It's intersting how the Rey character in these books is often so closed off when the canon Rey is so desperate for connection and finding somewhere to belong. I always felt she was a very earnest character
Like if she wasn’t so desperate for anyone to understand her reylo wouldn’t have kind of sort of worked! Or at least resonated with me when I was a teen
That's because a lot of Reylos don't really understand or care about Rey as a character. Mostly, they view her as a stand-in for the reader/author to insert themselves into to ship with Ben Solo or just Adam Driver. Or at least that's what other Reylos I know feel about their fandom.
I read exactly two Reylo fics that I liked and it's because they both had excellent Rey characterization. In one they bond because she's so charmed by the different landscapes of the planets she's traveling to (especially watery ones) that she just HAS to share it with someone and it happens to be Kylo through their Force bond. She's like, "MURDERER! VILLAIN! Why did you kill-- HOLY SHIT THERE'S A BUNCH OF WATER FALLING OFF A CLIFF!?! It's beautiful?? I didn't know such things existed!!!" And he's like, "Er, a waterfall?"
The WILDEST thing to me is that there are apparently literary agents reading AO3 to find clients to sign???? WHAT. I think if someone emailed me wanting to represent me for filing-off-the-serial-numbers fanfic novels, I’d think it was a prank at first.
I had a friend who was a moderately popular Reylo author and she did get a DM from somebody on tumblr about being a literary agent who was interested in her writing (which even though I didn’t really Star Wars at the time (more into Anime tbh) was pretty good on a craftsmanship basis) … and she blocked that account because she thought it was a scam
re: the first order/Kylo Ren giving alt right vibes - when TFA was being promoted, JJ Abrams specifically referred to the First Order as "what if the Nazis went to Argentina and actually rebuilt instead of fading away". That man doesn't know subtlety, so any alt-right vibes Kylo had were probably deliberate.
Honestly, I'm surprised how Reylo started so many writing careers while still be a mediocre-level written ship. The sequel trilogy did the new (and old) characters so dirty!
In my experience, well-written canon ships are less likely to generate fanfiction and fanart, because canon satisfies the fans' hunger better than it does for poorly-written or non-canon ships
reylo wants to be edgy but comes across as milquetoast. out of all the het ships that exist, it's the least interesting one for me, but that could just be that i don't find kyle very compelling.
i think this is why i’m completely uninterested in reylo. rey is an interesting character but kylo has always come off to me like a prep school trust fund baby in boating shoes who is salty that his successful parents never came to his little league games
I think the biggest moment that shows that The Hurricane Wars didn't want to grapple with its implications was when Rey/Talisin is oggling Kylo/Alaric's lips...while he's talking about how he's going to wipe out all her people
@@sarcomeresarecool I was confused too because Netflix and Voltron seemed so closely linked at the time but!!! Voltron: Legendary Defender is actually a DreamWorks production. Netflix loses the streaming license six years after the release of the final season. The same thing has already happened to other DreamWorks shows that used to be on Netflix, though none that were quite as notable as Voltron. (I'm curious about whether She-Ra is similarly going to leave Netflix in 2026) No idea what DreamWorks intends to do with the show afterwards or how other IP holders factor into it...
from what i understand voltron: legendary defender is the reason proship/anti discourse is so widespread today, and for this i think the showrunners should face criminal charges. (for legal reasons this is a joke)
@@yesplease8805 They are and at the same time arent, the VLD fandom was like *that* because it was the big fandom on a very specific socio/political climate, it was the "trump election, post gamergate, gen z entering the world fandom" and so it showed how fandom would be in the future (as in, the idea that evryone out there is secretly a bad person who wants to hurt others and you can't trust anyone and evrything they do is a posible slip of the mask that will allow you to protect yourself)
wait dude you're telling me they made the Gaston character Finn?? FINN??? ok first of all I'm taking him away from the Reylo girls and putting him on the top shelf where they can't reach him. He is literally the only character in the new trilogy I was actually invested in, he's perfect he's my baby and I love him Leave Him Alone. I am so personally offended why would they do that to him. it's so contradictory to his personality I'm like, in order to cast him as a Gaston-type villain you would need to change so much about him as a character why not just make a weird OC at that point???? 😭there was literally no reason to drag my favorite guy into this leave him alone
Reylos have a long history of making Finn the bad guy for no reason, it’s always felt really gross especially considering how many reylos were blatantly racist in regards to not only Finn but John boyega as well.
Finn's character had so much potential. I wish the movies did more. It feels like the writers forgot about him and then had to wedge a plot involving him into the movie
@@Graycata I knowwwww, I was so sad about that. honestly I think the lack of good Finn stuff was the thing that really made me start to lose interest in the new movies lol. that guy was my blorbo
It's never that one fanfic with the most poetic and earth shattering writing that you read once at 2 am and think about for the rest of your life that get published..... Edit: omg i reached the part of the author who wrote that alpha/omega reylo fic and i remember vaguely one of my friends telling me about the racism undertones about Finn in this fic... I never knew the author had published a book oh man
"i'm not going to add nuance to this" is a wild thing to say but sums up the vast majority of ship arguments i've seen in the only seven years i've been involved in fandom spaces
i used to feel the same about reylo but after recently getting into this one toxic genshin ship that causes a huge split and a ton of discourse among the fans of noe of the characters... i think i'm willing to look at reylo with a perspective other than "everything about it is bad and if you ship it you're a terrible person"
Regardless of the quality of those books (I have only read a few and there were just fine), there is something very wholesome in the way all the writers gathered together to beta-read their fanfic, exchange gifts, and edited each other query letters. Truly a fandom on its peak.
god, i remember being 14 and reading all those 'reylo is abusive' posts, and feeling so morally righteous because i also hated reylo 😭 looking back i did not at all have the critical thinking skills to realize that i just... didn't like the ship... and that the narrative that shipping it meant condoning abuse never really added up. like, imo (at least in fiction) there's a pretty big difference between abuse happening between people that are (for all intents and purposes) on the same side (ie in a relationship), vs abuse that's happening in the context of literal war, between political enemies. as a sidebar, beyond being a classic finnpoe shipper i also liked finnrey and was hoping that if rey got a (male) partner it would be finn.. alas... :(
Yeah, the reason Reylo gives me the ick isn't so much what he did to *her* it's the fact that he blew up multiple inhabited planets and killed billions. And Rey's just...fine with that
I was also a huge FinnRey shipper! Their relationship was so wholesome and I felt like it had the potential to be interesting too. Ended up getting completely sidelined even as a friendship. ALAS.
@@whiteraven562Well…I wouldn’t really say that Rey was just fine with it. The whole planet destruction thing is largely pinned on Hux and Rey never attributes that galactic crime to Ben. But she’s clearly not fine about him killing Han and wanting to rule the galaxy
@@gracedilawri9741that’s kinda part of the problem, no? Kylo was still heavily involved but they don’t actually want to think about the narrative implications and deal with his role in multiple omnicides
This is such a refreshing addition to the I read [blank] so you don’t have to genre. I loved that your recaps also contained a lot of good commentary. I usually don’t pay attention to these but I was actually super interested in what you had to say! Also I love that you focused on actual numbers for your stats it was actually so interesting. (I know this sounds like a response in a college discussion board I promise this is genuine)
It’s kinda cool to think that a group of (presumably) online friends all collaborated and spurred eachother enough that Reylo fanfiction is now it’s own sub genre.
I love this video essay so much! As someone who has never really been into Reylo but loves ships like Draco/Harry and Draco/Hermione (the latter having loads of overlap with Reylo obviously), I have enjoyed some of those traditionally published books a lot! But I never knew the history of reylo or the reylo fic to traditionally published works timeline so this was so informative and fun. Especially as someone who adores fandom history. You obviously put so much work into this and it really shows! This video essay is incredible!
I've never seen your stuff before, but I salute your sacrifice. I have never understood why people even liked reylo, like ooh, a fantasy supremacist fascist with incel vibes. And then the racists in the fandom flocking to it meant it was even more offputting. Like, I like villain ships & enemies to lovers, they're usually great fun, but reylo was just so... Bland. And then ending on him being "redeemed" in the most predictable & boring way... Yeah. I don't get the appeal. Also finnpoe rights. Edit: I might have to read the vampire one, that sounds hysterical
50:05 i am enchanted/horrified that all of the Reys and Bens in Ali Hazelwood's books are friends. i know that having all of your protagonists in your books be in the same/adjacent social circles is the thing you do in romance novels and i tend to find it very charming. but they're all the same guys...... imagine all of your friends are you just with a different hair color, and you're all dating versions of the same guy and again the only real difference is hair color!
if macmillan hadn't put me in the high school textbooks section, kylux fic would be the ones getting published ... unfortunately educating the youth is probably more important
I'm still looking for books that scratch that particular itch. Seems weird that the ship that had been the most popular one at a time never got one of their writers published. :/ But who knows: maybe it's better this way...
@@Naniru87 ever since i've been hired i've wanted to sneak a printed manuscript of Flyboys by Gefionne to the trade publishing floor and just leave it around for someone to find... i'm 100% convinced that fic could be adapted into an original novel SOOOOOO EASILY
Love how comprehensive the history portion was! I love learning about fandom behavior and how it ties into something more mainstream like book publishing. Can't wait to see more fandom history videos from you! Subscripted!! ❤️
this was an absolutely FANTASTIC watch, thank you so much for sharing! I’m shocked this only has 3.7k views, the amount of effort and production value that’s gone into this deserves way more recognition. keep up the good work! very glad this popped up in my recommended!!! :>
I used to be anti Reylo but then I realized that nowadays they are a pretty insular part of the fandom who mostly just want to be left alone while the alt right anti-woke Fandom Menace continues to grow and I find the ‘facist’ criticisms really funny because guys there is a facism issue in this fandom but it’s not coming from the women who just find Adam Driver attractive
This video is sooo well made! Thank you for the research and the time consuming effort of reading bad books!! Also: Your pet peeve about the Hurricane Wars name dropping their war every other chapter is so true lmao
It's incredibly interesting to me how popular Enjoltaire was because as someone whose life otherwise revolves around Les Mis it passed me by completely
Not finished yet, but your presentation style and script are so engaging I've been zoned in the whole time! I've noticed this phenomenon a lot as a fic reader/writer and library worker. Even if it's not a filed-off fic, new romances often have notable "face claim" depictions of the love interests. Back page blurbs reference terms I used to only see in fandom spaces. And the books themselves contain stuff I used to only associate w/ fan-interaction, like playlists and jokey cw lists. My assumption is that its easy money for publishers since they get a story with a pre-established fanbase, a writer with a portfolio of works they've written with no expectation (originally) for profit, and that hits within a profitable niche. Bc even if I don't know the fandom a book was from, it can be easy to guess that it's fic: spelling and continuity errors, weird pacing for original fiction, expectations of pre-existing knowledge about characters or the plot that haven't been divulged, lack of physical descriptors. Basically, stuff that makes sense in an ao3 fanfiction where you have an understanding of characters and tropes, but doesn't translate to original fiction and was never edited for. The publishers do the bare minimum for a book to sell, rather than helping authors flourish, because that isn't their priority. And a lot of fic writers could excel as novelists (ofc many still do) if anyone helped them navigate original fiction, which stretches a different writing muscle from fanfic. Ah, this became a ramble. I just find it fascinating seeing this pipeline from both ends. Amazing work, you're so fun to listen to!
I had a friend in college who was into writing Reylo stuff and I don’t really Star Wars but they were pretty good fics from like a technical standpoint. She even got messaged by one of those publishing agents on tumblr… but she ended up blocking them because she thought it was a scam. Fast forward a couple of years to when she became the bookstore that she worked at’s designated Booktok curator…
I know this isn’t the point of the video but I’m one of the people who actually really liked the last Jedi and I hate how Rise completely cowtowed to the backlash making both the movie worse and the two previous films worse. Either JJ should have had a plan from day one or JJ should have taken off from where rian Johnson left off
Yes, please do a video about Voltron. It also had a ship between one of protagonists and one of antagonists, but it made a lot of sense (and then they break it).
I kinda disagree with the take that Star Wars character designs are supporting the whole neoclassical notion that beauty=moral goodness. Especially since I remember watching a video about all the different alien designs throughout the series and at one point in the video they go over how the notes in the production of return of the Jedi had Admiral Akbar designed the way he was specifically to undermine that sentiment of inherent beauty=natural goodness and why there’s a lot of aspects to his design that feel distinctly inhuman in a way that if taken out of context could be played as grotesque and horrifying but Star Wars never does that. Hell Chewie is practically a walking bear who’s actively called ugly by Leia, a character who fits typical beauty standards and yet he’s shown as no more heroic than the main crew. Hell in return of Jedi the dude who was the rancor’s master who dies and is not at all fitting into typical beauty standards especially in the 80’s is given time to respect and show his loss when the rancor dies and we’re meant to feel bad for me him even though we know Luke had no other option really. Even in the prequels dexter jexter whose design overplays the whole slovenly bigger dude aesthetic that is usually played as something I like to call, “fat evil,” where the bigger the person is weight wise the worse they are morally. Yet he not only is obi wan’s friend but he’s the reason obi wan knows anything about the clones and is crucial for the plot of the movie he’s in with him having a beneficial effect on one of the protagonists. Granted it’s not really flattering portrayal of heavier set people but it still betrays the neoclassical beauty standards that say goodness relates to beauty and underlies how aliens have always sort of been used in the series to undermine that notion.
Also this is one of the best essays I have seen so far. I was enthralled the whole time and didnt noticed it was almost 2 hours long. Thank you for your work and dedication these past 8 months! May I suggest you do one or the Marauders fandom or the Leakira fandom (the subset fandom of Voltron)
nah cause its so annoying that only the bad/weird fics get published there are so so many good writers out there, even very popular within the right fandoms
this is incredible. you put so much work into all of this. the look on your face as you mention kylux took me back to a dark time lmao. looking forward to more vids from you!
the algorithm is algorithming a little too hard 😭 i was an og reylo in 2016 and then promptly forgot about them after the last jedi. something about ship actually becoming canon soured my opinion of it
As someone who WILL fall asleep within 20 minutes of trying to watch anything star wars, i appreciated the history section (i have been vaguely wondering what reylos about for years so this was timely)
Absolutely Banger video. Great analysis of star wars fandom and I feel like I learned a lot on the history (despite mildly being involved back in the day). I think it's incredibly fascinating what Kylo Ren has done to the male romantic lead archetype and the overall rise of enemies to lovers in the current publishing world, even to people who didn't directly base their work off of a Reylo fanfic.
Super interesting video, great job!!! I laughed at Dead Romantics and My Roommate is a Vampire, I have read both of those and had no idea they were Reylo! I have a weird relationship with Reylo, I like the dynamic but the actual in universe material is.. meh.. and the fics range from interesting to the author is actually a bad person for writing this. Funny about Julie Soto though, I thought her books looked bland, and despite loving Dramione in general, I absolutely hated the Rights and Wrongs series LMAO
Really great job on the video once you get into the meat of it! To me, the background section was more comprehensive than it was interesting at times, but I am also a Star Wars fan so I may have been coming from a bit of insider perspective, if not a full Reylo one.
in the spirit of sharing the reylo wealth, my favorite not!reylo that got self-pubbed is "All's Fair in Ruts and Heats" a modern au dark romance omegaverse fic where rey and kylo are both lawyers. a real "hat on a hat on a hat" situation. (the fic version gave rise of an in-joke with my friend "kylo ren, esq") it's an insane ride, highly recommend if you want to read an unhinged formerly reylo story. (also i had been asking why so many reylos got tradpubbed!! so thank you for the deep dive!!)
The Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare started out as Harry Potter fiction I believe. Specifically, as incest fiction between Ron and Ginny Weasley which sure is.... something 😬
Dude I was not expecting f that last minute conspiracy board! That was a master class twist! L… but I’m gonna still use this video as a reading list lol bc I’m fanfic trash. ❤ thanks for the amazing video, only two in the can and both are worth the wait. Any recommendations on good fan fics by the way?
Every time I see people say that reylo is abusive I want to roll my eyes so hard. I get why someone might get that vibe, but... Guys, never heard of enemies to lovers? And you don't have to try and find a morally wrong reason to dislike a ship... You can just, you know, ignore it?? Vent about it to your friends??
I've liked reylo since the force awakens, always quite casually though. i never read any fic or interacted with the fandom in any meaningful way. overall i have always had a poor impression of reylos and since i have a dislike for the practice of filing off the serial numbers from a work and publishing it as original fiction, my opinion of them only worsened. i realize now i may have been a little biased. it's clear that some of these authors used reylo as a starting point and later developed original novels around the archetypes. that's original enough for me. i might pick up some of these books in the future. my dislike was never for the pairing because I've always understood (and enjoyed) the appeal of those kinds of archetypes. i do think it's much harder to pull off the switch if you're writing non-au fic. I've heard from people who read the hurricane wars and the fanfiction that originated it and many say it works much better as fanfiction.
Kylo ren was not supposed to be redeemed. He was supposed to be the reverse vader. starting with doubt and ending fully convinced he did right vs. anakin being convinced he is right and ending with doubt which leads to a change of heart. I'm also not sure if he can be called conventionally attractive. During my screening of TFA, when he took his helmet off the girl next to me whispered to someone next to her "ok, put the helmet on again D:" and apparently this wasn't something rare to be said. Even in FF he is often called unconventionally attractive bc of his facial features. Surprisingly, HUX gets that conventionally pretty treatment at least in FF much more often (at least in the kylux ones). And one little point about the John Boyega hate: he posted a montage of screenshots where Kylo and Rey fought and wrote something like "so romantic" over it or something which got the reylo's attention. This is why they kind of hated him? Still incredibly stupid (I mean - he was poking fun at it nothing more and he's right.).
It’s kinda cool to think that a group of (presumably) online friends all collaborated and spurred eachother enough that Reylo fanfiction is now it’s own sub genre.
i was a jedistormpilot shipper in 2015-16 (I'm ot3 trash lol) so I do remember this time. I think one issue you missed is the Reylos cross tagged everything. part of this was because tumblr did away with only having the first 5 tags of an original post appear in main tag, so not the fans fault nessiaraly but still annoying. Additionally the tag wrangling on AO3 meant that Ben Solo, Kylo Ren and Matt the Radar Technician (yes from the SNL Skit) where all different characters and many new AO3 users didnt know the difference between the / and the & which meant of you wanted to exclude Reylo fic your search you had to block SIX TAGS. I think that irritation certainly added to anti reylo sentiment in a way I've not really seen discussed.
No comment on her character and not saying this to mock her but there is something kind of funny about someone who went by kylotrashforever torpedoing her Kylo fandom presence. The eternal peril of the Forever fandom username. EDIT- I remember withcindy actually did a video a while back about some author drama that offhandedly mentioned the Reylo pro community connections! I remember a lot of them having shared Discord servers and so on- kinda incredible the way they bring each other up in a very fandom-y way after breaking into the industry because I feel like that was NOT present in the Twilight wave. It's super super representative of contemporary AO3 based fanfiction communities I've been around on Tumblr and Twitter though! You hype up your peers and friends and pull them up with you. Interesting to see where that mentality goes!
FINNPOE RIGHTS. NEVER FORGET WHAT THE MOUSE TOOK FROM US
they deserved so much better 😭
@@Taradoxxi It might have given us the Live Slug Reaction, but at what cost?
I could talk about the character assassination of both Finn and Poe for dayyysss
REAL.
It's intersting how the Rey character in these books is often so closed off when the canon Rey is so desperate for connection and finding somewhere to belong. I always felt she was a very earnest character
Like if she wasn’t so desperate for anyone to understand her reylo wouldn’t have kind of sort of worked! Or at least resonated with me when I was a teen
That's because a lot of Reylos don't really understand or care about Rey as a character. Mostly, they view her as a stand-in for the reader/author to insert themselves into to ship with Ben Solo or just Adam Driver. Or at least that's what other Reylos I know feel about their fandom.
I read exactly two Reylo fics that I liked and it's because they both had excellent Rey characterization. In one they bond because she's so charmed by the different landscapes of the planets she's traveling to (especially watery ones) that she just HAS to share it with someone and it happens to be Kylo through their Force bond.
She's like, "MURDERER! VILLAIN! Why did you kill-- HOLY SHIT THERE'S A BUNCH OF WATER FALLING OFF A CLIFF!?! It's beautiful?? I didn't know such things existed!!!"
And he's like, "Er, a waterfall?"
@kajamiletic3223 okay you can't just say that and not drop the fic names!! That sounds amazing!
@@kajamiletic3223 Don't be shy drop the link
I used to be happy that fanfic authors were getting deals. Now I just want them to STOP publishing them. Let them simmer! They're not ready!!!
The WILDEST thing to me is that there are apparently literary agents reading AO3 to find clients to sign???? WHAT. I think if someone emailed me wanting to represent me for filing-off-the-serial-numbers fanfic novels, I’d think it was a prank at first.
Ahh I got pinned! Thank you, love the video, love the channel, can't wait to see what fandom nonsense you cover next! :D
I had a friend who was a moderately popular Reylo author and she did get a DM from somebody on tumblr about being a literary agent who was interested in her writing (which even though I didn’t really Star Wars at the time (more into Anime tbh) was pretty good on a craftsmanship basis) … and she blocked that account because she thought it was a scam
@@phoenixfritzinger9185 Many of them are scams so she wasn't wrong in thinking that lol
re: the first order/Kylo Ren giving alt right vibes - when TFA was being promoted, JJ Abrams specifically referred to the First Order as "what if the Nazis went to Argentina and actually rebuilt instead of fading away". That man doesn't know subtlety, so any alt-right vibes Kylo had were probably deliberate.
i'm pretty sure the actor for hux said he studied hitler speeches for his scenes too
Honestly, I'm surprised how Reylo started so many writing careers while still be a mediocre-level written ship. The sequel trilogy did the new (and old) characters so dirty!
In my experience, well-written canon ships are less likely to generate fanfiction and fanart, because canon satisfies the fans' hunger better than it does for poorly-written or non-canon ships
What I learned in school today: any romance book can be a surprise reylo fanfic.
reylo wants to be edgy but comes across as milquetoast. out of all the het ships that exist, it's the least interesting one for me, but that could just be that i don't find kyle very compelling.
i think this is why i’m completely uninterested in reylo. rey is an interesting character but kylo has always come off to me like a prep school trust fund baby in boating shoes who is salty that his successful parents never came to his little league games
they wish they could be as edgy as mgk and megan fox and it shows
I think the biggest moment that shows that The Hurricane Wars didn't want to grapple with its implications was when Rey/Talisin is oggling Kylo/Alaric's lips...while he's talking about how he's going to wipe out all her people
I'm begging you for the Voltron video essay. Please? Pretty please? That fandom was so messy and I desperately need to see it analyzed
And apparently the show is being taken off Netflix in December so it might be now or never 👀
@@nah6024 didn't Netflix produce it? Why would they take it off?
@@sarcomeresarecool I was confused too because Netflix and Voltron seemed so closely linked at the time but!!! Voltron: Legendary Defender is actually a DreamWorks production.
Netflix loses the streaming license six years after the release of the final season. The same thing has already happened to other DreamWorks shows that used to be on Netflix, though none that were quite as notable as Voltron. (I'm curious about whether She-Ra is similarly going to leave Netflix in 2026)
No idea what DreamWorks intends to do with the show afterwards or how other IP holders factor into it...
from what i understand voltron: legendary defender is the reason proship/anti discourse is so widespread today, and for this i think the showrunners should face criminal charges.
(for legal reasons this is a joke)
@@yesplease8805 They are and at the same time arent, the VLD fandom was like *that* because it was the big fandom on a very specific socio/political climate, it was the "trump election, post gamergate, gen z entering the world fandom" and so it showed how fandom would be in the future (as in, the idea that evryone out there is secretly a bad person who wants to hurt others and you can't trust anyone and evrything they do is a posible slip of the mask that will allow you to protect yourself)
wait dude you're telling me they made the Gaston character Finn?? FINN??? ok first of all I'm taking him away from the Reylo girls and putting him on the top shelf where they can't reach him. He is literally the only character in the new trilogy I was actually invested in, he's perfect he's my baby and I love him Leave Him Alone. I am so personally offended why would they do that to him.
it's so contradictory to his personality I'm like, in order to cast him as a Gaston-type villain you would need to change so much about him as a character why not just make a weird OC at that point???? 😭there was literally no reason to drag my favorite guy into this leave him alone
Reylos have a long history of making Finn the bad guy for no reason, it’s always felt really gross especially considering how many reylos were blatantly racist in regards to not only Finn but John boyega as well.
Finn's character had so much potential. I wish the movies did more. It feels like the writers forgot about him and then had to wedge a plot involving him into the movie
@@Graycata I knowwwww, I was so sad about that. honestly I think the lack of good Finn stuff was the thing that really made me start to lose interest in the new movies lol. that guy was my blorbo
It's never that one fanfic with the most poetic and earth shattering writing that you read once at 2 am and think about for the rest of your life that get published.....
Edit: omg i reached the part of the author who wrote that alpha/omega reylo fic and i remember vaguely one of my friends telling me about the racism undertones about Finn in this fic... I never knew the author had published a book oh man
"i'm not going to add nuance to this" is a wild thing to say but sums up the vast majority of ship arguments i've seen in the only seven years i've been involved in fandom spaces
i used to feel the same about reylo but after recently getting into this one toxic genshin ship that causes a huge split and a ton of discourse among the fans of noe of the characters... i think i'm willing to look at reylo with a perspective other than "everything about it is bad and if you ship it you're a terrible person"
@@twistedhyruleI’m curious, what was the Genshin ship?
hurt me deep in my soul to hear “only my second video” and see released one day ago when i thought i just found my new person to binge watch
Regardless of the quality of those books (I have only read a few and there were just fine), there is something very wholesome in the way all the writers gathered together to beta-read their fanfic, exchange gifts, and edited each other query letters. Truly a fandom on its peak.
your eight months of sacrifice are appreciated
this is INSANELY underrated, i know its only been a day but i hope this goes viral, your research is amazing
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I feel like eli would be SO GOOD at explaining the marauders fandom please please please please please
"Starsky and Hutch fanfiction" well and truly stunlocked me for a few minutes.
god, i remember being 14 and reading all those 'reylo is abusive' posts, and feeling so morally righteous because i also hated reylo 😭 looking back i did not at all have the critical thinking skills to realize that i just... didn't like the ship... and that the narrative that shipping it meant condoning abuse never really added up.
like, imo (at least in fiction) there's a pretty big difference between abuse happening between people that are (for all intents and purposes) on the same side (ie in a relationship), vs abuse that's happening in the context of literal war, between political enemies.
as a sidebar, beyond being a classic finnpoe shipper i also liked finnrey and was hoping that if rey got a (male) partner it would be finn.. alas... :(
Yeah, the reason Reylo gives me the ick isn't so much what he did to *her* it's the fact that he blew up multiple inhabited planets and killed billions. And Rey's just...fine with that
I was also a huge FinnRey shipper! Their relationship was so wholesome and I felt like it had the potential to be interesting too. Ended up getting completely sidelined even as a friendship. ALAS.
@@whiteraven562Well…I wouldn’t really say that Rey was just fine with it. The whole planet destruction thing is largely pinned on Hux and Rey never attributes that galactic crime to Ben. But she’s clearly not fine about him killing Han and wanting to rule the galaxy
I’m still so sad finnrey never got as huge as reylo did, they had such amazing chemistry!!
@@gracedilawri9741that’s kinda part of the problem, no? Kylo was still heavily involved but they don’t actually want to think about the narrative implications and deal with his role in multiple omnicides
This is such a refreshing addition to the I read [blank] so you don’t have to genre. I loved that your recaps also contained a lot of good commentary. I usually don’t pay attention to these but I was actually super interested in what you had to say! Also I love that you focused on actual numbers for your stats it was actually so interesting.
(I know this sounds like a response in a college discussion board I promise this is genuine)
It’s kinda cool to think that a group of (presumably) online friends all collaborated and spurred eachother enough that Reylo fanfiction is now it’s own sub genre.
I love this video essay so much! As someone who has never really been into Reylo but loves ships like Draco/Harry and Draco/Hermione (the latter having loads of overlap with Reylo obviously), I have enjoyed some of those traditionally published books a lot! But I never knew the history of reylo or the reylo fic to traditionally published works timeline so this was so informative and fun. Especially as someone who adores fandom history. You obviously put so much work into this and it really shows! This video essay is incredible!
I've never seen your stuff before, but I salute your sacrifice. I have never understood why people even liked reylo, like ooh, a fantasy supremacist fascist with incel vibes. And then the racists in the fandom flocking to it meant it was even more offputting. Like, I like villain ships & enemies to lovers, they're usually great fun, but reylo was just so... Bland. And then ending on him being "redeemed" in the most predictable & boring way... Yeah. I don't get the appeal. Also finnpoe rights.
Edit: I might have to read the vampire one, that sounds hysterical
50:05 i am enchanted/horrified that all of the Reys and Bens in Ali Hazelwood's books are friends. i know that having all of your protagonists in your books be in the same/adjacent social circles is the thing you do in romance novels and i tend to find it very charming. but they're all the same guys...... imagine all of your friends are you just with a different hair color, and you're all dating versions of the same guy and again the only real difference is hair color!
It's so funny to be honest
The cringe away when you were trying to shoot confetti made me laugh out loud because that would be me too
I got scared
if macmillan hadn't put me in the high school textbooks section, kylux fic would be the ones getting published ... unfortunately educating the youth is probably more important
I'm still looking for books that scratch that particular itch. Seems weird that the ship that had been the most popular one at a time never got one of their writers published. :/ But who knows: maybe it's better this way...
@@Naniru87 ever since i've been hired i've wanted to sneak a printed manuscript of Flyboys by Gefionne to the trade publishing floor and just leave it around for someone to find... i'm 100% convinced that fic could be adapted into an original novel SOOOOOO EASILY
1:35:03 Oh no. The Reylo collective is a like a fanfic-turned-original Habsburging. Oh no. Oh noooooo.
I am CRUSHED that Black Moon Rising wasn't included in this. Though I guess it wasn't traditionally published afaik.
Black moon rising lives rent free in my mind
I've been waiting for someone to disect the reylo fanfic to published pipeline
I wonder who so many Kylos are chefs in these...
Love how comprehensive the history portion was! I love learning about fandom behavior and how it ties into something more mainstream like book publishing. Can't wait to see more fandom history videos from you! Subscripted!! ❤️
I used to think Rey’s name was reylo☠️
haven't even finished it yet but this is the best youtube content i've ever experienced with my eyeballs and ear holes, thanks Eli
this was an absolutely FANTASTIC watch, thank you so much for sharing! I’m shocked this only has 3.7k views, the amount of effort and production value that’s gone into this deserves way more recognition. keep up the good work! very glad this popped up in my recommended!!! :>
I used to be anti Reylo but then I realized that nowadays they are a pretty insular part of the fandom who mostly just want to be left alone while the alt right anti-woke Fandom Menace continues to grow and I find the ‘facist’ criticisms really funny because guys there is a facism issue in this fandom but it’s not coming from the women who just find Adam Driver attractive
This video is sooo well made! Thank you for the research and the time consuming effort of reading bad books!!
Also: Your pet peeve about the Hurricane Wars name dropping their war every other chapter is so true lmao
It's incredibly interesting to me how popular Enjoltaire was because as someone whose life otherwise revolves around Les Mis it passed me by completely
Not finished yet, but your presentation style and script are so engaging I've been zoned in the whole time!
I've noticed this phenomenon a lot as a fic reader/writer and library worker. Even if it's not a filed-off fic, new romances often have notable "face claim" depictions of the love interests. Back page blurbs reference terms I used to only see in fandom spaces. And the books themselves contain stuff I used to only associate w/ fan-interaction, like playlists and jokey cw lists.
My assumption is that its easy money for publishers since they get a story with a pre-established fanbase, a writer with a portfolio of works they've written with no expectation (originally) for profit, and that hits within a profitable niche.
Bc even if I don't know the fandom a book was from, it can be easy to guess that it's fic: spelling and continuity errors, weird pacing for original fiction, expectations of pre-existing knowledge about characters or the plot that haven't been divulged, lack of physical descriptors.
Basically, stuff that makes sense in an ao3 fanfiction where you have an understanding of characters and tropes, but doesn't translate to original fiction and was never edited for. The publishers do the bare minimum for a book to sell, rather than helping authors flourish, because that isn't their priority. And a lot of fic writers could excel as novelists (ofc many still do) if anyone helped them navigate original fiction, which stretches a different writing muscle from fanfic.
Ah, this became a ramble. I just find it fascinating seeing this pipeline from both ends. Amazing work, you're so fun to listen to!
I had a friend in college who was into writing Reylo stuff and I don’t really Star Wars but they were pretty good fics from like a technical standpoint. She even got messaged by one of those publishing agents on tumblr… but she ended up blocking them because she thought it was a scam. Fast forward a couple of years to when she became the bookstore that she worked at’s designated Booktok curator…
your editing?? your humor??? I am now an EliEvilEye stannie
I know this isn’t the point of the video but I’m one of the people who actually really liked the last Jedi and I hate how Rise completely cowtowed to the backlash making both the movie worse and the two previous films worse. Either JJ should have had a plan from day one or JJ should have taken off from where rian Johnson left off
Or they maybe could’ve kept Rian on and just let him cook… or just let anybody cook for that matter
@@phoenixfritzinger9185 so true they should have let him cook. Honestly the fact they had no plan for the ST is one of its worst qualities
Yes, please do a video about Voltron. It also had a ship between one of protagonists and one of antagonists, but it made a lot of sense (and then they break it).
I happen to know for a fact that Eli has done a Keith cosplay, so this is not at all out of the realm of possibility 👀
I kinda disagree with the take that Star Wars character designs are supporting the whole neoclassical notion that beauty=moral goodness. Especially since I remember watching a video about all the different alien designs throughout the series and at one point in the video they go over how the notes in the production of return of the Jedi had Admiral Akbar designed the way he was specifically to undermine that sentiment of inherent beauty=natural goodness and why there’s a lot of aspects to his design that feel distinctly inhuman in a way that if taken out of context could be played as grotesque and horrifying but Star Wars never does that. Hell Chewie is practically a walking bear who’s actively called ugly by Leia, a character who fits typical beauty standards and yet he’s shown as no more heroic than the main crew. Hell in return of Jedi the dude who was the rancor’s master who dies and is not at all fitting into typical beauty standards especially in the 80’s is given time to respect and show his loss when the rancor dies and we’re meant to feel bad for me him even though we know Luke had no other option really. Even in the prequels dexter jexter whose design overplays the whole slovenly bigger dude aesthetic that is usually played as something I like to call, “fat evil,” where the bigger the person is weight wise the worse they are morally. Yet he not only is obi wan’s friend but he’s the reason obi wan knows anything about the clones and is crucial for the plot of the movie he’s in with him having a beneficial effect on one of the protagonists. Granted it’s not really flattering portrayal of heavier set people but it still betrays the neoclassical beauty standards that say goodness relates to beauty and underlies how aliens have always sort of been used in the series to undermine that notion.
Also this is one of the best essays I have seen so far. I was enthralled the whole time and didnt noticed it was almost 2 hours long. Thank you for your work and dedication these past 8 months! May I suggest you do one or the Marauders fandom or the Leakira fandom (the subset fandom of Voltron)
in what world is a 5'8'' woman petite???? thats tall enough to be a runway model????
sorry ill continue the video now.
nah cause its so annoying that only the bad/weird fics get published there are so so many good writers out there, even very popular within the right fandoms
this is incredible. you put so much work into all of this. the look on your face as you mention kylux took me back to a dark time lmao. looking forward to more vids from you!
Now I must ask: How is Reyfinn
Fandom racism wouldnt let it thrive
This is an insanely massive experiment. I will be watching with great interest. This should go viral what the fuck
No shit you are literally my favourite youtuber. i have been WAITING for this next video to come out
the algorithm is algorithming a little too hard 😭 i was an og reylo in 2016 and then promptly forgot about them after the last jedi. something about ship actually becoming canon soured my opinion of it
It’s cannon now… but at what cost
No! No! not like this…
No! No! not like this…
This is the deepest of deep dives and my gosh I appreciate it
Extremely underrated excuse me you talk perfectly for background noise may the algorithm pick u up
As someone who WILL fall asleep within 20 minutes of trying to watch anything star wars, i appreciated the history section (i have been vaguely wondering what reylos about for years so this was timely)
I was genuinely throwing this video idea around in my head for about a month.
Thank you so much for taking one for the team
THE PLOT TWIST????
Sometimes youtube recommended gives me a banger. Subscribed so fast
Just wanted to say I have lovveeddd your two videos so far, such fun topics and so engaging im excited to see what else u post!!
And let me add your research knows no bounds Who else is out here exposing the reylo mafia??
This video essay is SO unhinged... And I'm here for it! Thanks a lot for yet another incredible niche but amazingly entertaining video essay ☺ 🖤
great video! thanks for all the hard work that went into it!
Absolutely Banger video. Great analysis of star wars fandom and I feel like I learned a lot on the history (despite mildly being involved back in the day). I think it's incredibly fascinating what Kylo Ren has done to the male romantic lead archetype and the overall rise of enemies to lovers in the current publishing world, even to people who didn't directly base their work off of a Reylo fanfic.
"Only my second video" WHAT???? Dude, this is one hell of a second video, great job!
This was so fascinating!
Amazing video, very well researched. I can't wait to see where this channel goes
I just subscribed to your channel. I love your sense of humor and your details.
Also with Ali Hazelwood I can point out every star wars pairing with her books
Super interesting video, great job!!! I laughed at Dead Romantics and My Roommate is a Vampire, I have read both of those and had no idea they were Reylo! I have a weird relationship with Reylo, I like the dynamic but the actual in universe material is.. meh.. and the fics range from interesting to the author is actually a bad person for writing this.
Funny about Julie Soto though, I thought her books looked bland, and despite loving Dramione in general, I absolutely hated the Rights and Wrongs series LMAO
Extremely educational
Really great job on the video once you get into the meat of it! To me, the background section was more comprehensive than it was interesting at times, but I am also a Star Wars fan so I may have been coming from a bit of insider perspective, if not a full Reylo one.
Really well done and you did a great job.
Here before 100k subs 🗣️💥 you have a great personality for yt videos!
this is a well done video!
Thank you for suffering so we don't have to. Amazing vid💕
I wish you were my English professor
I wish YOU were MY English professor
in the spirit of sharing the reylo wealth, my favorite not!reylo that got self-pubbed is "All's Fair in Ruts and Heats" a modern au dark romance omegaverse fic where rey and kylo are both lawyers. a real "hat on a hat on a hat" situation. (the fic version gave rise of an in-joke with my friend "kylo ren, esq") it's an insane ride, highly recommend if you want to read an unhinged formerly reylo story.
(also i had been asking why so many reylos got tradpubbed!! so thank you for the deep dive!!)
I wonder if there’s any other serial numbers filed off books based on other media besides the big ones like Twilight, Star Wars, Harry Potter…
The Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare started out as Harry Potter fiction I believe. Specifically, as incest fiction between Ron and Ginny Weasley which sure is.... something 😬
Dude I was not expecting f that last minute conspiracy board! That was a master class twist! L… but I’m gonna still use this video as a reading list lol bc I’m fanfic trash. ❤ thanks for the amazing video, only two in the can and both are worth the wait. Any recommendations on good fan fics by the way?
thank you for doing gods work
you remind me to a scary degree of my friend jay. super off topic, but it’s actually crazy
I may be a Reylo shipper but I was a FinPoe shipper first, and no one can take that from me, not even the mouse. We were ROBBED.
i love the internet
I love this vid
13:20 i was just thinking about zutara
Great vids
Whoa…
Every time I see people say that reylo is abusive I want to roll my eyes so hard. I get why someone might get that vibe, but... Guys, never heard of enemies to lovers? And you don't have to try and find a morally wrong reason to dislike a ship... You can just, you know, ignore it?? Vent about it to your friends??
I've liked reylo since the force awakens, always quite casually though. i never read any fic or interacted with the fandom in any meaningful way. overall i have always had a poor impression of reylos and since i have a dislike for the practice of filing off the serial numbers from a work and publishing it as original fiction, my opinion of them only worsened. i realize now i may have been a little biased. it's clear that some of these authors used reylo as a starting point and later developed original novels around the archetypes. that's original enough for me. i might pick up some of these books in the future. my dislike was never for the pairing because I've always understood (and enjoyed) the appeal of those kinds of archetypes. i do think it's much harder to pull off the switch if you're writing non-au fic. I've heard from people who read the hurricane wars and the fanfiction that originated it and many say it works much better as fanfiction.
plz make a marauders video plz 🙏🔥
Awesome vid but pls cut out swallowing noises if u can 💔💔 my misophonia is going bananas ahahah
should have started the video at part III. What a waste of time for the initiated...
someone needed to do it, thank you for your service sir 🫡
51:52 "reggie johnson"?? like two-weight world champion boxer reggie johnson?
1:43:43 lmao
I've been waiting for somebody to do this thank you for your service 🫡
Kylo ren was not supposed to be redeemed. He was supposed to be the reverse vader. starting with doubt and ending fully convinced he did right vs. anakin being convinced he is right and ending with doubt which leads to a change of heart.
I'm also not sure if he can be called conventionally attractive. During my screening of TFA, when he took his helmet off the girl next to me whispered to someone next to her "ok, put the helmet on again D:" and apparently this wasn't something rare to be said. Even in FF he is often called unconventionally attractive bc of his facial features.
Surprisingly, HUX gets that conventionally pretty treatment at least in FF much more often (at least in the kylux ones).
And one little point about the John Boyega hate: he posted a montage of screenshots where Kylo and Rey fought and wrote something like "so romantic" over it or something which got the reylo's attention. This is why they kind of hated him? Still incredibly stupid (I mean - he was poking fun at it nothing more and he's right.).
It’s kinda cool to think that a group of (presumably) online friends all collaborated and spurred eachother enough that Reylo fanfiction is now it’s own sub genre.
i was a jedistormpilot shipper in 2015-16 (I'm ot3 trash lol) so I do remember this time. I think one issue you missed is the Reylos cross tagged everything.
part of this was because tumblr did away with only having the first 5 tags of an original post appear in main tag, so not the fans fault nessiaraly but still annoying. Additionally the tag wrangling on AO3 meant that Ben Solo, Kylo Ren and Matt the Radar Technician (yes from the SNL Skit) where all different characters and many new AO3 users didnt know the difference between the / and the & which meant of you wanted to exclude Reylo fic your search you had to block SIX TAGS. I think that irritation certainly added to anti reylo sentiment in a way I've not really seen discussed.
fellow jsp shipper here, and I totally agree on this, the crosstagging was inescapable, and that was with me diligently blocking tags
i dont really get why its presented like you can only ship either reylo or finnpoe (stormpilot). those ships are not mutually exclusive??
truly fantastic work, godspeed on reading all those books. cant wait to see more from you
No comment on her character and not saying this to mock her but there is something kind of funny about someone who went by kylotrashforever torpedoing her Kylo fandom presence. The eternal peril of the Forever fandom username.
EDIT- I remember withcindy actually did a video a while back about some author drama that offhandedly mentioned the Reylo pro community connections! I remember a lot of them having shared Discord servers and so on- kinda incredible the way they bring each other up in a very fandom-y way after breaking into the industry because I feel like that was NOT present in the Twilight wave. It's super super representative of contemporary AO3 based fanfiction communities I've been around on Tumblr and Twitter though! You hype up your peers and friends and pull them up with you. Interesting to see where that mentality goes!
IIRC back in the day especially pre 50 Shades filing off the numbers was seen as a bit of a fandom faux pa, like you were selling out