman and Shelley Conn.
More likely, they'll just present me with some more Martin Jarvis, because that does seem to be the law of BBC Radio in any decade, but, hey, I would take that, too.
Your main fandom of the year?:
Doctor Who, as ever. Not that I don't run off to flail at least briefly about many other deeply obscure things every other day, communicating my enthusiasms to the distant and patient sympathy of the flist by means of semaphore or something, but that only feels fannish if someone responds, and that can't be expected very often.
Your favorite film watched this year?:
Out of those I watched for the first time - Dean Spanley (2008). I watched quite a few that were also very good, but retrospectively, this was the one that stayed in my mind the most, and it was such a mix of grieving and whimsy and so beautifully observed. Sometimes working your way through someone's CV throws up a gem you'd never have found otherwise, and this was absolutely one of those instances.
Other highlights were Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Amongst Thieves (2023) which was great fun and actually from this decade, amazing, look at me; Amistad (1997), Happy, Texas (1999), & Stardust (2007) - all excellent in mostly very different ways.
With honorable mentions to Mimic (1997), Little Shop Around the Corner (1940), The Cruel Sea (1953) & The Statement (2003)
Your favorite book read this year?
Golden Witchbreed by Mary Gentle. I also then read Ash by her, which was in many ways even more of a feat, but GW was pretty much everything I wanted in a SF novel and I enjoyed it so much and it was so beautifully written and weird.
Plus, The Empire of Sand by Tasha Suri, another SFF book I also really enjoyed.
Plus, I got to a point in the Chronicles of St Mary series, where I could obtain the first short story collection, The Long and the Short of It by Jodi Taylor, which was great fun.
Your favorite TV show of the year?
Doctor Who came back! And it was good! \o/
Plus, The Traitors (UK S2) gripped me ridiculously while it was on. I discovered another cosy crime series, McDonald & Dodds, which I enjoyed, although obv not as much as Sister Boniface Mysteries S3.
A House Through Time came back at last, and I watched it too fast.
And while I haven't finished it yet, I'm 3/4s of the way through, so also the v impressive (so far) Jewel in the Crown.
Oh, and in the summer when I was awful, I had a month of Netflix, so I finally watched Bridgerton s1-3, Queen Charlotte & S6 of Lucifer which were all fun in different ways. (Probably s2 of Bridgerton was my favourite out of all four of those.)
And panel shows, like Taskmaster and HIGNFY, which I forget to say. HIGNFY probably outdid TM this year, though, although Junior TM and the New Year's Treat were pretty great.
I've watched less TV this year - a bit less watching overall - with a fair bit of NF in the mix, and more films. It just has seemed to switch over a bit lately, but I think I'm back into TV working better again, which is always good.
Your favourite audio drama of the year? <-- I added this in!
Not quite as stellar as 2023, where I continued to work my way through an amazing abundance of Martin Jarvis Saturday Night Theatre plays, Craddock & Co and the amazing Vivat Rex and then finished up with the Christmas at the Wells plays, but it was definitely more exciting than most of my TV.
Probably Hamlet (1971) & its paired 1978 Rosencrantz & Guildernstern Are Dead, which was Martin Jarvis's fault again, but it was pretty awesome. I must listen to more radio Shakespeare sometime, because it does seem to work very well for me - if I know the play, and if it's good. If it also has a favourite actor in, even better, of course!
Then Dangerous Corner (SNT 1980, Martin Jarvis again) really ate my brain and I had to go find a version of Time and the Conways to listen to as well, but more about that below.
The Twelve Maidens (1971) suddenly turning up on BBC Sounds was amazing and I enjoyed it very much. I'll have to relisten to it sometime.
Guards! Guards! was a really lovely adaptation. I ended up listening to bits of it all over again when somebody repeated it in the slot after The Twelve Maidens, because evidently the BBC had been missing having a solid hour of Martin Jarvis on once a week or something.
I also listened to some other really nice things - The Warden, which had Alec McCowen as the titular character (and David Collings in the mix), Pilgrim, which I'm still working my way through and enjoying in a quieter way - The Flare Path as my favourite radio Rattigan so far, despite starring nobody I know at all (although I also did enjoy While the Sun Shines!)
BFA's The Five Companions was fun, and I finished up the year by relistening to the Christmas at the Wells play The Schoolmistress which still made me laugh all the way through. And, of course, I was relistening to Bleak Expectations, which remains amazing, talking of things that make me laugh all the way through. <3
Honourable mention to Crown House which was maybe not exactly good, but it had a wonderful cast and I was entertained waiting for it to sort itself out and allow Richard Pasco to do something that wasn't gardening. Martin Jarvis was a bounder and Jane Asher gave him what for. It & Crown Papers are now up on the Internet Archive and I'm almost tempted to listen to CP a bit, at least to hear Richard (Martin Jarvis's character) get murdered, but also they recast almost every single person, because clearly the cast were with me on it not being the best radio serial in the world. So, yeah. I think I should continue to resist that temptation.
Your best new fandom discovery of the year?
I mean, I don't think that I did really get into anything fannishly, not that much, not that was new as such. I suppose I did write for Dean Spanley?
Oh, and, actually, yes Dangerous Corner (BBC Radio 1980) which led me into J. B. Priestley's Time Plays and their relationship to Sapphire & Steel, except I then only did Time and the Conways after and got distracted, so I still need to hunt down some of the others. Dangerous Corner did get into my head, though, more than T&tC, but T&tC had the OMG this is where S&S came from quote that I picked out even before I stumbled over the PJ Hammond interview than confirmed it was a big influence on the show.
(There is, btw, a BBC TV play of Dangerous Corner from 1983 on YT, which has Anthony Valentine in it. I haven't finished watching that one, because I mostly just marked it so I could go back after it'd had been a while since the radio one, but the play is very cool! And there are two different BBC radio versions up all over the place, too.)
Oh, and I am still pursuing more Rattigan plays, because it was really about time. But I can't claim to have discovered him in 2024. More like 1993. I'm just slow sometimes.
Your biggest fandom disappointment of the year?
I think that I do get further and further out of touch with the new things - I did get Netflix, but with streaming, you have it for one month, and that's fine for watching, but it's no good for being fannish about things, and so much else is just out of reach entirely for one reason or another, either because of my limitations with the illness, or the platform or medium or whatever.
But. Let's not be gloomy. There is Doctor Who! \o/
Your fandom girlfriend of the year?
There does seem to have been a lot of Shelley Conn in my viewing*, and even in one radio thing (Body Horror, in which she was doing her past to make herself immortal by body transplants), but I don't think any of it crept into anything fandom related.
* I don't know why I say this as if it was an accident, when it was absolutely on purpose.
Your fandom boyfriend of the year?
Look, it's always James Maxwell now. No other man will do, none have such unique pointy noses! He is best blorbo. But in terms of 2024, even though I did scrounge one new-to-me remaining fragment of JM via YT, it was Jeremy Northam if it was anyone, which, if we take my Yuletide efforts into account, I suppose it must have been.
Although, I hadn't realised I was still listening to quite so much Martin Jarvis on the radio for the first part of this year, so maybe he was a contender too.
Your biggest squee moment of the year?
When I fell off my bed in the middle of my afternoon rest because I looked at BBC Sounds and found The Twelve Maidens on it, just, like casually, right then somehow, even though last I knew it was probably part missing and had never been repeated since 1971. (Ask
sovay because I was so excited I tried to comment on Dreamwidth at them using my phone.)A whole new season of Doctor Who and I really enjoyed it, and not just very isolated bits of it
The most missed of your old fandoms?
I still pine for Spooks. There's been a minor uptake on tumblr, perhaps because it's now on the BBC iPlayer, so every so often my Ruth gifsets are reblogged by new people who have discovered it and then fall in love with her like everyone else. And then I pine.
The fandom you haven't tried yet, but want to?
idk, every time I hear about something that sounds good it's on a platform I can't have, available by no method I can manage, and it's been cancelled already anyway. Or it was actually on TV, but not on the BBC and I missed it and the catch up services has unskippable ads or whatever. I am intrigued by the sound of Slow Horses and Kaos, but well. Do not hold your breath. I am entitled to a free month of Amazon Prime again, so if I can work myself up to it, I might be able to watch The Rings of Power, possibly. But idk if I can work myself up to it. It depends how the year goes. Maybe in summer.
Your biggest fan anticipations for the coming year?
Next season of Doctor Who!
And, who knows, maybe Talking Pictures TV will decide to show some exciting archive TV or something. (They haven't found any more of The Hidden Truth yet, unsurprisingly, but since I don't think I did this meme for that year, I should record that that was my fannish event of this decade so far, and I think the only thing that could beat it would be similar unexpected James Maxwell findings. So I can't really complain about being out of touch, I'm just wilfully going in the wrong direction for my entertainment.)
And maybe BBC Sounds will just magically repeat that version of Lord Savile's Crime from 1992 that stars Jeremy Northam, or whatever it was that I was curious about that somehow starred Honor Blackman and Shelley Conn.
More likely, they'll just present me with some more Martin Jarvis, because that does seem to be the law of BBC Radio in any decade, but, hey, I would take that, too.
no subject
Date: 12 Jan 2025 02:23 pm (UTC)I'd blame all the DW serials called The[something] of the Daleks for ruining your memory, because that's what I do XD
no subject
Date: 12 Jan 2025 06:09 pm (UTC)