Phandom (YouTube RPF)
| RPF Fandom | |
|---|---|
| Name(s): | (The) Phandom, the Phamily |
| Scope/Focus: | Fans of Phan |
| Date(s): | 2010(?)- |
| See also: | YouTube RPF |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
Phandom is a portmanteau of Phan and fandom. It refers to the fans of YouTube star vloggers Dan Howell and Phil Lester.
Canon History
Dan and Phil are YouTube vloggers. They met online in the comments to Phil's videos, then IRL in 2009, becoming fast friends and starting a successful series of video collaborations.[1] In 2011, they became roommates in Manchester,[2] before moving to London together in July 2012,[3] to working with BBC Radio 1 on various projects, including Dan and Phil and an interactive, award-winning 'fully visualised' request show.[4] During this time they were maintaining more or less a 'separate brands' arrangement.
In December 2013, Dan deleted all his previous tweets by accident, although many people believe that it wasn't an accident. Phil also deletes old tweets when they start getting retweets or likes, so the Phandom self-polices themselves in regards to shipping content. It is seen as wrong to post shippy things in the main tumblr tags (danisnotonfire and amazingphil), to tweet Dan and Phil or other youtubers links to such content, and to post the Valentine's Day video or to even talk about it.
In 2014, online magazine TenEighty did a piece on YouTube RPF slash fanfic and during its Twitter promotion, decided to tag Dan. This propelled a full-on wank. Around the end of 2014, they created the Dan and Phil Shop and also launched DanAndPhilGames.
Dan and Phil Come Out
On Jun 13 2019 Howell came out as queer/gay in a video on his channel. He discussed external and internalized homophobia he dealt with over the course of his life and said he had come out to his family earlier that month. On June 30 Phil came out as gay on his channel, saying he had been open about it in his personal life since university.
The reaction of fans and fellow Youtubers was positive and supportive.
This article or section needs expansion. |
Fandom History
This article or section needs expansion. |
In 2011, Youtube glitched and accidentally unprivated videos from lots of channels, including Phil's second channel LessAmazingPhil. Two videos have been confirmed to have been leaked this one time, one of them being a 2 minutes vlog, where Phil is his room and talks addressing Dan and recounting his favourite moments of them together as a couple as a 'gift' for 2010 Valentine's Day. The contents of the other video are unknown. At this point, few people who were talking about it on Twitter, DeviantArt, and Tumblr were messaged by Dan, asking for them to just not talk about it. Sadly, one person managed to save the video and it has been resurfacing on the internet ever since. It's latest copyright removal dates as soon as May 2016. Officially Dan and Phil have said countless times that the video was a prank they were planning to do and accidentally leak it on April's Fools, but they decided it would be 'too mean' and didn't go with it.
With their audience growth, the internet scavenge for old tweets, pictures and youtube comments is, more or less, what cemented the roots of the Phandom back in 2012 with tumblr blogs such as Phanlentines (deleted at Phil's request) and The Phan Directory (half its contents have been copyrighted by Dan and Phil, including the timeline yet, the author has kept reuploading them). These blogs, plus a bunch of others, started to push the narrative that Phan was real, which commenced a war not only between shippers and non shippers, but also Dan himself who at the time started to get involved in the Phan tag wank, going as far as to create a sideblog named Customer Service Blog (now deleted) in which he replied questions in an askbox. At this point he reaffirmed the explanation for the Valentine's Day video, made rant-y posts about shippers, denied a lot of the so-called proof these previous blogs had come up with, and tried to separate the danisnotonfire brand from the AmazingPhil brand. He mentioned not being joined at the hip and not being a double-act like Ant and Dec a lot. Many people refer to 2012 Phan as 'The Dark Times', which led to its own subcategory of angsty fanfiction. Dan and Phil, ever since the 2012 wank, have neglected to even touch on the subject of shipping except for counted occasions such as Tumblr Tags videos and a few tweets, but always referred to it as joke regarding fanart.
Around the end of 2014, another flock of new viewers joined the community and so it propelled the creation of another place of discussion, La Vita Ricca (deleted), which discussed everything from body language analysis to behaviour in liveshows and videos. It seemed like Dan and Phil were getting more comfortable with the notion of shipping and many people believed they were on their way to "come out" until March 2015, when Dan and Phil announced the release of The Amazing Book Is Not On Fire, accompanied by a world tour of a theatrical performance, which propelled the blog's owner (with many other people backing them up) to claim the way they had been relaxing towards shippers was just a manipulation from them to keep Phandom interested, plus the general shitstorm of calling them sell-outs. This would be known as the second 'Dark Times'. Dan and Phil did not refer to the drama at all, but so did other Youtubers.
On another occasion in 2015, Youtuber Evan Edinger tweeted someone about how every Youtuber of the UK Community had seen the infamous Valentine's Day video and had discussions about it, which again propelled wank within the Phandom. It is generally advised to not mention the video from both the shipping side (they believe it's real and it shouldn't be posted because it was clearly a personal video) and the non-shipper side (because of the rumor mill it seems to generate).
Controversies
'Dangirls' vs 'Philgirls'
See for example:
Anonymous asked: "To be honest I don't think PhilGirls are a thing. Lets be real, DanGirls are a thing. There are girls out there who are so fucking obsessed with Dan they're willing to say mean nasty things about/to Phil and his fans. PhilGirls? You don't see girls running around wishing death upon Dan/his fans. Yes, there are girls who prefer Phil over Dan and those are called Phillions. And there are no PhilGirls because, tbh, Phil is more mature which causes his fans to act the same way. That's just that."I see where you are coming from but ‘philgirls’ are there. There just aren’t as much of them compared to ‘dangirls’. I have seen messages on other peoples blogs that have been directed towards Dan from ‘philgirls’ saying he doesn’t deserve Phil and that Dan doesn’t appreciate him. True that there are many more ‘dangirls’ but ‘philgirls’ can be just as bad. It’s just that you don’t come across them as often. - T[5]
Dan's response in a 2013 YouNow livestream:
I really have a fricking problem with the word 'Dangirls'. [...] If someone likes Phil and they don't like me, I don't get offended. If someone likes me and doesn't like Phil, that doesn't mean they're a 'Dangirl,' you shouldn't go attacking them. However if someone is mean to somebody, that doesn't make them a 'Dangirl,' that makes them a twat, no matter if they're hating on Phil, if they're hating on me, if they're hating on anyone. Life is too short to hate. Do not be a drama llama. [...][6]
Phandom and the Fourth Wall
The term is used by Dan and Phil themselves - see the official "Phandom Member #" writsbands on sale in their online shops.[7]
Dan and Phil have made several videos directly interacting with their fandom:
- My Tumblr Tag! posted on AmazingPhil July 1, 2013.
- Dan and Phil vs. Tumblr posted on danisnotonfire July 11, 2013.
- MY TUMBLR TAG 2! (with Dan) posted on AmazingPhil Sept 15, 2014. It should be noted that for this video, Phil actually notified his fans via twitter to use a specific Tumblr tag for the posts that they wished him to see, showing a good understanding of Fourth Wall issues in fandom.
Example Fanworks
| Examples Wanted: Editors are encouraged to add more examples or a wider variety of examples. Please keep examples on this page gen. Other examples can go on Phan |
The Phandom is especially dynamic on Tumblr and Twitter, producing numerous gifsets, lots of fanart and stories.
As of March 9, 2024, there were 17,741 works in the Phandom/Fantastic Foursome AO3 tag, most of which were Dan/Phil slash. The earliest was posted on March 25, 2011.[8] The most popular had 100k+ hits and 6000+ kudos.[9]
Fandom Resources
- Phandom on urbandictionary
- Phandom Information with glossary and in-jokes explanations on aboutthephandom.tumblr.com
- Phandom AO3 tag.
External Links
- AmazingPhil Youtube channel and side channel LessAmazingPhil
- danisnotonfire YouTube channel and side-channel danisnotinteresting
- The Super Amazing Project (starts 2011)
- Dan and Phil BBC Radio 1 episodes (starts 2011)
- DanAndPhilGAMES (starts 2014)
References
- ^ The first 'Phil is not on fire' video was posted Oct 25, 2009.
- ^ Amazingphil, Living With Robert Pattinson video, posted Aug 10, 2011.
- ^ Amazingphil, The Wardrobe video, posted July 30, 2012.
- ^ BBC, Dan And Phil, published March 2013.
- ^ phandomopinions, Response to anon Tumblr ask, Archived version, posted in 2013, accessed Oct 2, 2014.
- ^ Danisnotonfire on dangirls - Younow 3/5/2013, posted by canariesrcute on March 5, 2013 (accessed Oct 2, 2014).
- ^ Official Phandom Member Wristband, Archived version, www.danandphilshop.com, on sale as of May 2015.
- ^ you could go swimming in those eyes by namelikeafairytale.
- ^ a match and a fuse by waveydnp, a 198k words, 55-part coffee shop AU