Long long way to go

OMG, I saw PAPA Stilinski in Iron Man3. PLOT BUNNIES EVERYWHERE!!!!

But still find none of this crossover on AO3. Kinda sad…;_;

Really?

Sincerely hope some certain (Chinese) SHERLOCK fans stop apologizing for Chinese fans “misunderstanding” Martin Freeman’s “dry sense of humor”. 

For one, I hold my own opinion. No one has any right to represent another person without consent. 

And really, commenting other people’s appearance in an interview like this is rude and low, sarcasm or not. And being a meanie to you counterpart never make anyone looks good.

I do believe dry sense of British humor doesn’t always mean offending anyone though. So can some people just think before they even open their mouth? 

P.S. For a series gave me high hope on episode 1, SHERLOCK has really worn out that hope now. No improvement in story telling, no improvement in character developing, poorly integrated and problematic Chinese elements(meh), and now, attitudes. 

At least Elementary has less dickery at the moment. 

The difference of the superhero market in China

Recently, there’s a new DC store open in Guangzhou. Actually, this is not the first one. The last one didn’t do very well and was closed early this year. I hoped this one will do better and went to have a look. But I was disappointed.

Quite disappointed. And kind of pissed.

The failure of the first store is predictable. Aside from the market size at that time, the material and design did not match up with the excessively high price. I ended up buying a BAT neck tag with a huge discount and still feeling overly charged.  If I bought those clothes, I would have spent so much more than an American customer and end up getting some franchise with worse quality. It’s not fair. I don’t think other fans think it’s fair either. I’d rather spend money on trades because I can get the same product as an American customer.

And when the second store opened, I had high hope. When I saw their road show and saw all those cute posters they were setting around, I had so much higher hopes. Hey, maybe there will be something new, like mugs or towels or other franchise products with them that I’m happy to  buy. Well, no, they don’t have those. Instead, still similar accessories, higher prices, HUGER HUGER MALE LINE CLOTHES.

And you already know how I feel about this.

For those who don’t know much about the Chinese fans of superhero, this may be the biggest difference of this market than the American one: AT LEAST half of these fans ARE FEMALE. And the portion is actually quite a conservative estimate.

The first one introducing American comics in Chinese online community IS A FEMALE READER. Fangirls took up the larger part of the fandom and were mostly stable for many years. And after Superman Return, Nolan’s Batman trilogy and some other superhero movies were introduced since 2005, the fandom grew so much and fangirl number also spurted. You are more likely seeing fangirls spilling out correct geek knowledge of superheroes on the internet or giggling at the geeky nods to comics when watching superhero movies. And I already said that, they spend a lot of money to fill their shelves with superhero books and models and figures, even those designed to male fans. We even have fandom-con devoted solely to US and Europe comics and other media every damn year.

The market’s always here and I don’t understand why we don’t even have a UNIQLO female line franchise(they only have male DC and Marvel T-shirts) and end up heading to illegitimate source to get clothes with LOGOs that can fit our body and also charge a reasonable price.

Sometimes I really wish companies can learn something from Japanese’s Evangelion series. Their franchise strategy is so greedy, but at the same time so effective and diverse. Fans might complain a bit every time but are always ready to buy. One of my friends once said the best franchise strategy should make fans willingly emptying their wallet and still weeping in happiness for you gracing them a chance to spend their money. They are happy because they feel recognized, not just devoting their love to something treating them like they are transparent. You want to sell and make money in a market, you do your research, you don’t make stupid business decision because of ignorance, you don’t alienating the larger part of a market.

Rethink about this.