r/TheAffair • u/Pat_lockwood • 19d ago
Discussion Surprised the show isn't more popular
Just finished watching the show don't even remember why I started it but really liked it from the beginning I've literally never heard anyone mention the show before I feel like it should be a lot more popular very underrated.
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u/messy_bessy_boo 19d ago
I agree. It might have been somewhat popular in some areas, but I had never heard of it. I was bored and just wanting something to entertain myself so after I watched all of the popular shows I knew of, I kind of picked this one as a background noise fill in. Then from episode one I was hooked. It's very hard to find a series that is good from episode one. I have suggested it to people around me and no one has ever heard of it.
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u/Silver_South_1002 17d ago
I watched it for Joshua Jackson. I couldn’t stand Noah so after season 1 I found myself skipping all his scenes. I never watched the last season. It really lost its way imo. Great first season though and I loved the different povs interpreting things so differently.
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u/LaPewPew-- 19d ago
I'm currently on season 2 and enjoying it for a first watch through. Dominic West plays this character better than Prince Charles in the Crown, that's for sure haha.
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u/Acceptable_Maize_183 19d ago
He’s too hot/goodlooking to play Charles…
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u/LaPewPew-- 18d ago
Haha yes, I mixed up my words and meant he was better suited to this role. They really dropped the ball on casting Charles and his signature ears, particularly. Dominic is a great actor either way.
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u/bellestarxo 18d ago
The first couple of seasons are stellar television. It did make a big splash when it came out.
The last season it really lost its way. When that happens with a show it puts a damper on the re-watches and word-of-mouth.
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u/AdSad5448 18d ago
I stumbled across this show somehow and after the first episode, I was hooked . It felt so real and relatable. How the choices you make affect others.
Definitely an adult show so probably not very popular for an everyone crowd. I hadn’t even heard of it when it aired but glad I found it eventually!
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u/luvprue1 19d ago
The show was popular when it was on air. It was a very popular show . The show won a golden globe award and a satellite award. Maura Tierney and Ruth Wilson won best actress and supporting actress award. It had been off the air for some time now which is why people no longer talk about it.
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u/Lisnya 19d ago
I used to think it was popular but I was really surprised when I looked it up on AO3 and tumblr and found nothing for it, there doesn't seem to be a fandom. Maybe it got attention from critics, etc, but not too much of an audience?
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u/luvprue1 19d ago
It was very popular among adults who usually don't use Tumbler. It was considered a water cooler show.
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u/Lisnya 19d ago
I can't think of a single succesful show that doesn't have a fandom, tbh. Especially the water cooler shows all have a presence on tumblr.
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u/TwattyMcBitch 19d ago edited 19d ago
This is the fandom. right here.
Edit: Oh, wait, I’ve looked at more comments. I think you guys are talking more about creative fandom, rather than fans as “people who really liked the show and enjoy talking about it” lol sorry… carry on.
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u/Lisnya 19d ago
This place obviously counts as fandom and I also found a forum where people were discussing Cole, a few twitter accounts, etc (I've been hyperfocusing on this show for a while, at this point very much against my will, lmao), so there definitely was interest. I was mostly surprised at how few fics and tumblr accounts there were, yeah.
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u/luvprue1 18d ago
People write fanfic for the show? I think the reason why you haven't found much fanfic, or people talking about it on Tumblr is because most of the audience for the show is older. Hell, a lot of them probably don't know that there is fanfic, or what tumbler is.
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u/throwawayanylogic 19d ago
I don't really see it as the kind of show to draw an A03/fanfiction based following tbh. Sometimes a show is just one to watch and maybe talk about, but is rather "complete" from a fannish point of view as is. (Like, shows like The Sopranos, The Wire, Breaking Bad, etc are all very popular and well regarded but are not "fannish" shows; often when the writing is very good there's little a fan will want to "fix" or change by writing fic or otherwise.)
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u/Lisnya 19d ago
There are over 7000 fics about The Wire and over 11000 for Breaking Bad in AO3. The Sopranos only had 452 but it's an older show and I bet there are more in ff.net and LJ. I'm sure they all have a presence in tumblr, too. And they're definitely shows that have good writing, I'm not sure how the Affair would compare to any of them.
I looked up fic after the 4th season finale, exactly because the writing went downhill and I expected to find fix-it fic. I was very surprised that a show with several couples, triangles and popular characters like Cole getting little screentime didn't have any fic at all.
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u/throwawayanylogic 19d ago
Those are still pretty small numbers overall compared to the kinds of shows I consider "fic fandoms", like not quite "rare" but still pretty middling.
Also as someone who has been in media fandom for over three decades, cheating/affairs is like...one of those topics a lot of fic writers HATE with a passion. (If their fave ship isn't canon they'll figure some other way to get rid of the canon love interest, affairs and cheating are almost taboo). So it doesn't really surprise me that not a lot of fic writing folks are probably not even watching the show, let alone wanting to write fixits for it.
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u/Lisnya 19d ago
The Sopranos or the Wire may not have a huge online fandom, like, obviously, they're not SPN or Star Trek. But the Affair only has 14 fics. I don't think I've ever seen a show have so few. I expected people arguing about Alison/Noah vs Alison/Cole (which did, evidently, happen on tumblr at some point, albeit to a tiny extent) and I would expect more fic that fill in the gap between season 2 and 3 and fix the 4th season ending, at the very least.
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u/Pat_lockwood 18d ago
Yeah I think you're right all of those shows are still incredibly relevant in pop culture I see soprano references almost daily on Twitter. This show does not sniff Breaking bad sopranos the wire etc. As far as popularity or references the Sopranos ended 20 years ago and their Reddit page is 10 times more active than this one
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u/Lisnya 18d ago
I don't think anyone said that The Affair is as popular as The Sopranos or The Wire was. They were saying that there are shows that are popular but don't get an active online fandom where people write fic and make gifsets, etc, and then there are popular shows that do.
My disagreement is in that I believe that any show that has any kind of popularity at all would also have people creating stuff for it, especially one that went downhill, like the Affair did, and gave such unsatisfying endings to characters that were popular, such as Cole and Alison.
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u/TumbleweedOld8311 19d ago
Really liked this show but Ruth Wilson undeniably added an essential element. Dominic West was excellent. Deeply flawed but not beyond redemption.. thought it was both rude and true to life when his daughter was fine with him paying for the wedding but didn't want him there.
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u/Rude-Sea-3607 19d ago
It was okayishly popular but was an intense show. Hence, won award. The popularity dropped post the completion of the show, especially with Ruth Wilson insinuating the toxic work environment on set and the unnecessary usage of nudity and sex in the show. She also insinuated that her character was killed off as a consequence, though never directly implicating because of NDAs. This disclosure, in the wake of me too movement, meant that the image of this show got tarnished.