I was reading metafandom today and saw this post on fannish tendancies. One of the things lyore did was list her fandoms, the primary characters she liked, and then her secondary favorite characters in parentheses. She noticed that she tended toward loving the main characters and then paying some attention to the secondary ones.

Of course I had to try it. ^_^


Batman-BTASverse: Joker (Harley Quinn, Poison Ivy, Batman, Mad Hatter, Scarecrow, Penguin, Tim
Drake, Barbara Gordon)
Batman-Nolanverse: Joker (Crane, Harvey Two-Face, Rachel)
Batman-Comicverse: Joker (Catwoman, Batman, Ra’s Al Ghul, Tim Drake, Poison Ivy)
JLA: Batman (Hawkgirl, Wonder Woman)
JLU: Batman (Hawkgirl, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern)
Sandman: Death (Dream, Delirium)
HP: Snape (Sirius, Lupin, Luna)
Yugioh: Pegasus (Kaiba, Mokuba, Yugi, Mai)
/>Sweeney Todd-Filmverse: Mrs. Lovett (Sweeney Todd)
Vampire Chronicles: Armand (Lestat, Louis, Gabrielle, Santino, Claudia, Akasha)
/>Legacy of Kain: Raziel (Kain)
LotR: Aragorn (Eowyn, Faramir, Eomer)
X-Files: Scully (Mulder)
Star Wars: Obi-Wan (Luke, Leia, Han)
Ju-On: Kyako
Inu-Yasha: Kikyo (Sango, Sesshomaru, Kagura)
Aliens: Ripley (Hicks)


I noticed something very different, as you can see. Firstly, I had to add things like Ju-On and Aliens because thos characters are ones that I refer to often, are a part of my fannish identity, influence me on a regular basis, and if I could find any good fiction about them I'd probably read it. (Of course I don't read fiction or fan works in all of these fandoms, mostly because it's unavailable -- a whole other topic.) The only series with multiple recurring characters in which I liked a main character is JLA, JLU, and LotR. The first two of those are probably because I'm a fan of Batman and, when there are other characters around with which I'm unfamiliar, I latch onto old Bats first and get to know the rest of the cast later. My favorite character in that fandom collective, though, is the Joker. When he shows up, I'm there. ^_^ With LotR, I watched the movies before reading the books, so I think a lot of that love of Aragorn is highly influenced by the film.

Anyway, what did I learn? Well, that I'm not really as biased toward male characters as I'd expected -- in fact, I identify with strongly with quite a few female characters i.e. the Inu-Yasha, Aliens, Sandman, and Ju-On media.

I do, though, tend toward identifying with male characters a) when there is a distinct lack of female characters (Yugioh, Batman, Legacy of Kain), b) when I find the lead female characetrs distasteful (such as HP with Hermione, Yugioh with Anzu, and Inu-Yasha with Kagome), and c) when I can strongly identify with a character's personality/behavior/approach to situations (Batman, Snape, Joker, pegasus, Raziel, Obi-Wan).

I wish I was 1337 enough to calculate the percentages and stuff, but alas I'm a writer not a calculator. Anyway, any thoughts on this guys? I know a lot of you are fans too.