Camp Rock
| Fandom | |
|---|---|
| Name: | Camp Rock |
| Abbreviation(s): | CR |
| Creator: | written by wikipedia: Karin Gist, Regina Hicks, Julie Brown, Paul Brown directed by wikipedia:Matthew Diamond |
| Date(s): | 2008-2010 |
| Medium: | television movie |
| Country of Origin: | USA |
| External Links: | Camp Rock on Wikipedia |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
Camp Rock is a 2008 Disney Channel Original Movies directed by Matthew Diamond about a young girl who attends a musical summer camp starring Demi Lovato and the Jonas Brothers.
Canon
Camp Rock
When Mitchie Torres (Demi Lovato) desperately wants to attend prestigious music camp, Camp Rock, her mother Connie takes a job as the camp chef in order to afford the high tuition while Mitchie works in the kitchens with her. Though Mitchie initially bonds with punk-ish music producer Caitlyn Gellar (Alyson Stoner), Mitchie is accepted into mean girl Tess Tyler's (Meghan Martin) clique after she lies that her mother is a powerful music executive in China, intimidated by the affluence and well connectedness of her new peers.
Meanwhile, bad-boy popstar and Camp Rock alumnus Shane Gray (Joe Jonas) has been sent back to camp after his behavior resulted in his band's tour being cancelled. After being dropped off to his Uncle Brown (Daniel Fathers) by bandmates Nate (Nick Jonas) and Jason (Kevin Jonas), Shane overhears Mitchie singing in the dining hall. He becomes obsessed with finding "The Girl With the Voice," all the while bonding with Mitchie with both of them unaware she was the girl he was looking for. Through this, the film parallels Mitchie's and Shane's arcs towards their individual self acceptance and coming to terms with the idea of being true to themselves rather than performing an inauthentic image.
Camp Rock 2
A sequel premiered September 3rd 2010 that takes place the summer following the first film, though much of it is inconsistent with its predecessor. This time, Mitchie and the gang must save Camp Rock from going out of business when a rival camp, Camp Star, opens up across the lake. Nate and Jason have much more prominent roles, with Nate having a romance plotline of his own with the daughter of the director of Camp Star, but this time Connect 3 are written as brothers instead of just bandmates. The film also explores Mitchie and Shane's relationship as they try and find time to spend together within their busy schedules.
Books
Disney Books released a Junior Novelization for both films, both of which included pages of photos from the movie in the center of the binding and small details and cut lines from the film. In between the two films from 2008-2010 eight non-canon original stories were published as the "Second Session" series which took place during a second half of the first summer. [1]
Fandom
The Camp Rock fandom has historically been a subset of the Jonas Brothers and Demi Lovato fandoms, especially when the acts were frequently combined under the Jonas Enterprises and Disney Channel brand in the late 2000s/early 2010s. The film also popularized the Joe Jonas/Demi Lovato RPF pairing, spurring even more fanworks of them than their Camp Rock counterparts on a wide range of platforms ranging from but not limited to Youtube slideshow fics, detailed and more mature Livejournal entries, and stories posted to sites such as Jonas Brothers Fanfiction Archive.
Fanfiction and Shipping
During the height of interaction in the fandom, Camp Rock fanfiction had its base on Fanfiction.net, as it was one of the most popular hosting sites at the time, especially for first time authors of which the Camp Rock fandom had many due to the targeted age demographic. There are 6.5k works listed in the Camp Rock category, but only 2k of those were added since 2013.,[2] The first fic listed as of 2021 was published in January of 2008, six months before the film even aired. [3] After the film's release, 550 new fics were added that summer alone. Content continued to be churned out at a steady pace up until late 2011, about a year after the release of the second film. Popular fic tropes of the time included Mitchie going on tour with Connect 3 as their opening act instead of going back to school, usually with Mitchie and Shane getting married when she turned 18 and depictions of conservative views regarding sex influenced by the Jonas Brothers's public comments on their own purity rings. [4] In many fics, Nate and Caitlyn would also start a relationship, frequently acting as the B couple in many Mitchie/Shane multi-chaps.
Slash ships such as Mitchie/Caitlyn and Tess/Caitlyn were present in some capacity on every platform, though in the same vein as the crossover between the Mitchie/Shane and Joe/Demi ships, much of the Livejournal fic community was interested in Nate/Shane slash, as they wrote Jonascest slash too. Most content produced by the Livejournal fandom has been removed or lost over the years, with only a limited number of Jonas Brothers RPF fics being left up as well. Archive of Our Own hosts a very small batch of Camp Rock fic, with only 36 works in the tag, the most popular ship being Mitchie/Shane. [5] Fic posted in the last few years has shifted in terms of narrative, often focusing on a more serious and realistic look at the story such as prioritizing discussions about mental health as well as emphasizing LGBT+ headcanons and relationships. These interpretations align with much of the non-nostalgia based meta and conversation in the Tumblr tag.[6]
Cultural Impact and Casual Fans
The film is the third highest viewed DCOM of all time, with 8.9 million viewers during its premiere on June 20th, 2008.[7] Camp Rock made Demi Lovato a household name overnight, [8] and skyrocketed the popularity of the Jonas Brothers, all of whom were set to go on the Burning Up Tour the same summer. The release of Camp Rock and the calculated promotion of the Disney corporation led to Summer 2008 being the height of the Jonas Brothers career. Their Google Trends result based on the number of searches for "Jonas Brothers" since 2004 peaks at August 2008 with the release of their third studio album, A Little Bit Longer. For comparison, the second highest peak was in August 2007 during the release of their sophomore album, and still it was only at 38% of the number of August 2008 searches. [9] Camp Rock remains a fixture in Millennial nostalgia culture, often being featured in 2000s nostalgia listicles or the topic of casual one-off viral tweets. When the Jonas Brothers reunited after their breakup they made a well received TikTok jokingly acting out one if their scenes from the first film. [10]
Example Fanworks
Fanfiction
- After the Credits Roll by DevilPup
- The Reason That I'm Singing by Moliver
- smells like summer, feels like letting go. by shanegray
- the story untold. by poketa
- 20 Things. by LaPaige
Fanart
- holding hands in the sunset. by joenas
References
- ^ Camp Rock Second Session Books Goodreads. Accessed 8/8/2021
- ^ Camp Rock Fanfiction.net search results 2013. Accessed 8/8/2021.
- ^ Camp Rock Fanfiction.net search results 2021. Accessed 8/8/2021
- ^ The Clean Teen Machine, Rolling Stone 2008. Accessed 8/8/2021
- ^ Camp Rock AO3 Tag.Accessed 8/8/2021.
- ^ Camp Rock Tumblr Tag.Accessed 8/8/2021.
- ^ [1]. Accessed 8 August 2021.
- ^ Simply Complicated. Accessed 8/8/2021.
- ^ Jonas Brothers Google Trends Accessed 8/8/2021
- ^ The Jonas Brothers Have Recreated A Scene From "Camp Rock" And I Can Now Die Happy. Accessed 8/8/2021