Welcome to Fandom Rising. We’re an independent, creator-owned site which first began in 2022 when a group of professional journalists and critics united with a shared goal: To build a home online for people who want serious, thoughtful work about the art, stories, and culture that means something special to real people. “Fan” isn’t an insult, a punchline, nor a distinction for only those who’ve memorized the minutiae. It just means someone who cares. It’s the kind of shared feeling that turn a group of strangers into a community.
Fandom Rising: A Critical Eye On The Art We Love
You love this stuff, and so do we. Comics, movies, television, Bollywood, video games, shared culture, and the genre stories that get passed around and argued about and revisited for decades. We’re skilled professionals, but we’re also, always fans, too. Fandom Rising exists because we think loving something and thinking seriously about it aren’t in tension. They make each other better.
We hold this work to the same standard we’d want if we were reading it: real analysis, honest reactions, and writing that respects both the material and the reader enough not to phone it in. We’re not here to harshly criticize, nitpick, or be cruel. We don’t think being a critic requires losing the joy of being a fan, but rather marrying that enjoyment with the kind of critical thinking that reveals the deeper meaning just waiting under the surface to be discovered.
Fandom Rising promises substantive, professional, and insightful commentary on art, culture, and everything else we love. Yet, what’s just as important is opening up the larger discussion to many different voices. With A.I. summarizing (even in some cases plagiarizing) the aspects of the larger cultural discourse, singular, distinct, human voices are more important than ever before. So, while all the work will be held to a high standard and fit into our ‘house style,’ it won’t be repetitive nor interchangeable. The dynamic voices that make up the Fandom Rising team are our most precious asset, and they will be the core of this new, inclusive community where being a “fan” and deep critical thinking are not mutually exclusive.
What We Cover, and How We Do It
Reviews that dig deep and have something important to say.
We review new releases in film, television, and gaming quickly and thoroughly. Being a fan of something doesn’t mean pretending every installment works, and being critical of something doesn’t mean tearing it or the people who love it apart. We can disagree with a show’s choices, or with each other, without treating disagreement as a fight to win. We offer our honest opinions and analysis so you can decide for yourself if it’s worth experiencing for yourself. Our “spoiler” reviews aren’t mere recaps, but rather dig into the substance of storytelling choices, character exploration, and many other elements so readers can better enjoy the narrative arts or understand why they didn’t.
A second look at the stories that shaped where we are now.
Alongside new releases, we regularly revisit the stories and “franchises” that stay with us forever. Early MCU entries, foundational Star Trek seasons, the movies, shows, and games you keep coming back to or forgot you loved. Sometimes, they hold up beautifully. Sometimes they are more complicated than nostalgia gives them credit for. Either way, it’s a conversation worth having. We officially launched in August 2026, but this site features a number of earlier works our incredible critics brought with them to Fandom Rising.
Pop culture and trending topics
From industry award shows to documentaries to, sometimes, the things blowing up your social media feeds, the stories that touch us aren’t just on TV, in movie theaters, or on the page. Just as our reviews and features help broaden our understanding of television, film, and even songs, our pop culture coverage can help us all try to make sense of the world around us. We also include select reporting, explainers, and editorials about the business of entertainment, for better and worse.
Room for the bigger picture.
We will cover the news that actually matters to fans, and go deeper than a review or feature allows. We’ll break down a scene worth unpacking shot by shot. We can zoom out and analyze a full season of a show or an entire franchise (with the benefit of hindsight). We also look at the broader trends shaping how these stories get made and told, and why some make it and some never get their fair shot. Some of it will be very timely. Others will be the kind of essays that will still be worth reading weeks, months, or years from now.
Our coverage isn’t meant to be the definitive last word on these subjects. They are meant to start a bigger conversation, where there will be room for all sincerely held opinions. That’s what makes fandom special. It’s creative, collaborative, and communal. Stories are empathy engines, after all. The work the Fandom Rising team does can help us all understand the stories we love (or don’t like at all) better. But, if we’re really lucky, the larger discussion this work begins will help us understand each other a little better, too.