The Fandom Review

I am a furry - and that's something I'm proud of. I've been a furry for a long time, even since long before I knew the word. I didn't always identify with the term, but in all honesty I always was. The furry fandom is far from perfect, but there's also a lot of good within it that I'm proud to see every single day.

Of course, if you go on the internet at all, you know that us furries have quite the bad impression, and while again, we're not perfect, it's really unearned. We're not sex freaks or degenerates, we're just a community of people with a common interest in anthropomorphic animals. At the same time, though, it's not really "just" that is it? It's a huge community that's so much more than what just one dictionary definition can encompass.

In recent years, the furry fandom has been getting steadily more positive press, with various features and documentaries coming out with the goal of education, rather than defamation. Few of these have come from within the fandom itself, however - until now.

I can't say for certain that something like The Fandom has ever been done before, because I don't know. Surely there have been attempts to document the fandom's history, but Ash Coyote's documentary feature The Fandom takes this history and uses it to answer one of the most misunderstood questions about our subculture; What is a furry? Furthermore, it does so from the perspective of someone inside the fandom - for once, it's us telling our story.

For a long time, even after I accepted myself as a furry, I didn't think I could tell people because of the stigma and misinformation. I've been slowly getting over that barrier and being more open about it, but now, I feel like I can finally include my friends and family in my hobby - if not directly than at least in the sense that I can be fully transparent about who I am and what I like to do. The Fandom is something I can point to and say "watch this," whenever I want people to know what furry is and what it means to me.

That is really what The Fandom excels at; portraying just how meaningful the furry fandom is to those within it. I can't imagine myself as anything but the proud queer furry I am now, and I'm not sure where I would be if I didn't open up to myself about that. It's a place of inclusivity, community, creativity and passion, and there's a longstanding tradition behind that.

The Fandom tackles a wide berth of topics; furry's origins in the science fiction conventions of the 1970's, the furry conventions beginning in the 1980's, the advent of the internet in the 1990's, the origin of fursonas and fursuiting, prominent works and creations in the history of the fandom, and the presence of LGBTQ+ people, among other things. It's definitely not the end all be all of the fandom's history, but it's a great jumping off point nonetheless, and it's made entirely by people with nothing but passion for the subject, and it shows. The filmmaking is highly professional, and the editing allows it all to come together to tell an overarching narrative of a community that celebrates, art, passion and identity.

Even though I knew a bit about furry history before this, and I know that not everything was tackled, there was still a lot I didn't know. I didn't know about the origin of fursuiting or fursonas, I didn't know about the Burned Furs of the early 2000's, I didn't know just how prominent the LGBTQ+ community was in the fandom since the very beginning. All of that was fascinating to learn about even as an insider, and I think people who are outside the fandom who want to know more are going to legitimately find something wonderful here. Already, I'm seeing people who aren't furries say they're looking at us in a whole new light from watching this.

I can't say that The Fandom is necessarily a perfect documentary, and I think its flaws come into play when we're discussing what it doesn't cover. Most notably, there's a striking lack of Black/Indigenous/People of Color representation. There's one fascinating segment that discusses the origin of fursonas, revealing that the first true fursona was created by a prominent Black artist in the fandom, but that's really about it. There's a history of racial tension within the fandom that was there even in issues that the documentary brought up, such as the Burned Furs, but while issues such as LGBTQ+ representation and women's representation were brought up, there was ver little as far as furries of color go. I know that Ash is planning on making further documentaries in the future expanding on this and including more BIPOC voices int he future, but it's still an oversight that I feel the need to call attention to. We need to do better by our BIPOC members in this community.

I'd also in general liked to have seen more about recent furry history, as most of it is focused on the first three decades of the furry fandom, but again, I know there is going to be more in the future, and there's only so much that can be covered in one documentary. As it stands, The Fandom does something more important than just tell the history of the furry fandom; it presents an introduction to what furry is for those who don't know, and it speaks to the ideals and passion at the heart of it all. Despite its flaws, it does these things exceptionally.

There's a lot of issues within the fandom now that the documentary doesn't even go into, and I hope that in the future someone will shed more light on the causes and potential solutions to those problems. But The Fandom did something else that I think is also incredibly important; it reminded me of what being a furry means to me, and why I would fight tooth and nail for the good in this fandom, no matter what. It made me remember why I'm proud to be a furry.

The Fandom is now available in its entirety to stream on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iv0QaTW3kEY&t=23s