What Makes Fan.Fic Tick?
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| Title: | What Makes Fan.Fic Tick? |
| Creator: | Laughlin B. Cunned |
| Date(s): | 1999 |
| Medium: | online |
| Fandom: | Xena: Warrior Princess |
| Topic: | |
| External Links: | What Makes Fan.Fic Tick? |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
What Makes Fan.Fic Tick? is a 1999 essay by Laughlin B. Cunned.
"How come Xena: Warrior Princess, a campy, low-budget imitation of chop-socky movies, has transformed - and been transformed by - so many? It’s all about archetypes, and this one’s been sorely missed."
Excerpt
Even for the richest, strongest, smartest and luckiest of us, life’s a bitch. It’s hard, it hurts and we spend way too much time wondering which way is up. That’s why we’re always looking around for hints about what the hell to do next.
Some people are picky about the hints they’ll pay attention to. It’s got to be popular or pricey. Or scientific. Or literary. Or biblical. Most of us, however, will take help from wherever we can get it. And the damnedest thing is that most of us have a weird, unerring instinct about what’s really helpful to us and what isn’t.
Like songs on the radio: some of them move you and some of them don’t. End of story.
Unless you don’t find anything that moves you. The music’s boring. Your job sucks. The world seems gray and dimensionless. Every now and then you notice yourself asking ‘What’s wrong with this picture?’ But no one answers and it’s clear - painfully clear - that something’s missing . . . .
Perspective in the pixels.
I have a friend who spent years like this. Dazed and confused. Ask her what she cares about, what she wants - really wants - and you’d get a shrug. She didn’t have a clue. Until one night, surfing across the TVscape, she came upon Xena: Warrior Princess. It’s cartoonish, it fractures history, it’s television at its most primitive. Nevertheless, my friend, who holds a masters degree from one of the world’s best universities, was riveted. She remains riveted to this day, by each unlikely, ass-kicking episode and by the vast Xena-verse that has emerged on the Internet, offering thousands of stories of two women trying to save the world.
As an innocent bystander, I am fascinated. Xena: Warrior Princess has become the most popular syndicated television show in the world, translated into many, many languages, beamed from chaotic Russia into fundamentalist Iran, watched weekly by millions upon millions of dedicated fans. What’s more, it’s clear that, thanks to the Xena-verse, a significant number of Xena devotees are themselves, in a spectacular explosion of creative inspiration, helping to shape the evolution of the two protagonists and their relationship with each other. The TV show has transformed its audience and they, in turn, are transforming it.
As I watch this phenomenon unfold, it occurs to me that something downright supra-cultural is happening here. Something that needs explaining in larger terms, from a much wider perspective.
Welcome home
What makes Xena so important is that she signifies the reinvention of the Crone. Not the wizened, toothless old woman for whom we were all carefully taught to feel fear and contempt, but the real Crone: a strong, powerful, wise woman who was profoundly loved and looked up to by all in her community. A real Crone is many things the Animus has falsely tried to wrest for himself: a leader, a healer, a hero whom women and children can trust to protect them.
That Xena is also an ass-kicking warrior with a bad-girl history tells us much about our times and our needs. The stories we watch about Xena - created by her loyal community of one, Gabrielle - concern transformation through love. We watch Xena struggle with her "dark side" and win, inspired to battle on for who she wants to be by her community’s vision of her and need for her. What's more, we see Gabrielle being transformed, too - from a feisty but basically helpless virgin into a strong, confident woman devoted to making the world a better place to live in. As the Crone is once again recognized and embraced by the Virgin, her awesome power is liberated to strengthen and enlighten the Virgin. (That both Gabrielle and Xena have suffered such extreme oppression as Mothers that they have been unable to experience that part of the female journey in anything like a normal way is revealing - but we'll save that exploration for another time.)
Why is all this so important? As we watch Xena and Gabrielle evolve because of their love for each other - Xena, who once embodied the worst of the Shadow that inhabits us all, and Gabrielle, the quintessential helpless, about-to-be-enslaved female - we are shown that we, too, can evolve. And it's a whole lot easier than we thought. All it takes is the loving reunion of the Crone with the Virgin/Mother.
So it begins. The power and inevitability of Xena: Warrior Princess lies in its lack of intention. No one planned this, no one expected Xena and Gabrielle to turn out to be who they are, least of all the people who created the television program. Archetypes are like that, appearing when needed, shaped to the demands of the moment, impossible to stop.
Arguably, once upon a time it was important that the Anima retreat and the Crone allow herself to be kidnapped and hidden away. That time may be ending, for in Xena: Warrior Princess we see the Crone return to a community eager to greet her, embrace her and tell her story over and over again in thousands of different ways. The Crone has been found and welcomed home at last. Let's celebrate!