Not really into most mainstream franchises. Am I missing out?

[Markness]

I don’t really keep up with or even follow most mainstream franchises, especially when it comes to movies and television. I am often in my own world and that’s because I am socially isolated and alone most of the time so my initiative to keep up with trends is low. However, I sometimes wonder if I am missing out on anything by not showing more interest in mainstream franchises.

I am not bashing any of the franchises I am listing. I am just explaining why I find them difficult to invest in and maybe fans can help me find ways to circumvent these barriers.

Dr. Who - I’ve never watched a full episode or movie if there are any of this series. Growing up in the 90’s, if it wasn’t Star Wars or Star Trek, no one talked about it or at least I didn’t know about it. It wasn’t until I was an adult I finally learned about it and occasionally heard people point at the Daleks as well as the TARDIS. I’ve been told the franchise is very old and has been ongoing for decades so it feels daunting for me to try to get into it.

Star Trek - I’ve watched the original movies up to The Undiscovered Country, watched the three reboot trilogy movies, and thumbed through a comic but have never watched a full episode of any of the tv series nor read any of the novels. While it was talked about in my childhood, it wasn’t as liked as Star Wars and wasn’t really considered “cool”. I now no longer care what is “cool” or not but just like with Dr. Who, the amount of content to watch is daunting for me so I can’t really call myself a “Trekkie”.

Star Wars - I’ve seen all of the trilogies (The Disney Wars trilogy only because someone else paid for my tickets each time because I really don’t like Disney), the Rogue One movie, some episodes of The Mandalorian, played some of the video games, thumbed through some of the comics, used to have some of the toys, read the novel of Shadows of the Empire, and loosely participate in a D&D type role playing game based on it with friends. However, I am not a “Warsie” because I can’t keep up with the lore for both the large amount of content associated with it as well as finances, I used to worry that liking it made me a “nerd” so I fell behind majorly, and there is almost no middle ground in how it’s perceived by others.

Game of Thrones - I see library patrons check out the DVDs as well as the novels the TV series is based off of. I’ve also seen it get compared to the manga Berserk a lot which I am a fan of. I can’t really put my finger on why I don’t feel the need to watch the series and I am intimidated by the sizes of the individual novels.

DC - I read a good number of DC’s comic titles, watched some of the movies (Both live action and animated), watched most of the Bruce Timm helmed cartoons intermittently as a kid, and loved the recent Harley Quinn cartoon. I do still feel daunted by the sheer amount of media associated with the company so there is a lot of content that I still haven’t read and watched yet or possibly never will. I know more than the Average Joe does about the comics but dedicated fans make me look like a novice.

Marvel - Pretty much the same deal with DC. I do read more Marvel than DC comic titles and have watched more Marvel movies.

Transformers - I am familiar with a good number of the characters as well as their various incarnations and used to watch Beast Wars as much as I could as a kid as well as had a good number of the toys. I’ve never watched a full season of the original TV series, never read the comics, and don’t keep up with the toys. Admittedly, I like Gundam more when it comes to “robots” (Gundams technically aren’t robots since they are mecha.) and that’s partly why I don’t really keep up with Transformers.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - I loved the cartoon as a child, played some of the video games, had some of the toys, and watched the original three movies. But I’ve never read the comics (Both old and new) and the newer cartoons don’t catch my interest.

Power Rangers - Similar situation with TMNT. I honestly lost interest sometime after the original series. The recent movie I only watched because someone paid for my ticket.

The Walking Dead - It’s a similar situation to Game of Thrones. I guess playing the Resident Evil games gave me my fill when it comes to zombie media.

The Big Bang Theory - An ex-friend actually expressed shocked at me for not watching this. I actually didn’t even know about it until I heard someone talking about it randomly but what little I’ve actually seen of it just didn’t enthrall me.

The Matrix - I don’t really know why I wasn’t interested in watching them when they used to be super popular. Later on, I read interviews that the Wachowski brothers drew a lot of influence from things like William Gibson’s Sprawl books (Particularly Neuromancer) and Ghost in the Shell.

 

[Misery]

Are you missing out? Just depends on what you like, I suppose? Frankly a lot of mainstream stuff is... not very good. But some is okay, I guess. And some IS good, particularly some older ones or series that are still going but have simply been around for a long time.

Just some thoughts on individual series you've mentioned:

Dr. Who: Eh. Honestly I've always found it to be kinda overrated. It tends to go with the "let's just be as weird as possible and that'll be entertaining" style of sci-fi. Some of it just ends up coming off as purely goofy. Absolutely nothing wrong with jamming some humor into your sci-fi series, but I tend to think that "LOL SO RANDOM" isnt the best way to do it.

Star Trek: This is the one I'm super familiar with. I've seen most all of it (except Enterprise). You dont need to understand a giant pile of lore to grasp what is going on nor is there really any "correct" starting point. If I were to choose, I'd say, start with Next Generation. Reason: It's Next Generation. It was just so good, soooooo darned good. It's also where Q gets introduced and where the series starts to show just how wild it can get (wheras the original series was a bit more restrained... sort of. You still had things like Kirk having fist fights with a freaking god and stuff like that... okay it's not THAT restrained). Star Trek is good, and it really is best to just sort of jump in. If you do give it a shot and there's something you dont get or just arent quite sure of, feel free to ask me about it directly and I'll try to help it make sense for you.

Star Wars: Ehhhhh. I sorta feel like this one kinda degraded at a certain point. The movies hit the prequels and got kinda stupid, the books got REALLY stupid (look, I'm sorry but dropping a moon on Chewbacca to kill him off when a Jedi was RIGHT FREAKING THERE to pull him onto the ship before it happened was a very, very special level of dumb). I find this series is best when taken in pieces rather then when considered as a whole. I've always preferred the books (some of the books, again they got idiotic after a time) over the movies. But I've never been a huge fan to begin with.

Game of Thrones: Bleh. Seen bits of it, wasnt really impressed. Also I've heard that the ending (for the TV series) is legendarily bad. Heck if I know why. Note that the TV series and the books very heavily diverge after a certain point as the show came out much, MUCH faster than the books.

DC: Oh yes this one is daunting. A friend of mine is really into DC, and he made a good point: it's best not to worry about it too much, and just sort of leap into individual story arcs and watch how those play out. He gave me the Darkest Night compilation, as well as the Green Lantern Corps one (the one where all of the different Lantern colors are involved), and the... er... "Darkseid possesses everyone" one (I cant remember the name) and those were very good. Because they were well written, they were easy enough to understand even for me. And if I was curious about any given character (for instance I was a bit baffled as to who/what the Anti-Monitor was, aside from the fact that he was enormous, evil, and dead) the wiki for it is very well done and it's easy to just look it up and go "Oh, so that's what that guy does". Also certain series are just really good, as far as non-comics. The old Justice League animated series is highly regarded for a reason, for instance. The ONE problem I see with DC is that, like Marvel, the exacts of certain aspects can vary a bit from one writer to the next. For instance, a certain writer doing Superman might make him WAY overpowered, even when considering the nature of what he can do... another might write him as being incredibly strong, but still able to be defeated by particularly strong foes like Darkseid, without Kryptonite being involved.

Marvel: Not as familar with this as my friend isnt really into it. What I DO know is that the movies can differ very heavily from the comics. For instance, in the movies Thanos is presented as being a "well-intentioned extremist", in that what he's trying to do is *awful* but he does genuinely have a good reason behind it, even if his approach is nonsensical. In the comics... he's a pure villain through and through, definitely just evil, and nothing like his on-screen counterpart, which includes the sorts of things he does and his entire motivation. So the movies can confuse the franchise a bit.

Transformers: wow I remember Beast Wars. That was so darned good. This franchise seems to have fallen by the wayside after awhile... just dont hear about it much outside of the "LOL EXPLOSIONS" movies. It doesnt seem like there's really all that much to explore here, after a certain year.

 

[unperson]

You have to be an adolescent to be into those series. In the case of Dr Who, you also need to be British or from a former British colony.

 

[BrokenBoy]

I'm going through something similar, however it's because of my ADHD making me unable to watch TV shows or movies. I've been making efforts to consume more this year though. As for the mentioned franchises themselved:

Dr. Who - I watch a few episodes of the reboot which is the 9th doctor era. Never felt the need to continue due to episodic nature of it.

Star Trek - Seems interesting. Never watched it.

Star Wars - I watched the first movie. I gave my opinion on it in another thread. I dunno if I'll watch the rest of the trilogy.

Game of Thrones - I own the first novel but I couldn't get into it because the vocabulary was too much.

Marvel and DC - I hate superheroes.

Transformers - I am very interested in this series. Initially didn't care as a kid and disregarded as a toy commercial. However one day I just stumbled upon the wiki and all of a sudden my hours were sucked away. The lore was so weird and yet, so interesting? I watched a bit of Beast Wars and never got back to it.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - Don't care.

Power Rangers - Don't care.

The Walking Dead - I am interested in the comic, not the show. The show seems to be a watered down Hollywood-fied version.

The Big Bang Theory - Don't care.

The Matrix - I really don't know much about it. Maybe I'll watch it some day. I heard the sequels are terrible though.

 

[Sherlock77]

I say to just enjoy what you enjoy, don't worry about what other people are into

My main thing is music, I know very little about the artists who populate the Top 40 charts and I don't care... Prior to Covid (ahem), I have always enjoyed music genres that tend to be less popular (I love bluegrass music!) and also exploring our local music scene, musicians who aren't famous but who I think are as good, who play in small cafes around town and at open mic's, and such

And I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything, I think that the best creative work most often comes from lesser known artists, who may never get a big break

 

[Fino]

Half your list I wouldn't have identified as mainstream. Not that I'm disagreeing. I hear about some of these from my students. Luckily, when they hear I haven't watched any of them, they just assume it's because I'm adult. Adults are always freaked out about it. Hopefully I never have another of those conversations again in my life.

 

[Trophonius]

Most mainstream franchises are garbage anyway.

 

[Progster]

Doctor Who - I grew up on Doctor Who- I really liked it, until more recently when they started running out of (good) ideas.
Star Trek - great! One of my all time favorites, particularly The Next Generation and Deep Space Nine. Edit: also Voyager.
Star Wars - I saw the movie when it first came out and liked it, but otherwise it is overrated in my opinion.
Big Bang Theory - enjoyed up to about series 4 or 5, then got bored of it.
Can't stand fake laughter, I don't need to be prompted when to laugh.
I never liked Disney.
I never really got into superheroes, though I did watch Batman, Superman, The Incredible Hulk as a kid.
I'm not into video games and know little about them.
I don't know any of the others mentioned. I don't watch mainstream TV, and anyway, documentaries are really more my 'thing.' These days I like to be informed, rather than entertained.

 

[Thinx]

I watched Dr Who from Episode 1, aged about 5 I guess, I recall hiding behind the sofa it was so scarey. Luckily a sturdy sofa protects one from all manner of aliens. Black and white telly in those days. But I abandoned it at university time, the only TV was in a group room, I never watched TV much from 1976 to 79. Later I watched it again when the stories and characters appealed. I liked the series with Billie Piper in it.

Star trek, first series, my sister loved this, but although I enjoyed it I found it a bit sad that the future was still so sexist. And still dominated by old men, as those guys looked to me back then. New Generation I liked a lot, also Voyager, another great team, and great captain. I also had a phase of watching Deep space 9. Quite good. Interesting ideas.

Star Wars, never watched it but my friend loves it so have seen it all, quite amusing.

Marvel, ditto, and quite like some of these. Wakanda Forever!

Big bang theory is very light, I did watch some, because of the connection to Aspergers, but often wasn't fully engaged by the stories. I liked the one where the blonde girl got into gaming and went all grungy, that was funny. And sometimes it was poignant in a familiar way.

But generally I prefer films, and drama or police series, or, gardening. Real gardening I mean.

 

[Major Tom]

I liked game of thrones and walking dead up to a point in each series. Then I was like WTH and just quit watching them. Which is something I rarely if ever do.

The others don't interest me at all.

 

[Wolfsage]

Wouldn't Dragonball Z be considered mainstream now? I always liked the 90s version. It's unique. Especially the Frieza Saga. So good!!

Star Wars. Old fan. Not one of Disney'' version though. Aside from Rogue One. 2003 Clone Wars miniseries I would recommend to anyone.

Power Rangers. Saw many seasons of this show. And have a vcr tape of the very first episode of said series. Watched Time Force, Ninja Storm, Space Force, SPD, after that I don't remember any others. Oh. Also saw the 90s movie they made of it. Still good in my opinion. I think they did a spoof of it in Dragonball Super at the tournament of power my opinion.

Transformers. I have bad memory loss but, I think I saw Beast Wars a few episodes anyway. It was back when they first really started experimenting with computer generated animation. Oh. And Transformers Armada. I also watched Transformers Prime. Would recommend. Saw the movies too. Enjoyed the action.

Dr Who I got into when David Tennant was the Doctor. He and the one after him were the best. After that it wasn't as good.

Marvel. Batman the animated series 90s version. The movies with Christian Bale. And Arkham games were all good.

Marvel. Spider-man movies with Toby McGuire really seemed to start the beginning of a new hero movie era. One I think ended with Avengers Endgame.
90s animated series was one of the best shows I have ever seen. Xnen cartoon also from the 90s was good too very memorable theme song.

Star Trek. I've only seen next generation and only because professor Xavier was in it.

Anyone else remeber Swat Kat's? Scary show that one.

 

[Markness]

I was going to reply to some posts but my draft for the first one got lost and my executive function has been malfunctioning so I will have to try again later.

I will say that the Dragon Ball franchise is indeed mainstream and I like it though I am more of a fan of the manga. It’s similar to how I prefer the comics by DC and Marvel nine times out of ten. I prefer canon over adaptations generally.

I watched Swat Kats as a kid and I was thrilled that there was to be a revival but it’s currently in developmental hell.

When it comes to comedy, I love Beavis and Butthead.

 

[Eclipse14]

I used to watch Doctor Who, but lost interest after a little while. It's alright but I'm not a superfan of it. It's often a little too crazy and out-there for me personally.

Star Trek I love. Great science fiction and adventure, and explores a lot of really interesting ideas. I actually want to get deeper into Star Trek because all that I've seen of it has been nothing but great.

Star Wars I used to love but kind of stopped caring about after the sequels and other Disney crap. Only Star Wars media I still genuinely love is The Clone Wars and Knights of the Old Republic.

Game of Thrones I never cared about ever. I love Berserk but yeah GoT just doesn't appeal to me at all.

DC/Marvel, meh, don't really care about superheroes. I think Batman is neat and I get why people love it so much but I'm mostly apathetic about it all.

Transformers I love. I've collected a lot of figures and I haven't seen too much of the cartoons yet but I intend to sit down and watch them all eventually. I'm a big fan of mecha and giant robot stuff in general so Transformers is kind of up my alley lol. Used to watch the 80s Transformers movie every week as a kid. Like you though I'd say I like Gundam more. Gundam is more for 'adults' and is a more consistent and gritty sci-fi universe while Transformers tends to get a bit silly.

TMNT I loved as a kid but don't really care about anymore.

Power Rangers I never cared about.

The Walking Dead I never cared about, zombie stuff is generally just not interesting or appealing to me.

Big Bang Theory is terrible and I highly recommend avoiding it like the plague.

The Matrix... I ADORED the first movie, but thought the sequels were utter garbage. The first film is a sci-fi masterpiece, the other two movies just take a dump all over what made it good to begin with.

Overall... not missing out on much. Star Trek I really enjoy so maybe you're missing out on that but meh. Everything else mentioned here is either just 'fine', overrated, or honestly trash. Honestly none of these things mentioned are my favourite franchises at all. My favourite franchises are things like Gundam, Fallout, The Elder Scrolls, Metal Gear Solid... they aren't talked about much but those are some of my TRUE favourite things.

 

[tkcartoonist]

I didn't have an opinion on this franchise one way or the other before I went to the mental hospital, but afterward I never want to see a frame of a Fast & Furious movie ever again. Every other patient seemed to want one of those movies on in the dayroom.