Sparkly

Synonyms:
See also:	Mary Sue, Sparklypoo
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In fannish usage, the word sparkly is sometimes used to refer to over-the-top wish fulfillment, particularly ridiculously beautiful and talented characters.

One early use of the word was in 1986 in the editorial from the zine Highly Illogical: "I'm still sparkling from seeing ST: The Voyage Home. What a great way to round off the ST's 20th year!" The term started cropping up in earnest in the early '00s, in fandoms such as Harry Potter and popslash.

In Harry Potter, Sparklypoo is a fictional Fifth House at Hogwarts for Mary Sues, which features in a comic strip by Pirate Monkey.

In popslash, the term is more affectionate; sparkly dance boys was common shorthand for the members of 'N Sync and Backstreet Boys, and from there the fandom developed sparkly communities, challenges, and even conventions -- Camp Sparkle, an annual (still ongoing), week-long popslash get-together for UK fans. The use of "sparkly" in popslash had a concrete origin; circa 2000, when the fandom was growing fast, the members of 'N Sync in particular were prone to wearing clothes that were sequined, bejeweled, or shiny. These outfits were both widely loved and widely mocked, often by the same fan in the same sentence. From that beginning, "sparkly" came to have a range of meanings in popslash, from the purely descriptive to signifying the gayness of the groups' public personae.

The Twilight anti-fandom often uses references to the fact that the vampire characters canonically sparkle as a shorthand for everything that is wrong with the series. The fandom catchphrase for this phenomenon is "sparkly vampires."

Twilight anti-fans have coined similar terms like Sparkledammerung (analoguous to Potterdämmerung) and sparkle motion (an adaptation from the film Donnie Darko) for the antics of Twilight fans.