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Just finished season 1 of Empire and I've really been enjoying it, has anyone else on my flist been following it? :) My favourite character is Cookie naturally, and I'm afraid that I've ended up shipping her and Lucious, even though he is of course terrible in every way, but somehow their chemistry and history has completely sucked me in all the same XD Oh and another character that I have a soft spot for is Andre. At first he didn't make much impression on me, but then towards the end I was really starting to emphasis with him. It always seems clear that Cookie first favoured Jamal before starting to bond more with Hakeem, and vice versa for Lucious, whereas Andre was always the afterthought, even his brothers clearly like one another more than they like him :( It really made me feel so bad for him when the rest of his family were all singing together, and he was always the outsider. I was kind of expecting Cookie to worry about him more after his mental breakdown actually, and realise that he needed more mothering that she had at first assumed, but even that seemed to be brushed aside very quickly after that initial scene of the family with him in the hospital, ironically Lucious was the only parent that seemed to be around and paying attention when Andre first left the hospital and had his religious crisis
And I'm totally team Andre on who should get the company, he's the oldest, he works hard, and he's clearly the most responsible. Neither Jamal or Hakeen have show any business aptitude, yet Lucious originally had a plan to hand the company over to Hakeen just because he liked the way that he rapped, when can anyone see Hakeen doing a good job with running a billion dollar company??? And Jamal was a better choice than Hakeen granted, but he's never shown any real interest in anything other than making music, he was just flattered at being chosen because it meant that he was finally getting his father's acceptance. Meanwhile even Cookie is telling Hakeen that she thinks it should be him and Jamal running the business between them, never mind the eldest son being the one who went to business school, and who actually has the skills and experience when it comes to running their company. So yeah, I am firmly Team Andre *g*
One thing that did surprise me was that, after reading that it's the number one drama on American television, I found that the online fandom really doesn't reflect that at all? There's next to no fannish content when it comes to fanfic or fan music videos, there's not a whole lot of icons or fanart either, and there's really not all that much discussion anywhere. For such a supposedly massive hit I was really expecting a little more, but half of the tumblr communities for Empire don't seem to have been updated in months...
And I'm totally team Andre on who should get the company, he's the oldest, he works hard, and he's clearly the most responsible. Neither Jamal or Hakeen have show any business aptitude, yet Lucious originally had a plan to hand the company over to Hakeen just because he liked the way that he rapped, when can anyone see Hakeen doing a good job with running a billion dollar company??? And Jamal was a better choice than Hakeen granted, but he's never shown any real interest in anything other than making music, he was just flattered at being chosen because it meant that he was finally getting his father's acceptance. Meanwhile even Cookie is telling Hakeen that she thinks it should be him and Jamal running the business between them, never mind the eldest son being the one who went to business school, and who actually has the skills and experience when it comes to running their company. So yeah, I am firmly Team Andre *g*
One thing that did surprise me was that, after reading that it's the number one drama on American television, I found that the online fandom really doesn't reflect that at all? There's next to no fannish content when it comes to fanfic or fan music videos, there's not a whole lot of icons or fanart either, and there's really not all that much discussion anywhere. For such a supposedly massive hit I was really expecting a little more, but half of the tumblr communities for Empire don't seem to have been updated in months...
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(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 03:41 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 06:22 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 06:55 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 03:59 pm (UTC)Fandom usually reflects the interest in ships rather than the interest in a show, and we barely see Jamal with Michael or Ryan, so I can understand people don't really feel the urge to create fanworks.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 06:29 pm (UTC)I can see it being a show where it's hard to get fully invested in any of the romantic ships though, the pacing does move so quickly that it's not really a show that's interested in setting up a slow burn
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 04:27 pm (UTC)Learn more about LiveJournal Ratings in FAQ (https://www.dreamwidth.org/support/faqbrowse?faqid=303).
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 05:07 pm (UTC)But there were some nice vids made nevertheless. Here's couple of recs, in case you missed them:
Cut Like a Buffalo (Cookie) by kiki-miserychic.
Monster (Lion family) by awkwardlyary.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 06:31 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 05:50 pm (UTC)Cookie and Jamal are my favorites (but especially Cookie)
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 06:34 pm (UTC)And I figured that Jamal would be most people's favourite, it seemed like he was set up as the most rootable of the three brothers definitely, so I was surprised at how much I ended up sympathising with Andre instead. He didn't seem like an obvious underdog at first, obviously he was pretty ruthless with his brothers in the beginning, but by the end I was really feeling bad for him and how out of place he seemed within his own family
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 08:19 pm (UTC)Cookie and Jamal (in S1, at least) are my favourite characters.
But I actually never even thought about fandom or checking fics for this series. I didn't feel the need to do so after watching the show.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 09:17 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-10 12:33 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-10 12:55 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-10 08:37 pm (UTC)I saw a lot of different reactions to S2 of the show, though. I guess it depends on the fact that people have different reasons to watch it.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 09:46 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 10:10 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 11:32 pm (UTC)Here's my reaction post to the Empire S2 premiere. I stopped watching shortly after. The narrative was just too stunt driven instead of character/plot driven, IMO, and it really put me off.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-10 09:32 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-10 06:29 am (UTC)Yeah, I remember being surprised about the lack of fannish activity last season. I thought it would be a much more popular vid fandom what with all of Cookie's amazing one-liners but...not so much. Then again, I never felt compelled to vid it either so...IDK why it never caught on fandom-wise.
I have mixed feelings on Cookie/Lucious. Obviously Lucious is the worst. He was a terrible husband. He treats her like crap half the time even now. And they often bring out the worst in each other...but at the same time, they have this ferocity when it comes to defending one another that I find really appealing. And the actors have insane chemistry. So I wouldn't say I ship them but I do enjoy them sometimes? If that makes sense?
Vids:
cookie humor
L/C
L/C s2 spoilers
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-10 09:38 am (UTC)And yeah Lucious/Cookie are a pretty problematic ship because I am always rooting for Cookie when she snaps at Lucious and gets one over on him, but the sense of history there does tug at my heartstrings every time still, and the actors do play it with so much chemistry that you can tell there is still a lot of love there. Thank you for the video recs! :)
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-10 12:28 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-10 01:02 pm (UTC)Jamal reminds me of his father the most of the three sons actually, he always seemed very confident and self-assured, so it did make sense that Luscious ultimately handed the business over to him once he got past his son being gay and could see himself in him, but I couldn't help feeling bad for Andre after all the work he had put in, yet his family seemed to have no real appreciation for him just because he wasn't creative like them
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-10 02:18 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-10 06:57 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-10 07:37 pm (UTC)And I was surprised that there seemed to be next to no discussion for Empire on tumblr, or even message boards like Fan Forum. I suppose it's not really a show to get fannish about when it comes to ships, but still it would have been nice to come across more general discussion
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-10 07:57 pm (UTC)Honestly fandom is so bonkers that as much as I like talking about things I'm now just hiding out, sometimes reblogging pretty gifsets. I wish you luck in finding people you can talk to and squeal with.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-11 02:20 pm (UTC)I am a huge fan of Hakeem, however, with what he did at the beginning of S2, it shall be interesting to see if I feel the same way about him at the end.
I do love Cookie too. It comes back at the end of this month and I cannot wait.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-11 04:29 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-13 07:23 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-13 08:36 pm (UTC)I'll just d/l the episodes from 211 when they come back, hopefully they'll have a detailed recap to help me catch up :P
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-11 09:12 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-11 11:10 pm (UTC)