[Maybe this one ain't for the main feed bc I'm not sure how much I stand behind everythink in it (drafted after a couple of pints as it was). Also I ran out if energy for making the it read nice so have my typo ridden half cooked ramblings (how long can an ask be? I know there used to he no limit for fanmail... let's find out together)]
Okay to address more directly your actual discussion question re: autistic!Q from the other replies: my thought would be that autistic!Q specifically could be an example of projecting onto the blorbos.
yes autistic stereotypes definitely definitely play a big part of this. Craig!Bond cant be autistic bc he talks to ppl and has sex. Q must be autistic bc he's awkward and works with computers. Even if this isn't the entire basis it probably at least primes the pump in a certain direction so to speak.
But I also think that a not insignificant number of people who engage in fandom are autistic, and people like to see themselves reflected in the media they consume. I am autistic, so it would be cool if [character] was also autistic. Both as an "autistic people are cool and capable and can do fun things like fictional characters" AND as a "I experience these problems as a result of being autistic and it's cathartic / helpful / interesting to process them by subjecting blorbo to them".
I think this is also the animating principle behind a lot of trans and certain race/ religion / ethnicity -bend headcanoning. Tho the latter I also think can be people trying to force inject more diversity into undiverse source material, which I do wonder if that's as much motivates by guilt: "its okay that I like [thing with exclusively white characters], I headcanon one of them as [nonwhite]" again not a bad thing in and of itself but its not like a get out of jail free card for not considering why [thing] isn't very diverse. Probably a tangental point but something I think about.
Now why this happens with with Q rather than Bond I would suggest is that Q, though depicted as peerlessly brilliant at what he does, he is somewhat more atainable/ relateable than Bond. Hes not a super fit action hero that gets all the girls and has loads of sex and performs mad stunts. He's an awkward bloke that sits behind a computer in a basement. A stereotype, to be sure, but that's a hell of a lot closer to my life than Bond's at any rate and I'm not even that computer minded a guy. Also the point I made before about him having a relatively narrow set of absolute canon characteristics due to having much less screentime, may make this kind of projection easier.
I do think it fits with one of my many "essay I will never write" half cooked theories of fandom that is certain fandoms can have sections that are very one character centric. I know yous is more of a stony person but I think about Bucky Barnes: he's shipped with a n enormous array of different characters and there are mass volumes of fanart especially that are just him, and lots of fanfic revolves very specifically around him. I would say the same thing happens to Q (hell I found some Q fanart I reblogged in like 2012 having had no interest in JB and probs not having even seen skyfall at the time, but I must have come across it bc I was obsessed with another show he was in, where the exact same thing happened ie its all very whishaw centric) (I pull on this thread a bit more below just specially from a smut angle)
This could be because Q is more relateable as stated above, however I think it has much more to do with Q fitting that 2012 tumblr sexyman energy in the vein of loki and later bucky Barnes: pasty, skinny, a bit twinky (though I don't think that was a word fangirls were using much at the time), sad, a rejection/ parallel to a much more traditionally masculine character that is presented/ expected to be more of a heartthrob to female viewers (Bond, Cap, Thor)
I think this is actually makes for quite an interesting contrast to the floppy/ submissive/ bottom Q thing which we've both waved at before. My working theory on that is that there's a canon of works that come from a place of Wanting To Fuck Q/ See Q Get Fucked (which I think is also the animating motivation behind the baviour you're describing in this post: https://www.tumblr.com/halfbaked00q/820051963166244864 , and very entangled with my above point re: Q centricity) and a canon of works that come from Wanting To Fuck James Bond/ See James Bond Get Fucked (to put my cards on the table I am NOT immune to the latter....) All while remaining firmly in the metaphorical cuck chair.
possibly you could add another axis onto this chart of Wanting To Be Fucked By James Bond and Wanting To Be Fucked By Q, which would be much closer to the above projection thing... although there's also X reader... I love to start making a point then taking myself out of it/ running out of steam and being like "what am I even trying to say here"
Anyway maybe some of this makes some kind of sense. I'm just trying to use my brain more bc I think I've genuinely low key forgotten how to draw conclusions from the media I consume....
I agree w a lot of what you have to say on this esp the first several pp, it's basically in line with my thoughts but stated more analytically and less saltily, lOL,,
(for ref- the referenced post in question)
I also mostly-ish agree with paralleling in Bucky- it's the "blank slate"-ism of them, I think, the like, fact that they are prominent enough in proximity to the main guy/main action, while remaining quite un-filled-in still. It fits the like general theories on fandom of why "bad" media has/gets more fanworks than "good" ones (and yes the nec. caveat of- they cant just be bad bad they also do have to be good in some ways. but it's like. the fixer-upper vs turnkey theory, ig. I dont think it's called that and idk if anyone else said this before lol, I just thought of it. But the idea of like... a media that appears like a fixer upper probs inspires more fixing upping, and also customization, vs a media that is more turnkey and so most ppl have a harder time imagining/envisioning customizations to it since they don't immediately think of going in and demo and reno'ing the place)
Ur pp on him fitting the sexyman stereotype- yeah I agree and that's part of my qualms/gripes lol, that ppl project sexyman stereotypes/archetypes - and beyond that - bottom-twink arche-stereotypes onto him. and it's part of the I Get It/Why it happens, but. Where yeah, I can see the confluence of things that have ppl tending to do that. ...but I gripe about it nonetheless lmao, like... "oh so we're using our made up dude?" <- yes ik these are bold words/fightin' words in fandom where its kind of all *spongebob Squidward* sir, we use our made up dudes here .meme
I will say tho to ur pt abt >> vs bond, cap w.e. I do feel like I remember a time when bottom Steve/sub Steve was particularly prevalent in Stony fandom. and I remember feeling this way cuz I am more of a bottom/sub Tony enjoyer lmfao. I do think that was particularly interesting from a stevetony lens/side of things, cuz that was Cap2 fandom era (*war flashbacks* lmao...) and peak Tony villainization-by-haters era. Like it was Accepted at the time that it was okay to openly hate on Tony, cuz that's where the zeitgeist was. It was the whole reason the TSDS got founded lmao, Tony fans got so much flak for being fans and it was like, almost obligatory to be like "yeah I know hes done Problematic Stuff, but I still love him anyway!" at the mildest on any vaguely positive posts on Tony... so I wonder if that contributed to the. okay gonna be unflattering-blunt but, the maiden-ification of Cap, in comparison, lol. >> not to say this is or was an all-the-time all the time thing, the stony fandom was/is big enough that you'd see waves, and I do think on the whole it probs evens out.
anyway idk how this compares to the exp on this front in the stucky fandom, I still have all sorts of tags blacklisted from back in the day of the most virulent cap2 fandom wank/ers, like it truly was/felt like 'then everything changed when the fire nation attacked' back in the day...
Ur penultimate paragraph here is interesting and I do think it has legs for further study. It also reminds me of the posts abt the supposed prevalence of ppl imagining themselves as the bottom vs the top (again tho... cant relate cuz ya Im firmly in the cuck chair lmao...) HOWEVER I DO think there *is* something there to it beyond just the literal, "do you see urself as one or the other in a literal bottom/top projection" way, it's also kind of the thing about... god what was it... I think it was sth about either yaoi or romance novels, and how ppl tend to - if not project themselves into, then like, empathize with? the more... "passive" party, in a passive-dominant kind of dynamic. The fantasy of being the persued, vs being the persuer. I DO think that even if it's not a literal putting urself in the place of, it still is a co-sympathy with the character kind of thing, of projecting more onto Q than Bond. and that's what drives at least some of the prevalence of bottom/bottom-coded /romanced (vs romancer) Q, as opposed to Bond.
