FANgirl Blog 2012 Year in Review
Lex here with the blog’s year-in-review for 2012. Tricia is putting the final words to the page on Wynde, but we couldn’t let the end of the year pass without acknowledging the many highlights for the blog and fangirls.
From the beginning, one of the main goals of FANgirl Blog has been to provide a venue where fangirls can make their voices heard. With that in mind, in 2012 the blog dramatically expanded its roster of regular contributors. Linda has shared her experiences playing Star Wars: The Old Republic and reading the tie-in novels, and has conducted several interviews. Mary also has conducted interviews and written reviews, Megan provides a weekly review of The Clone Wars, and Kay has reviewed several Expanded Universe novels and contributed to the Hapan and Fel roundtables. And of course we all miss Racheal and her positive voice here and at her own blog. FANgirl also featured several guest posts from Priya and others – with a special shout-out to Abby DarkStar for garnering nearly 6,000 hits for her commentary on cosplay – and interviews with Victoria Schmidt, Shea Standefer, Erica Heflin, and Katrina Hill. It’s safe to say the goal was accomplished this year!
Of course, Tricia had a great year for her own fangirl voice, too. Her first two official Star Wars publications were interviews with Aaron Allston and Timothy Zahn for Star Wars Insider. She provided great posts for Suvudu, and had a chance to provide her insights with an early fan read of the The Essential Readers Companion – with the best possible synergy, seeing the Jaina-Jag and Tyria Sarkin Tainer art created for Suvudu printed in the ERC. A huge thank you to Erich Schoeneweiss and Frank Parisi at Del Rey for making all that happen, as well as opening several incredible opportunities at Celebration VI. Tricia also made several more appearances on the ForceCast, was a guest on Star Wars Report to talk about Star Wars Weekends, and guest-posted twice at ActionFlickChick. And at GeekGirlCon she hosted the featured Saturday Star Wars panel to standing-room-only attendance and highly favorable reactions.
Although I may not be a biological fangirl, I’ve been delighted to continue serving as editor of FANgirl Blog and Wynde this year. Thanks to Tricia and all of our contributors and guests for making my job easy most of the time. I’ve enjoyed contributing posts of my own, as well, and will be making more in the year ahead. And I’d like to give a nod to Ian Miller for his guest post comparing Revenge’s Emily Thorne to Batman.
Aside from all these accomplishments for Tricia and the blog, 2012 also was a great year for female characters, strong women in real life, and fangirls in the fandom. From movies to television we saw many heroines as hitmakers, further dispelling the notion that female-led stories can’t thrive in the marketplace. Topping them all, obviously, was The Hunger Games and Katniss Everdeen, whose journey to heroism and supportive team of friends and allies became not just one of the bestselling books in recent years, but also one of the highest-grossing movies of all time. The Legend of Korra also earned excellent ratings, including with boys. Brave, Joss Whedon’s The Avengers, and Fate of the Jedi: Apocalypse let female characters shine, as well. We also watched women excel at the Olympics, serving as role models in and out of competition. Within genre fandom, women’s voices are making themselves heard more than ever, too. Bogus fears about “fake” geek girls now are roundly dismissed from a wide variety of perspectives, and female Star Wars fans rallied together to denounce another appearance of the ridiculous idea that the Star Wars franchise is “for boys.” Once again, the fandom spoke up to say Star Wars is for everyone. With the Sequel Trilogy now on the way, that welcoming message to fans of all kinds is more important than ever.
Speaking of Episode VII, no doubt 2013 will bring huge developments in the process of creating the new Star Wars movies. It’s impossible to predict the timing, but we’ll likely learn the movie’s director fairly soon. With pre-production on tap for the spring, casting can’t be far behind – which means we’ll begin to discover the featured characters and maybe the basics of the setting, antagonist, and plot. Although FANgirl Blog isn’t a news site, we’ll certainly have commentary and analysis on Episode VII developments throughout the year.
But 2013 won’t be limited to Episode VII in its excitement, of course. The Expanded Universe will continue to provide tales about old favorites and perhaps create some new ones. We’ll continue to talk about our favorite characters, starting with the conclusion of the Fel Roundtable. The Clone Wars will conclude Season Five and enter Season Six, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire will hit theaters, and much more. Tricia has exciting news in store for 2013, too, but I’m not authorized to say anything about it just yet.
Finally, thanks to all of our readers throughout the year. We’ll do our best to make 2013 even better.
B.J. has served as editor of FANgirl Blog from its inception, as well as contributing reviews and posts on a range of topics. He edited Tricia’s novel Wynde, and is collaborating with her on several future projects set in that original universe.
Currently a tenured law professor in Florida, B.J. has been a practicing lawyer in Washington, D.C., a law clerk to a federal appeals court judge, and a law journal editor-in-chief. He is also a proud geek dad whose son who is a big fan of Star Wars and The Clone Wars.
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How right you are, Lex! This was a great year to be a fangirl, especially for those of us with the good fortune to be associated with FANgirl Blog.
Tricia – sneaky little bundle of energy that she is – persuaded me to expand my participation in the burgeoning fangirl community. Her nudges resulted in some great personal highlights:
GeekGirlCon in Seattle: Having missed the first GGC last year due, I was very happy to go to GGC2. It was terrific to meet fellow FANgirl contributor Linda, as well as have a second chance to visit with old Cantina friend, Joanne, along with their families. Meeting the amazing Ashley Eckstein – ambassador extraordinaire for women and for Star Wars as well as Her Universe – was fantastic. Ashley is such a genuine, caring person. Children gravitate to her and now I know why: she is an absolute delight. She was part of the reason that being roped into joining Tricia, Linda, and Ashley on Tricia’s “Women in Star Wars” panel was a lot more fun than I expected (thanks for the big shove, Tricia).
That panel also paid much-deserved homage to the very painful loss of long-time friend and fellow fangirl, Racheal Ambrose-Stinson. Just a few weeks after the accident in which Racheal lost her life, her husband Joao Stinson courageously flew to Seattle to take her place on the panel. His contributions to the discussion were touching tributes to his wife. Racheal was with us in spirit that day, and was undoubtedly very proud of Joao.
On more official FANgirl Blog-GGC business, it was my absolute pleasure to meet and spend an hour talking with Erica Heflin, Editor and Writer at GrayHaven Comics. If you haven’t found GrayHavencomics.com yet, take a look. They have some of the very best indie comics anywhere. I am particularly fond of Erica’s “Mother and Son” series as well as “The Gathering” anthologies. Fantastic! It’s their fault (Erica and Andrew Goetz) that I am now intrigued with the idea of developing my own style of comics art. I’m having fun with that.
We all barely got home from Seattle before boarding more flights and changing focus to Star Wars Celebration VI in Orlando. Once again, Tricia introduced me to some very cool people and provided the opportunity to meet with and interview prolific Star Wars author, Troy Denning.
That interview felt more like a “fireside chat” than a Q&A session. Troy was generous with his time (we talked for more than twice the time allotted by Del Rey) and he graciously discussed a wide range of topics. Troy is quite a raconteur with a great many stories to tell. I hope to have the chance to hear some more from him in the future.
As an artist newly interested in different styles and methods of drawing, coloring, and lettering comics, I was thrilled to find so many Star Wars artists at CVI who were more than happy to discuss their work and show me their artistic process, from pulling out their personal concept sketchbooks to discussing finished products. Thank you all so very much! A special nod goes to fellow Canadian, Ken Lashley (“Ledkilla”), whose talent is surpassed only by his generous spirit and shining presence in the Force. Ken, my Yoda is framed and on the wall for inspiration. It has garnered quite a bit of jealousy among those who have seen him! Thank you so much for leaving those sketch layers visible – and for answering my questions as I watched you work at your Celebration table. You have helped me to grow as an artist.
After Celebration, I discovered that Tricia wasn’t finished with me yet. She offered the chance to conduct an online interview with famed art and social critic, Camille Paglia, and write a review of her controversial new book, “Glittering Images: A Journey Through Art From Egypt to Star Wars.” That was a truly fascinating and gratifying experience.
Attending a midnight showing of The Hunger Games movie was a definite highlight of 2012. After reading the novels several times, I can’t wait to see the Mockingjay movie next fall. Hopefully, that will make the highlight list for 2013. At the very least, I have no doubt that Jennifer Lawrence will continue to inhabit the character of Katniss Everdeen like no other actress could.
Thank you, Tricia, for several well-timed and well-deserved kicks in this fangirl’s butt. You pushed me to grow, and for that I am eternally grateful.
Now, let’s see some more fangirls kick some industry butt in 2013!
Mary
Oops! Getting ahead of myself! Waiting to see Mockingjay when we haven’t seen Catching Fire yet!