On Reader-Insert Fanfiction in The Mandalorian fandom (a meta i suppose)
Recently there has been discussion about Reader-Insert Fanfic, especially within the The Mandalorian fandom. Some had expressed their displeasure about how Reader-Insert Fanfic made up the majority of the fanfics this fandomĀ while other people defended Reader-Insert Fic and their authors. I personally have a neutral stance on Reader-Insert Fic in general and in The Mandalorian fandom in particular. I read some of them but I had also read plenty of non-Reader-Insert fic. And in the end, I donāt like or dislike them more or less than any other type of fanfic out there.Ā However, I wrote this meta to talk about how having Reader-Insert Fanfic to be the majority in The Mandalorian fandom is actually a natural progress. That there are reasons for why people wrote so many of the same type of fanfic, instead of any other type, for any other ships within the show. I will be comparing and contrast with other fandoms here, mainly One Piece, to show my points. (Disclaimer: Iām not a native english speaker so I will make mistakes here and there so please bare with me. Thank you.) We all know shipping is an important part of fandom especially on Tumblr. I had participated in numerous fandoms through out my life on many platforms (forums of the old ages, message boards, discussion chat rooms, Tumblr, Facebook groups, Reddit, Twitter,ā¦ etc) and I observed that shipping is always a crucial part of a fandom but it is on Tumblr that shipping (and shippers) are common business. In comparison to Reddit or Facebook groups where it is quite rare for people to mention ships or shipping in general. Maybe only once or twice would I read about these topics on those platforms. While on Tumblr, making fanarts, headcanons and writting fanfic for ships are always happening. First, shipping in The Mandalorian is not of the usual kind. This is because the main relationship portrayed in the show is not of the romantic variety but of the parental kind. Din Djarin, the titular character who made up most of the screentime and very much our protagonist, had no real love interest. In canon he only briefly had hints of romantic interest with one particular character that was Omera from S01E4: Sanctuary. You can even argue with me on this part that he might not have any romantic interest in her at all because the show had only vague gestures that tell us about his feeling toward others (beside Grogu). Then Omera disappeared and had yet to returned to the show while Din met various other characters, allies and enemies, since then. However the new characters themselves never showed more than platonic interaction with our protagonist. It is a breath of fresh air to have our main character exist without forcing a romantic relationship just for the sake of it. However, in the fandom side, this brought up problems, mainly: So now who and what should we be shipping ? Beside Din and Groguās paternal love, there are only the Frog Lady and her husband who is in a relationship of any kind or show any gestures of romance at all. But we all know: there must be a ship or two for the fandom to gush about.Ā That being said, when thereās a will, thereās a way. And in The Mandalorianās case, it is Reader-Insert Fanfic. Here I want to make a comparison with One Piece. One Piece is a manga that was also heavily averse to romance. Instead the āRomanceā that is featured in the series are the āLove for adventureā with the author outright saying the only thing that most of the main characters love is 'Adventureā in the literal sense and figurative sense. The fandom for One Piece then came to the same problem: there are no real ships in this manga to talk/be fannish about (Iām not talking about ship that actually sail on actual water like Going Merry or Thousand Funny). So for a long period of time, the One Piece section on either fanfiction.net or AO3 had most of their fics to be Reader-Insert or Original Characters shipped with canon characters. This problem had faced other fandom before. I will be mentioning another example here, which is very cursed but bare with me: the Onceler fandom. It will be too long to explain if you are not familiar with what went down with that fandom so read this [https://madredhattie.tumblr.com/post/110111848841/what-was-the-onceler-fandom] or search the name on youtube because there are videos about it. Long story short, it is evident that when a series or piece of media had no to very little romantic prospect, the fan wonāt be writting non-shipping pieces. Instead, they will either start writting Reader-Insert or OCs fic or invent ships out of thin air to write about. It is just fandomās nature at this point, especially on Tumblr, given its preference to ships and shipping compare to other fandom platform. Secondly, there are chances that just because Reader-Insert fic are popular in the The Mandalorian fandom now does not mean it will always be like that. To make my case, I will point to One Piece again. One Piece currently by the time Iām writting this has over 1000 manga chapters and more than 900 anime episodes. Yes, even by manga standard (if you are unfamiliar) that is huge and crazy. The amount of characters that had appeared in the manga are in the hundreds as well. This length also meant the main casts of characters had a lot of screen time together, where they had a lot of interactions for the shippers to look into. And by now, in the One Piece fandom, a few ships had emerged to be popular enough despite the authorās lack of canonical evident of any romantic feelings between the characters themselves. In comparison, The Mandalorian currently ended its season 2 with only eight episodes. Despite being great television that show us quality is better than quantity, this meant the screen time for characters to interacts is still limited. The shippers thus have quite little material to work with. Of course fandom power to breath new life to limited canon material is powerful. Especially within the Star Wars fandom who themselves had partook in the building and expanding of the franchise instead of just George Lucas and his writting staff or the people who made the movies. So, with new seasons on the horizon, The Mandalorian can have new materials to fuel ships (of any kind). It is possible that one day, a ship or two will become dominant enough that Self-Reader Fanfic is not the majority. Thirdly, I believe another reason why Self-Reader fic in this fandom is currently popular is because it is a live-action. Live-action starring real people with real faces and voices to look at instead of animated lend itself a nudge to make Reader-Insert Fanfic. Compare to One Piece which is a manga and anime, where OCs fic are more prevalent than Reader-Insert. Lastly, which is not an analysis from me but more of just a hunch, I think The Mandalorian is an gateway fandom. Which meant it serve as a gateway to fandom for people who had never been in one before (in general) and never got into Star Wars (in particular). And gateway fandom are often chock full of Reader-Insert fanfic. The comparison is Harry Potter. It is my gateway fandom and even with canon ships, the amount of Reader-Insert and OCs fic are high. In the end, I just want to say: it is natural for the Mandalorian to have a lot of Self-Insert fanfic shrugĀ .
Great analysis here.
Iām wondering if another reason weāre seeing so much reader-insert with Mando is its timing with a plague that has severely limited our real-life, in-person interactions with other people simply to survive. Authors and readers are making up for the deficit with the type of fiction that most easy replaces whatās been lost in real life. Self/reader insert has rubbed me the wrong way for a lot of reasons that maybe Iāll write about later, but Iām feeling a bit more forgiving about it in light of current events.
I agree that the plague does play a role as well but I can not put it in my meta post because I donāt think I have good enough evidence for this point. Thanks for reading !
