So…I’m a nerd. I’ve been a nerd, or at least into nerdy, pop-culture type things, and fandoms for almost ten years. For me, it mainly started around my senior year in high school, progressed through college, and helped me become the person I am today. Through this I have met new people, found a love for blogging and podcasting, talking and dissecting the shows I love, and it has all brought me into the crazy, loving, and anxiety-ridden world of fandoms. So I wanted to talk about the anxieties I felt over the years about not agreeing with the masses sometimes, and how I learned to cope with these issues and learn a valuable lesson about fandoms and nerd culture. Before we get into that I thought it would be a good idea to discuss the shows and movies that turned me into the woman and nerd I am today and some of the thoughts that have given me the most anxieties over the past years. This is part one…How I became a fan of Doctor Who.
Doctor Who is a British Sci-Fi about an alien called The Doctor traveling through time and space in his TARDIS (Time and Relative Dimensions in Space), which appears as a police box from the 1960s. Along for the ride is a rotating cast of companions that keep him (or her) company as they meet historical figures, see different planets, fight monsters, and save earth on several occasions. The longevity of the show is in part to The Doctor being able to regenerate when he (or she) is seriously hurt, being able to change every cell in their body so that they look different…therefore they can bring in a new actor to play the part, and the show can last forever (or at least until everyone gets sick of it.)
I had some friends who were into the show circa 2011. they would talk about it, discuss theories on what was going to happen next, and I would just sit there pretending to know what they were talking about while also being VERY CONFUSED. I then decided to do some research and learned about the history of the show. Seeing that it has been running at that point for nearly 50 years, I was thinking OH FUCK I CAN NEVER GET THROUGH THIS SHOW I’M JUST GOING TO GIVE UP NOW, and figured this is just going to be something I know exists but never watch. Then one morning a few months later, I was at home, looking for something to watch on-demand, and saw some episodes of Doctor Who was available, including an episode I heard my friends talking about, “A Christmas Carol.” I thought…eh I’ve got nothing better to do, might as well watch this Christmas special (in I think March haha). I started it, finished it, AND LOVED IT. This episode is beautiful, fun, heartwarming, and is still a staple in my Christmas watch list. I immediately got the appeal of the show and wanted to start watching it, only problem was I assumed I would need to start in 1963, panicked, and gave up again. Cut to the summer of 2012 I had talked to some friends about wanting to watch the show, but thinking it was too much and would take too much time, and they suggested starting with the revival series, which began in 2005. Luckily this series was on Netflix at the time, and I decided to finally watch this show I had been afraid to start for so long. I ended up getting through 3 and a half seasons in a week, and the rest within the next 2 weeks, and became a huge fan, would talk about the show with my friends, starting buying merchandise, thinking about theories. This wasn’t the first “nerdy,” show or even movie I had ever seen, but getting into this show, I guess made me want to be a part of nerd culture and got me more involved in the other fandoms I was only casually into. Which I will be discussing in my next couple of posts
. So stay tuned!
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