48 Anti-Fandom in Depp vs. Heard
Benien Al-Askar
COMM 3P18
Summative project
Lad Instructor: Suze Tkachuk
Professor: Derek Foster
Benien Al-Askar
Student Number: 7610637
Amber Heard, a Hollywood actress best known for her work on Aqua man and former wife to Jonny Depp also a Hollywood actor best known for his lead role in pirates of the Caribbean. On April 20th, 2022, Amber filled a domestic abuse charge against Jonny Depp, which lasted till June 1st, 2022. This is where Amber Heard’s anti-fandom started. Ant-fandom is when one dislikes the object or text of a fan for moral or ethical reasons. In this content analysis I will be arguing as why and how Amber Heard has a(n) anti-fandom group on twitter. Amber Heard had a very active anti-fandom. Many were posting about how lied multiple times on the stand and was trying to purposefully ruin Jonny Depp’s career. Within this content analysis we will analyze five different examples of anti-fandom.
What is fandom. Fandom is best defined as ““specific social and cultural interactions, institutions and communities that have formed through the close interaction of committed groups of fans in a subcultural context.” (Sandvoss, C. (2005) pg. 5) This is traditional fandom, where we used to know the people in our community of fans by name. However, the traditional fandom has changed into something new, that has grown with the growth on social media and the internet. Now there is fanification, this is best defined as “online fans essentially represent the way all audiences will interact with media from now on.” (Bird (2011) pg. 503) This is how now fans interact online and can be part of a much larger community than ever before.
Today there is yet another new term, hegemonic fandom, this is best defined as “everyone has to be a fan of something,” and negatively, since “everyone knows” that fans are obsessive.” (Hills, M. (2005) pg. 40) Hegemonic fandom shows how ever single person is a fan of something or another and that regardless of what we are a fan of/who, we are obsessed to a degree with it.
As a result of the Depp vs. Heard case that took place in the United States of America, Amber Heard found herself to be the recipient of anti-fandom comments. The two months of court hearings and claims she made were made into memes, and jokes, to show that the public did not believe her. The ant-fandom was so strong that it appeared to be that Amber Heard had very few supporters left. Twitter was filled with the hashtag #cancelAmberHeard show causing cancel cultural. Negative comments in regard to Amber Heard’s character, and a boycott of the next Aqua man movie as DC refused to drop her from the movie for weeks, before giving in to the public’s voice and firing her from the film.
Amber Heard’s first claim on the stand was that Jonny Depp had hit her and broken her nose. “We were struggling, he’s bigger than me. He hit me, I remember my nose being swollen, red.” (Locker, M. (2022, May 5) However, days after this inci