Fandom is love, fandom is life. But when fandom stops putting out massive amounts of material, or has simply entered a break, what do the poor fans do to satiate their hunger for more? When their ultimate pair is not together, what do the poor fans do to quench their thirst for a romance that authors and/or producers have decided will not be? Of course, fans know what I'm talking about. Fanfiction, that underground universe where people subject their favorite characters to their wildest passions and fantasies, in varying levels of literary merit.
I'm far more familiar with this universe than I would usually care to admit to the public. It started -- to my immense embarrassment -- with "Hey Arnold." Yes, I mean that show from the '90s to early '00s with the fourth graders with way too much freedom and strangely shaped heads. In my defense, Helga and Arnold never got the closure they needed, and I will not be satisfied until their new movie comes out in 2017. In reading that fanfiction, however, I found some people may or may not be extremely sick in the head, or at least forgot that the characters were nine years old.
My adventures in fanfiction then continued into what might be considered even more embarrassing territory, that being One Direction. Yes, I was one of those people. I even wrote some of my own Harry Styles fanfiction. It was awful. Then, finally, when I succumbed to that little part in me that liked the idea of Dramione, Drarry, Drapple and pretty much Draco with every person and object in the series, I read "Harry Potter" fanfiction.
I believe that fanfiction writers and readers get far too bad of a reputation, which is part of the reason I admitted to my own adventures in the dark side of fandoms. No one wants to admit they read it; no one wants to admit they write it. Why? As I mentioned earlier, the stories carry varying levels of merit. Some of them are hideous and make one question the sanity of the writer (and anyone who enjoys it). Others could have been bestsellers if they were not based on an already existing series. And then, there are the ones that show potential in the writer, if they keep practicing.
Fanfiction can be an exercise for the budding author. It can be something that brings one back to a world they love, whose official tenure has ended. Fanfiction can be funny, something that brings fans together. However, above all of its merits is this simple fact: what someone chooses to write or read is no one's business but their own, and to judge it is no one's place. So pardon me while I read my Drapple fanfiction.
