#I have tried to curate my dash and fandom experience so hard but this just keeps happening and I feel like I am whining about it on here

[theultracharmingladynoire]

i am considering deactivating for real tbh

[eulchu]

im gonna get the record straight and be completely transparent.

i have never lurked critblr or leaktwt. i barely know who any of these people are. if you're critblr and i have you blocked it's because you interacted with dtblr and your url sounded weird, and people fact checked what kind of people were under your likes. or in your following list. you guys don't really know how to be subtle

many of us have been here for long enough to know urls of the people who post the most fucked up posts, because once in a while you'll pop up on the based on your likes tab.

implying im in critblr is fucking insane. i can genuinely tell all of you the exact number of leaked info i know. the truth is if you're in dtblr and you recieve more than 3 asks a day you ARE gonna get freak anons bomb dropping leaks in your askbox. there's unfortunately very little way of modding that. we try our best by blocking but every single day we get harassed with information we don't fucking want.

i am not in charge of the fandom and i will never be. tumblr is the least fucking relevant site in the fandom hierarchy. i'm no god of the fandom i don't make the rules of the fandom and i am under any impression than im more important than any other blog in dtblr. my blog would be NOTHING without all the members of dtblr. i am not special i am not famous. it's not my fault people who don't like being active blogs come into my inbox to express themselves. i don't pretend to be any authority figure. i say shit and if you agree with me cool and if you don't, that's cool too.

i am so fucking sorry that some of you have a complex over blogs that get attention, but that's not my fault. i have been here for Years of course i'm gonna have a big number of followers. especially since october all dtblr has tried so hard to not become what it used to be, and if you have a complex that's on you. there's tens of blogs with very little followers who are amazing. because a following count means NOTHING.

it's crazy to tell me im only finding reasons to shittalk dizzy and alison. i didn't know dizzy prior to their gross behavior regarding the shit they write about and the people they're friends with. if you know me well enough you'd know i have 0 problems with saying i hate x person for whatever personal grudge. i have done that plenty of times. i don't have to hide behind any excuse to shittalk someone.

calling me petty is ridiculous. petty over what girl? i'm just here to vibe idgaf what other people are up to if it's harmless shit.

yet another clinically fucking insane statement to make. i very politely to invite you to scroll my blog and tell me where i have confirmed anything. the only things i have talked about are dream's ex and those "body issues". i have never verified any kind of leak and you're insane for thinking i have. i genuinely invite you to send me one of those instances you talk about.

in regards of "a bunch of blogs complaining" i'd love to know what kind of blogs you're talking about because as far as i know the only conversation that's happened before regarding this topic, was something extremely similar to what i'm saying right now and not at all close to verifying any kind of leak. if you get those blogs on your dash that's a you problem and you should curate your experience better, but don't drag me into it.

yes. all of this. yes.

i do apologize for the confusion. dizzy didn't write that fic but they did defend it and they've co-written together before.

i'm not a lurker and i don't know them, don't think i know all this information because i'm a stalker. i don't even know alison's tumblr. some of these people used to be friends. friends of a lot of people in the fandom. but you can only cover your behavior for so fucking long, and then people talk, and shit gets brought up.

both alison and dizzy have done more than morally incorrect things in the past for other fandoms. other than the choice of the kind of fics they write and bookmark, they both are 100% friends with people who discuss doxxes like it's top of the morning news. dizzy particularly was part of the phandom in the side of phannies who harassed and were weirdly invasive of their lives to the point where it affected their mental health.

again, read what you want like what you like but be aware that these are the people you're reading fics of. hey if you're one of them, kudos to you. but genuinely. don't even try to say they're not the kind of people im describing right now. people across different fandoms who have had the displeasure of knowing them will tell you the same thing.

[littlespoonevan]

I'm honestly so tired of the bashing of this season... It's not perfect, far from it, and I definitely have things to say too, but people are acting like it's the worst thing ever made and this constant negativity is making it hard to enjoy it at all and it's killing all the fun for me. It's one thing to have expectations, it's another thing to say it's shit when they don't happen. It's just my opinion, but yeah, I wish people would just calm down a bit.

ahh i know what you mean, anon. as much as i absolutely love the experience of watching a show week to week and getting to deep dive into the ep and theorise about what's coming next, it's also a lot more stressful than binge-watching.

i think it's easy to spiral sometimes when watching a season live because for example, if you're whole dash is liveblogging and ten people all complain about one thing well then those ten people will probably rile each other up about the thing even more. in contrast, if i'm bingewatching, that thing either won't register with me or that part of the storyline will be over like two hours later so i won't bother posting about it.

it does frustrate me sometimes when people can't just wait and see. like there's a different between not liking something very specific eg. the copaganda in 5x03 vs just not having the whole story yet???? so i've always tried my best to withhold judgement on certain storylines until we reach season finales. like, i could complain about eddie not facing the trauma of the shooting yet but i'm also holding out hope that'll happen in upcoming eps. so unless we reach 5x18 without that being addressed i don't think it's fair for me to be annoyed???

season 5 in general though is not bad at all. i think it's suffered from some inconsistencies with the changes in production and not having two mains present but it's still a good season. i absolutely loved 5x01, 5x02 and 5x04. i really enjoyed 5x06 also (tbh the only reason i'm not like, omg god tier is bc seeing people's reactions beforehand sort of raised the bar too high for me? but that's no one's fault except whoever leaked the ep lol). 5x03 was its own beast and 5x05 and 5x07 did feel off. the thing about 5x05 though is that it's hard to know if that was intentional or not given the themes of the ep and that we were primarily viewing things through buck's eyes.

but like, in terms of 5x07 as an example. the things i didn't like about it are the same things i didn't like about 4x08 or 4x11 which was that too much of the focus was on side characters i didn't have an interest in. hell, i thought 4x01 and 4x02 were Incredibly boring, especially when compared to the tsunami the previous season. so idk if it's just that a lot of us are watching live for the first time now and that's why people are getting more frustrated but quality-wise i'm not all that worried rn.

the best advice i could give is to curate your dash and blacklist what you need to. i follow 20 911 blogs which tbh is a lot for me. and that's not to say there aren't lots of amazing people whose posts/gfisets i regularly reblog who i don't follow but i personally have always preferred to follow just enough people to keep up to date on everything i want to. i find it easier to maintain my dash that way and i rarely, if ever, see complaining unless i go looking for it. i've done the whole, follow everyone thing in previous fandoms and it's absolutely exhausting and generally not good for your enjoyment of the show

i don't want this to come off as preachy or holier-than-thou because i absolutely don't mean it to be and at the end of the day, if people want to complain leave them to it! i'm just saying that in my own experience following less blogs and blacklisting discourse tags has always made my fandom life much more enjoyable!!

[anupalya]

Please bear with me, I’m about to say this as a complete and utter Destiel lover (as anyone who spends even a tiny bit of time on my dash can see), Misha lover, and person who just loves my little curated corner of fandom and the incredible explorations of love and friendship and family and fun that fanworks bring. 

This is also very much NOT intended as a call-out post, and not intended to scold or shame anyone for anything they are experiencing or feeling.  I am just sharing my own differing opinion.

I’ve pieced together what happened during today’s Q&A after being very confused for a few hours (lol coming on tumblr is always an experience), and I honestly love that the questions today weren’t about Destiel.  That’s not because I don’t love having new Destiel revelations, and I definitely was celebrating yesterday when Misha shared that Cas could see the love in Dean’s eyes.  It is so wonderful to have someone say “you’re not crazy, I see it too, I played it that way ON PURPOSE, this is how I felt the character was” after all the gaslighting crap Destiel fans get put through, and how often we get called crazy and cringey.  It was also a particularly beautiful, thoughtful, affirming, and just all-around good take that adds another lovely piece to our Destiel mosaic.  So I absolutely celebrated and reblogged the shit out of things yesterday, and I am so glad we all enjoyed it.

That being said, I personally want to be moving away from holding Misha as an authority over the character of Castiel or of Destiel.  It’s actually hard for me to remember to do, honestly, given all the bullshit the see-double-you and various other people have pulled.  He’s shouldered the burden of all of their failures in that regard, which has to be exhausting and straining.  But, as shown by the care he gave to his Destiel responses yesterday, Misha does not want to be the definitive authority on this subject, and I quite agree, for a number of reasons.  If he tried, he’d never be able to avoid invalidating some or other person’s read or interpretation on the character or relationship.  It would end up being at the very least a publicly-not-queer-presenting man talking over queer voices, which he was so careful and conscious to NOT do, yesterday.  He also, and I cannot stress this enough, has not watched the show.

Fandom and fan works, the different interpretations of Destiel and the beautiful art created around it, have changed my life in many ways.  And this was done by different people presenting their own interpretations, by saying “screw you” to the story we got and “love you” to the characters we got.  The beautiful, incredible thing about fandom is that we are our own authority over the story, and no one person’s opinion overrides another.  It’s in that we don’t have to look to anyone to be the authority and say what is right or wrong.  Validation is wonderful, especially because people love calling us crazy and delusional, and so the thoughtful validation Misha gave yesterday shows respect and solidarity and acknowledgement that we are not stupid or crazy because he played it that way on purpose(!!!), but it was not the deciding factor on whether we were “right” or “wrong.”

Today’s panel had questions about Bridgewater, about the food show, his poetry book, Darius....I haven’t seen it yet but I am so excited to.  If Misha shares Destiel opinions I am so happy to hear them and celebrate them, but I also want to hear about his next endeavors and the fun he is having with them, what they mean to him, etc.  I am so glad people asked those questions, because that sounds like a fun panel, very interesting and lovely and I hope Misha also had a wonderful time answering them and sharing his interest and endeavors with us.

Once again, this is NOT intended to scold, shame, or hurt anyone.  I do want to say that I doubt we will be able to get much more of Misha’s opinions than what we’ve got (although if I’m wrong, yay) because I doubt he can share everything we want to know, ESPECIALLY about the see-double-you’s fuckery, and again, he doesn’t seem to want to position himself as an authority on the subject.  For that reason, I do want to caution everyone who might be disappointed right now to not get your hopes up again, but encourage you instead to just treat any possible new shared opinions or revelations of his intent in playing Cas as beautiful (although NOT authoritative) presents.

[justsomeoneunordinary]

Hello 😊 I have some questions about how I feel about certain things and I wanted to ask you because I don't really want to talk to my friends about this. Basically, whenever I read people's writing, I always in the back of my mind compare it to my own. I know this is quite normal. However, what I feel guilty about, and what I have tried to overcome (but have irrefutably failed to) is that I often think mine is better? I have even done the horrible act of sighing and saying "Why does this have

imma be honest: this was a bit weird for me to get. i am sometimes a bit of a mom-friend, i do give good advice (or so i've been told), but that's to people i have already known for a little bit at least.

you, however, i don't know. and i also don't know what kind of answer you need to hear and i also still don't quite know how to react to this message. but i will try anyway.

you ask "how do i stop" and i tell you: buddy, you don't. i have had similar thoughts about some writers and i continue to have them and i know that my friends have similar thoughts too. it's normal, it's human, it doesn't make you a bad person.

1) what helps, is having friends to talk about this. i have a friend who isn't a fan of the same popular writer as me and granted, it's a huge coincidence. it helps to let out some steam in our private messages where no one will ever know what we said, especially not the writer. and even if it's a creator my friend does not feel the same way as i do: we can still rant and the other will listen. having someone to listen alone helps a lot.

2) curate your own fandom experience. i realized that seeing this writer's content on my dash gave me a lot of negative feelings. seeing how many notes it has and not understanding why. so one day, i simply blocked them. they did nothing wrong, are a nice person and never interacted with me. but by blocking them i don't have to see their content on my dash anymore - and this helps a lot.

there is also an artist whose art it seems i'm the only person in this fandom to not like. i don't think i could do it better or the sorts - i can't art for shit - i just get irritated by seeing how people gush about it. so in the filtering options, i chose the "filter by content" instead of tags and filtered their url. this way, whenever their art gets reblogged, i get a warning and don't have to look neither at the art nor at the tags where everyone compliments them, and can simply scroll past.

generally, whenever i see content by creators i don't like, i do not dwell on it - i scroll past it. why should i read a fic i already know i'm not going to like? just to find out why it has this amount of notes? no, just scroll past it and good is.

3) accept that there is content that a lot of people value even when you don't. there is a reason why it's popular that simply doesn't resonate with you. because your interests are of a different nature. it is as it is - move on and don't dwell on it. and if it gives you negative feelings, if you cannot just ignore it - talk to someone you trust, block this person, filter their url. in short: find your own way how to deal with that so you can experience the positive sides of fandom.

4) you say you usually write your own versions - i say don't. that sounds like an unhealthy way to deal with that. i assume you don't upload it, cause you'd need permission for a remix first. thing is, you think you did better than the original writer; but was it your idea? was it you who came up with this exact story and wrote it down? no. no it was the other person and that's what will always make their fic more special.

so instead of thinking that you could do better, you can acknowledge that this author had an idea you did not have and made something original. and that's something you could do too.

don't think "how would i write this?" but "what ideas do i have?". make your own thing. something that is you and no one else's. come up with your own stuff and then be proud that you came up with it.

make friends here whom you can talk to and will show interest in your wips, will help you through difficulties, will cheer you when you need it.

and yeah, if it's something that doesn't resonate with many people, then that's hard. it hurts. we have all been there, i was there too and i will be there again with other fics. but at the end of the day i have friends i can talk to and let some steam out and most importantly: i can look back at what i wrote and be proud that this is something i came up with, no matter if many others liked it or not.

in short; feeling like that is 100% normal, but you shouldn't dwell on those feelings and curate your own experience in a positive way. simple as that.

[thefutureduchessmarie]

Look guys - Im old as fuck (had a bit of a mid-life crisis when I turned 27 earlier this year). I’ve been involved in fandoms for god know how long and it has always made me so happy and been such a comfort during hard times. Unfortunately I keep seeing people (strangers, mutuals, friends) struggling with it and it breaks my heart. So here’s a few things I’ve learned along the way, that made the whole thing so enjoyable for me:

First of all (and pay attention cause this is the golden rule), GIVE NO FUCKS! Honestly. This is YOUR space, so do whatever the fuck makes you happy. Forget about consistency. Forget about what others might think. Just do whatever puts a smile on your face. The minute it becomes a source of stress, sorry but you’re doing it wrong. Thats what real life is for. Tumblr is about the escape!

Stop trying to make your blog a Big Thing! Don’t plan out too much; Don’t stop yourself from saying something or reblogging something cause it’s not on brand; Don't give two shits about consistency, or posting time or proper tags. Forget about follower counts. Think for one second - what good does it do to have a shit ton of followers if you don’t enjoy being here? If all you feel is the pressure to keep it up? I’ve always had a great experience, I’ve always been able to connect to cool people and share my passions and I’ve never been a Popular One. Never even tried to be one either

DO NOT BE AFRAID OF THE UNFOLLOW BUTTON. Look, it’s there for a reason, people. If you see something on your dash that’s bothering you - unfollow. If somebody is bringing you down with their posts - unfollow. If you’re  tired of unnecessary drama - unfollow. If somebody’s posts trigger you somehow - unfollow. If somebody switched the focus of their blog and it’s suddenly not enjoyable - unfollow. We’re mostly anonymous here, save for the few friendships that bloom here and there. So we get to be “selfish”. This is primarily about escapism, and unlike real life, we get a magic button that makes al the negativity go away. SO USE IT!!! A carefully curated dash is the straightest path to fandom heaven if you ask me. 

Don’t be afraid of change. So you’re not as interested in your old fandom anymore, and keep following blogs about that new interest you’re having?! So your OTP doesn’t make your heart beat as fast and there’s that new pairing that’s consuming all your time on AO3?! So you saw something new that you can’t stop thinking about and you wanna share it with someone 24/7?! Embrace it! That’s what this is all about anyway- a bunch of strangers coming together to share obsessions. So don’t think of it as cheating on your Thing, don’t feel obligated to keep up with your old ways just because. There’s nothing better in life than that feeling of falling in love with something new and discovering others who love it just as much. And yeah, some people might hit their unfollow buttons on you, but so what? For each one that leaves, you’ll find some new ones to join the ride with you. 

Reach out. Send that ask. Follow that person. Hit that askbox. Some might never follow you back. Some with never reply to you.Some might find you annoying and make you question everything. It’s ok tho. Remember this is mostly anonymous and it’s much easier to deal with than real life rejection. And then, others will. They’ll answer back and stay and talk with you for hours and that’s gonna be the best damn part 💕 

Well, I can’t think of anything else at the moment. I might add to this if something else ever crosses my mind. And if you’ve read this far and somehow care, please add anything you find helpful. Let’s make this positive and enjoyable, yeah? 

[codenamesailordarillium]

I just stumbled across your tumblr & saw the thing where you said you don’t mind random asks, so I hope this ones ok: I got into DW over the past year & am now hardcore RiverDoctor. Unfortunately it seems like I’ve arrived to the party about 10 years late. Which means I stumbled across the section of the fandom that hates on THoRS bc 12 wasn’t “River’s Doctor” & 11 didn’t get to take her to Darillium for the first time today... Would you have any thoughts on that whole thing?

Wow…well, first I wanna say it’s always great to have new people on board. I know it might seem like you’ve gotten into it too late in the game, but trust me, new people in our corner in the fandom are always welcome (as with any fandom, of course). Feel free to send asks gushing about it to people, I’m sure fellow shippers would be happy to welcome you with open arms. ^_^

As for the rest well…this is gonna get long and probably have the potential to piss certain ppl off bc I have Opinions™, so gonna put the rest of this under a cut.

Hoo boy…yeah, 11/River *ONLY* shippers. See, the thing was, initially, back in late 2013/early 2014, when we were fresh off of Matt’s regeneration ep and all, I could sympathize to a certain degree with ppl who were sad about him leaving and were reluctant to see River/Alex with 12/Peter because it wouldn’t be the same or whatever. I didn’t agree personally (tho initially I was p bummed about Matt leaving, Peter started winning me over real quick not long after he was announced), but I understood that people have a certain attachment to characters and specific dynamics shippy or otherwise. 

But to me, River was always the priority when regarding my interest in DW, and I wanted to see more of her in the show again, regardless of which Doctor it was with. I didn’t like how abruptly Moffat decided to end her story, just because the majority of the big reveals unfolded with Matt as the Doctor and suddenly because he and Karen and Arthur weren’t gonna be on the show anymore it meant Alex had to go as well. That didn’t really seem fair to River as a character, ‘cause it felt like we’d only been shown the bare bones of her story, her background/origin, her getting married to the Doctor, and then her dying. It didn’t feel right for her to just…not be there all of a sudden. Certain episodes (and lbr character dynamics) during series 8 and 9 would have probably benefited from her presence (off the top of my head I’d say Time Heist, how the hell did this show have a heist episode with no River using her time-traveling archaeologist sleuthing skills, like dafuq).

So…pre-THoRS, the Doctor/River fandom after Peter took over the role was a bit of a mixed bag. There were the people who only wanted River with 11 and just angsting in general because there wasn’t gonna be any more of that, but there also was a significant bunch of us who were DEEP into wanting River & 12 to happen. People were still in the fandom, writing fic, drawing fanart, what have you, probably at a slower rate than they had previously, but there was still stuff being put out there, simply because we wanted to entertain what that hot Capalston Sex Storm chemistry might look like. So when news of THoRS suddenly hit us in the face like…

…needless to say, a good number of us were suddenly stoked, new life had been breathed into the fandom and there was pretty much constant excited yelling for like the three and a half-ish months after it was announced. Once the episode finally came out and Darillium got switched from that big dreadful moment where River’s story turned tragic (well, even more tragic than it already was) to literally the most warm and fuzzy soft 24 years of domestic marital bliss for River, there were diverging opinions.

Post-TNotD the fandom had come up with all these headcanons about 11 having lost River directly after losing the Ponds, which was why he was up on that cloud for a century and the generally accepted consensus was that Darillium had to have happened with 11. Admittedly, it doesn’t really paint 11 in the best light after the fact that he seemed to have tried dying on Trenzalore without ever having taken River to Darillium like he’d promised. But, looking back, a lot of 11 & River’s relationship as it was depicted in series 5 & 6 was fraught with emotional hurt on River’s end, so for me personally (and some others), it didn’t really seem entirely out of character for 11 once we really started thinking about it. 

Really, it’s more complicated because of the nature of TV and how with a show like DW it’s really impossible to plan out these big story beats ahead of time with different Doctors. Moffat initially tried getting David to stay an extra season after RTD left, and had David said yes, that means a good chunk of River’s story would have unfolded with 10. It kinda just ends up being a case of who’s currently part of the cast and how can we mold this particular part of the story around them. By the time Steven decided on the way in which he wanted to show Darillium unfold, Matt was already gone, so it had to happen with Peter.

(And I mean, if you wanted to put a positive spin on it, you could see it as 11′s big blustery last-ditch attempt at trying to prevent River dying in the Library from happening.)

I was admittedly a vocal cuntface about how much I DIDN’T want THoRS to end on Darillium before “24 years”. I hated the idea of 12 finally seeing and being with his wife only for it to end all unnecessarily angsty again. Moffat managed to completely upend and rewrite my expectations in that regard, fortunately. 

For a lot of us, it was about River being shown to finally have some no-strings-tied happiness with a Doctor who knew her. I think a lot of people wanted that to be with older!11, but narrative-wise, I think regardless of whether it’s older!11 or 12, the point is the Doctor being at a point where he can be the husband who River needs. One whose memories don’t need to wiped after the fact like all the classic Doctors, War, 9, or pre-Library 10. Aside from the whole HELL YEAH SPACE WIVES angle, I think that’s also what fuels a lot of the desire for River to be with 13 as well, a Doctor who knows and loves her regardless of what face their wearing.

For some ppl in this fandom tho, that didn’t suffice because it didn’t happen with Matt & Alex. And I mean, if that’s how someone feels, that’s their prerogative, but I don’t see any reason to rain on everyone else’s parade when it literally brought new life and excitement and joy and FUN into our fandom after what felt like quite a long dry spell without any River content. 

And I mean, not to get mopey and sad about it (trigger warning for some potentially upsetting stuff), but the news about River being back on DW in September of 2015 couldn’t have come at a better time fore me personally, bc that was literally a time in my life where I had sudden and overwhelming/dangerous mental health issues, to the point where daily I contemplated suicide and knowing that River was finally gonna meet the Scottish version of her husband was quite literally the thing that kept me alive, because I fucking HAD to see it. So, I do tend to bristle when I come across opinions that trash that particular episode, because it means a HELL of a lot to me. 

The only thing I can say about dealing with people who stew in negativity is to just try to avoid them. I don’t follow anyone who professes THoRS-negative opinions and in some very rare cases I’ve blocked certain people. In addition to this, bc Tumblr’s blocking system is balls, I use the xkit blacklist extension and literally put people’s urls into it so I don’t have to see their stuff when others unknowingly put it on my dash. (Tho be aware that if ppl change their urls you might need to go in and change it to their current one, but it’s not that hard to do.) Because at the end of the day, you just want to be able to enjoy the ship. You are the one curating your own fandom experience, and once you know what you want to avoid (or who), you gotta just take the necessary precautions.

[silentauroriamthereal]

So. I met Benedict Cumberbatch the other night. 

I’m still processing, honestly, and the big thing that I need to write is another letter to him, one which I assume going in that he will never read (I can’t even imagine the volume of fanmail he must receive!), but I’ll still write it because I need to say it, even if it’s never read. In this post I want to talk about some of the stuff I want to say there, so I’m just kind of working through my thoughts here. 

This is going to be long, and a little emotional, so I’m putting it behind a cut to spare your dashes (among other things!). 

I have a few different things to say about the entire thing. First, let me just go through the evening as it unfolded: 

I managed to buy a ticket to the New York debut of Letters Live. I’ve adored the concept of this event since the first time they held it and when I found out they were doing one in New York right during the tiny window of when I was going to be there, I jumped at the opportunity, though the tickets were uncomfortably expensive for me. There is literally no other living person that I would have been more excited to see perform and potentially have a tiny chance to meet, though, and the timing seemed almost foreordained, so I did it. 

The event was phenomenal. A gigantic wall of a human was seated in front of me - an unpleasant man who was approximately 10 metres tall and 5 metres wide, and I’m 5′4, so... yeah. I waited until after the first act and managed to slip into a much better seat, hahaha! The performance was so well-planned, I thought. The selection of letters was specially curated for an American audience, with most of the content written by Americans. To hear Rose McGowan read her own letter to the Hollywood higher-ups was chillingly powerful, as was hearing Toni Morrison’s letter to Barack Obama. There were several letters funny enough to make me cry with laughter, and to my pleased surprise one of these was read by another well-loved actor of mine, Tom Hollander (who I keep feeling so sorry for these days - people must confuse him with Tom Holland all the time, and they’re not remotely similar, lol). Benedict’s first letter was an absolutely hilarious one that just went around facebook about a month ago, written by a Canadian man apologizing for having absolutely trashed, via a flock of seagulls, his hotel room in Victoria eighteen years ago. He also read one of the Chris Barker/Bessie Moore exchanges with Loo Brealey, and finished the evening with Stewart Stern’s incredibly stirring and moving letter to the family of James Dean following his death. 

Listen: seeing Benedict perform live, with my own two naked eyes, breathing the same air as him - it may sound ridiculous, but that alone was profoundly moving to me. Just seeing him, period. Then seeing him perform - breathtaking. And then hearing him read this particular letter was just - it’s hard to even put it into words. I felt a little as though I was hearing him read what could be his own epitaph. Listen to these words: 

A star goes wild in the places beyond air — a dark star born of coldness and invisible. It hits the upper edges of our atmosphere and look! It is seen! It flames and arcs and dazzles. It goes out in ash and memory. But its after-image remains in our eyes to be looked at again and again. For it was rare. And it was beautiful. And we thank God and nature for sending it in front of our eyes. So few things blaze. So little is beautiful. Our world doesn't seem equipped to contain its brilliance too long. Ecstasy is only recognizable when one has experienced pain. Beauty only exists when set against ugliness. Peace is not appreciated without war ahead of it. How we wish that life could support only the good. But it vanishes when its opposite no longer exists as a setting. It is a white marble on unmelting snow. And Jimmy stands clear and unique in a world where much is synthetic and dishonest and drab. He came and rearranged our molecules.

I mean, this is exactly how I already feel about the nature of Ben’s talent, the privilege I feel at being allowed to experience it in any way, in any medium. He has a talent that lights up the cosmos and I’m just so grateful to the universe that this talent exists and has been given a place to be seen and witnessed by the rest of us. His talent blazes, and my life is the richer for being able to experience it. 

I tried really, really, really hard not to hope too much to have a chance to meet him at the stage door after. It’s kind of impossible not to hope, but I told myself sternly that I already never thought I would have the chance to see him perform in person, and it really would have been enough. I’d joked to my friends before leaving for New York that if he so much as laid his own two beautiful eyes on me and actually saw me, heard my voice, any of that, that I could die in peace. I’ve never expected that, though, to have any sort of fleeting brush of contact like that. It’s not the nature of the way a person like him relates to a person like me. In fact, allow me a tangential paragraph here: 

Being a fan can feel one-sided. I know everything that a person can possibly know about a person whom I have never met. I can guarantee that I have seen, read, or listened to every interview he’s done, ever, with very, very few exceptions. ALL of the press junkets. I could have written his imdb page. Like many of us! I know every line on his beautiful face. I know the freckles on his skin, the tendons of his forearms and calves. I know every part of his physicality that’s ever been shown to the public, and with him, that’s a fair bit! His voice is my ringtone (it’s a clip of Sherlock saying “it’s a text alert; it means I’ve got a text”) and his voice is more dearly familiar to me than most of the people I know personally. I know his facial expressions, though he’s constantly reinventing the way the muscles of his face can move for every new role he plays. I’ve analyzed his accents from a phonetics standpoint. In short, I know everything that’s possible for someone like me to know about someone like him. And he knows nothing about me - not my name, not what I do, not what I eat, not my voice or my talents or my eyes or fingernails or passions or pet peeves - not of my existence, full stop. But that doesn’t mean that our relationship - and bear with me on that word - is one-sided. This is how it works: he gives. He gives and gives and gives. Benedict doesn’t phone it in. He BLAZES. He burned through so much energy playing Hamlet (any wonder, have you seen him in it???) in the summer of 2016 that one of the reasons Dr. Strange had to push back its filming schedule was to give him the chance to bulk up again after the play’s run. Benedict commits, and like the aforementioned star analogy, he radiates energy to every possible point of contact around him. THIS is his side of the relationship: he blazes out his talent/energy/love/passion/commitment, and we receive it, and the appreciation and love and passion we feel in return for it is something that we share with each other, not with him. That’s how fandom works: it’s not a direct thing. Not in the standard, interpersonal way. He shines; we turn to each other rather than to him, to talk about how it made us feel, how it moved us, how it excited us and made us laugh and inspired us. Somehow, this entire experience crystallized this for me perfectly. 

Now, back to the stage door: there was an absolute CRUSH of people at the barricades. I don’t want to talk about this part too much because it was extremely unpleasant. We had to wait for a long time. I would have stayed until he left the building, no matter how long it took, unless it would have made me look like a total creep, because that’s not something I ever want to do to someone I admire. He did come out eventually, and that’s when the pushing and screaming started. I once said that I would never scream at a celebrity, and I didn’t. The crowd, unfortunately, was a mix of three groups of people: 1. aggressive paparazzi 2. aggressive fanboys who had brought comic book shit for Ben to sign so that they could sell it on ebay 3. genuine fans. Guess which group was not at all problematic?? Turns out I was standing right in a knot of #2′s, and because they were hollering at him, like screaming at him to get over there and sign their shit, Ben went over to the other side of the barricade to sign stuff there. He told off one of the paps and said he was there to be with the “real people”, which I appreciated. He did come back near us, and I had the briefest of moments to talk to him. I thanked him for not having become a lawyer, and he laughed. Everyone was thrusting stuff in his face and yelling. I just had my little ticket from the show, and the comic book manchildren kept putting their stuff on top of mine. Ben finally said he was going back inside, that his wife was there waiting for him, but he turned back toward me and I managed to ask (possibly plead) if he would sign my ticket. He looked me in the eye then, smiled, and said, “Of course”. 

I stammered out a congratulations on Patrick Melrose and he smiled again and said thank you, while he was signing. But that one moment of eye contact is all I wanted. He looked at me, and he saw me. And I made him laugh. 

I was literally almost suffocated by the awful people around me, none of which were: a) female, or b) actual fans. I’ve thought sometimes, while watching videos of Benedict on the red carpet, with all of those media folk screaming at him to turn this way, smile into their camera, all of that, that it feels very much like harassment. I know that people in his position know that it comes with the job, that the fame and riches are supposed to be the offset of having no privacy, of being followed by media and fans alike, quite literally, of being shrieked and barked at like they’re trained performing animals (which I don’t like, either!). I know he knows that, but it doesn’t mean that it’s pleasant in any way. He handles it like a pro, because he is in every way a consummate professional. But it can’t be pleasant for him. He’s incredibly, extraordinarily generous with his time. As a performer myself, I know how I feel when I’ve just finished a solo concert or an opera - I feel like taking off my heels and fancy dress, putting on pyjama pants and relaxing every muscle I have on a couch somewhere, preferably with a tall drink in hand. Performing Hamlet is considered one of the most demanding male roles in the English theatrical repertoire, yet Benedict would not only perform it a stunning eight times per week, but then sometimes spend up to THREE HOURS signing autographs and taking selfies after. If he chooses to limit how long he gets screamed at by aggressive, even violent paps and shitheads who just want to use his signature for money, good for him! I respect that, even if I felt incredibly sorry for the people further back who didn’t get to have that, one brief moment of contact with this person we all admire so very, very deeply. And so, because of this, because of seeing firsthand how gross people are to him and just the sheer volume of what he puts up with for our sake, so that some of us, at least, can have that tiny moment, I don’t think I would do it again, if only to reduce that volume by one teeny tiny amount. I got my one, deeply, deeply hoped-for, fleeting, searing moment of contact. It’s all that I could have asked for. He saw me, and I had the chance to say some tiny part of my gratitude to him for what he gives of himself to all of us. That’s all I wanted. 

The wait, the near-suffocation, all of that, was worth it, to win that one precious moment. I clutched my precious ticket and fought my way out of the crowd and wandered dazedly off toward the subway, through late Friday night Times Square crowds, feeling so much that I didn’t even know how to process it. I felt like I was about to burst into tears and I couldn’t have even said why or whether I was happy or sad or possibly a cornucopia of every human emotion ever. I felt - and still feel - a bit like I just had a brush with an actual, blazing sun. It was shattering, and I will be forever changed by it. I am so grateful.