Curator's Note
A Short Time Ago, Across An Internet Near Nearby...
FAN WARS
It is a time of
cautious rejoicing and
restless anticipation for The Force Awakens.
The zeitgeist rumbles with speculation, deliberative
concern, and unending discourse circulating a number
of Internet Fan Theories that may or may not bring peace
to the fanoptic galaxy. Spiritual renewal hangs in the balance,
with the masses in prayerful meditation as to whether the copycat
wunderkind, Cinemaster Abrams, can fulfullthe capitalist prophecy
and bring balance to the franchise...
Meanwhile,
across the galaxy at
the farflung reaches of the A.V. Club,
young padawan film critic Noel Murray ponders a
sideways universe in which the universally maligned
Star Wars prequels legetimate misunderstood genius on
the part of fallen filmmaker and Toy Rights Overlord,
Darth Lucas. Lucas, no stranger to controversy, relinquished
control of his Galactic Empire to the Monopolistic Mouse House
in 2012. With this Media Conglomerate acquiring the power to print
money ad infinitum, a great(er) tide hangs in the balance between
good and evil, or as fallen sage Ken-E-Wan Burke-Nobi identifies,
"The Nature of Art Under Capitalsim."
Not unlike the
secret war waged
beneath the surface of the
[Trade Federation and Galactic Senate]Rebellion and Empire, but less beknownst
to the average consumer, a temporal war wages on
between contesting paratextual ontologies or what I've previously
identified as oppositional engines of industrial fandom (Slade, Narro,
Givens-Carroll, Ch. 7, 2015). On one hand, the entertainment industry
thrives upon the distribution and positive reception of publicity, and
indeed, the nichification of media franchising speaks to greater
consumer demands for revisionist industrial nostalgia and a prosumer
affect combined by traditional modes of production and consumption
alongside audience innovations. On the other hand, fandom's "shoot-
first" cynicism can either highjack textual legitimacy, lead to
criticism, or simply (un)willingly smuggle billions of spacebucks in free
publicity. Given the popularity of space smugglers right now, perhaps
audiences are interested in a contradictory combination of both...
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