Hello and welcome to This Week in Fandom, the OTW’s roundup of things that are happening! This week, the entertainment world seemed to swing into action, with a deluge of new content either released or announced. Some highlights include Avatar: The Last Airbender’s arrival on Netflix, and Hamilton’s stage performance recording coming to Disney+ over a year ahead of schedule on July 3rd. Is there anything else new and shiny on a streaming service that you love and we missed? Tell us in the comments!
Another recent release to Netflix is the fifth season of She-Ra. We’ll keep things spoiler-free in this post, but: it’s so very full of queer joy, folks. Tracy Brown writes in The LA Times:
One of the things that has been abundantly clear since “She-Ra’s” 2018 debut is that… [it] is set in a world that is completely, casually LGBTQ-inclusive.
On Etheria, princesses are just as likely to be married to each other as they are to have boyfriends. Not even the most ruthless villain around has trouble remembering anybody’s pronouns. It’s a planet where gender isn’t constricted, heteronormativity does not exist, and queer people just get to be.
And still, the conclusion of “She-Ra‘s” fifth and final season surprised me.
See Commentary: ‘She-Ra’ rewrote the script for TV’s queer love stories. Here’s why it matters for a discussion with spoilers of why everyone’s been so emotional about it.
In other joyful news, there’s going to be a Legally Blonde 3! It was first teased back in 2018, but now Mindy Kaling and Dan Goor are confirmed writers and Reese Witherspoon is coming back as Elle Woods once more. It’ll be a while before we can expect any more concrete tidbits, but your blogger likes this trend of upbeat entertainment news and new things to look forward to.
Finally, Aja Romano at Vox comes to tempt us into a new music scene – or maybe even a new fandom – with A beginner’s guide to K-pop, a look at the history and culture of the massive K-pop industry – and its equally massive fandom. Whether you need something new for your playlist, want to know what on earth is going on in K-pop fandom, or want to see some incredible dancers, there’s something here you can dip your toes into.
Are you already in the fandom? Tell us about your favourites in the comments!