2024 in review - media

[deepestbluesky]

i previously had done fic reading in with my other fandom wrap ups, but this year i decided to do making things vs reading/watching things! this probably won’t happen again tbh, bc i just don’t have that much to say about the non fic stuff i read this year—however i’d like for that to be because i do a better job of sharing this kind of update for those things throughout the year!

Watching

i saw exactly two movies in theaters this year, and i think those might have been the only this year movies i saw in general. they were, of course, challengers and wicked pt1. challengers was incredible, and wicked was… as an adaptation it really impressed me! i was expecting it to let me down, and it didn’t! however i also think it really reveals some of the flaws of the stage show (weak characterization and plot that moves inconsistently).

other movie wise: i watched the Great Muppet Caper for the first time, MAYBE robocop (or possibly that was last year), and ruby gillman (i had a friend who worked on this!). in terms of rewatches: tron legacy (don’t look at me), the wizard of oz (after seeing wicked), and lilo & stitch (with my parents because they’d never seen it).

i watched the requisite unfathomable amount of critical role (i’m completely caught up) and also REALLY properly got into dropout. i have watched… so much game changer and make some noise. i continued to watch too much dirty laundry and um actually. i also actually finally watched some more d20! i watched escape from the bloodkeep, s1 of misfits and magic, and never stop blowing up.

in terms of tv, i continued my usual trajectory, which is to say: minna and i watched blood of youth and couple of mirrors, and personally i watched s3 of legend of vox machina, and then i as we all know finally watched s4 of stranger things. (i did actually rewatch s1 of ST as well, over thanksgiving break while making cookbooks.)

Book reading

i had set myself a goal of reading 30 books again, and barely scraped into it. i would love to figure out how to hack myself into actually reading more rather than whatever this is making me do, but i’m still happy to be reading some! some highlights: boys weekend by mattie lubchansky, the whole last binding trilogy by freya marske, guardian by priest, grand slam romance v2 by ollie hicks and emma oosterhous (cannot recommend this enough, it’s PERFECT), the prospects by kt hoffman (i can’t believe i read TWO baseball/softball books this year, but this one is ALSO great and very recommended), land of milk and honey (which i really liked except was also the book i discovered has ai-generated images in it :/// ), and light from uncommon stars!

Fic reading

questions taken from two different twitter memes in addition to suggestions last year from the Fic Clique discord and some of my own questions. i didn’t track any type of stats this year, so this is all running on vibes! also i’m being lazy about linking, feel free to comment if you’re curious about anything!

fandom you read the most in this year? it’s gotta be stranger things. i got back into ST in… march? february? around there. and i read truly an absurd amount of fic for it this year. like to the tune of i can name 5-10 fics or series over 100k i read this year and have had at least 5 different tabs of search results or someone’s bookmarks for ST fics open on my phone almost all year.

smallest fandom you read for this year? HMMMM… let me examine my bookmarks to figure out if i can divine anything. OH! once i finished the Last Binding trilogy, i read some fic for it!

did you reread any fics this year? hmmm okay so i definitely reread all of superstition hockey+a lot of its fanworks in prep for yuletide this year. i’m pretty sure i reread tiger and its skin early this year. i feel like there was a ST fic i reread… oh yeah i reread a lot of the greatest hits of steve/nancy/jonathan from my bookmarks in part of my initial re-dive into ST, so special shoutout to ducks on the pond, bc i’m obsessed with the sports fandom feelings of that one.

longest fic you read this year? hoo boy, well, i started my ST fic dive by remembering just how many novel length plotty fics there are in this fandom, so let me see… off the top of my head, the psychic boom of hawkins indiana and monster of the week are both super long. okay yes that was true! psychic boom is a series with currently two works, and totals about 225k, whereas monster of the week is one fic about the same length. however the LONGEST fic i read this year was actually: better by you, better than me by palmviolet, also a ST fic and basically a whole canon rewrite, which is [deep breath] 347,983 words. don’t ask how quickly i read it.

shortest fic you read this year? well! as i talked about in my fandom creations wrap up, i ran a doodles and drabbles exchange! and we had several exactly 100 word drabbles in that, all written by nerdyjellyfish and they were all lovely!

wip you read this year? well, actually, monster of the week (mentioned in longest fics) was a wip when i caught up, but only for like two updates, so i’m not sure that counts. there are several wips i’m still following! time to see if i can pull out which ones i was actively reading updates for… oh right! world.runExecution(), which i started reading in 2022, finished this year! other wips that live free in my brain that updated this year: the force of the blow., in the pines, going round the twist, t r u e r o m a n c e. some fics i read a significant amount of updates for this year: the (monster-hunting) shop around the corner, bitter melons (translation), and all around us are cliffs!

fic you betaed? uhhh surely i betaed something. if nothing else, i know i did first reads for some of minna’s exchange treats? OH!!! mary jane’s last dance, the ST sapphic mini bang fic i podficced! i also beta read that! ah also minna’s trembling followup fic, at least for some chapters.

favorite fic you read because of Fic Clique? OH it’s GOTTA be the goosekeeper game!!!! special shoutout to a romantic fool, but i read most of the challengers tag so i would have found that one anyway, but i NEVER would have found goosekeeper game without fic clique and it was TRULY something special.

yell about some favorites

fic you want to (or did) rec to everyone? i mean, monster of the week, actually lol. also the most remarkable thing about you standing in the doorway is that it’s you. i KNOW these are both stranger things fics and the second one has some content warnings to beware but FUCK they’re both SO GOOD, YALL!!! i know i recced monster of the week in FC, and i know i recced most remarkable thing to minna.

did you make any rec lists? genuinely don’t remember lmao. lemme go look. OH I FINALLY POSTED THE SHL/TYK/QY LONG FIC LIST BACK IN JANUARY!!! i also participated in FC’s annual rec exchange, so if anyone else would like a list of LONG fics that i think might read well without canon knowledge and have lots of plot (including once again monster of the week lmao), enjoy!