Promoted Fanboy: Difference between revisions

 

As noted in the ''[[Doctor Who]]'' entry below, many [[Long Runners|long-running franchises]] (such as ''[[Star Wars]]'', ''[[Star Trek]]'', ''[[Kamen Rider]]'', [[Marvel Comics]], [[DC Comics]] and ''[[Transformers]]'') have been on for so long that it's only natural that fans would get to work on them.

 

* A lot of folks who appear on ''[[Star Trek]]'' get roles because they are big fans of the show(s).

** And now, he's made [[Battlestar Galactica|his own sci-fi series]].

* [[Bryan Singer]] revealed to [[Patrick Stewart]] that he was a ''Trek'' fan, and therefore Stewart arranged for him a quick cameo in ''[[Star Trek: Nemesis]]''.

* Allegedly when Paramount learned Tyler Perry, of Madea fame, was a ''Trek'' fan, they got him a guest appearance in [[Star Trek (film)|the 11th film]] as the Dean of Starfleet Academy.

* [[Simon Pegg]] is also a major fan of Trek, and he has said that he was placed in the [[Star Trek (film)|new movie]] (canonically the eleventh) to disprove comments his character made on the sitcom ''[[Spaced]]'':

{{quote|"Sure as every odd-numbered Star Trek film is shit."}}

* In his book "Worlds of Wonder" writer David Gerrold states he was one of these already during the show's original run.

* [[Dwight Schultz]] was a big fan of Star Trek—in fact, it was the first show he ever watched in color television as a child. He worked with [[Whoopi Goldberg]] on the movie ''[[The Long Walk Home]]'' and told her how big a fan he was of the show and her part in it. She had a word with the writers, resulting in Reg Barclay.

* Almost happened to [[Tom Hanks]], yet another long-time Trekkie, who auditioned for the role of Zephram Cochrane in ''[[Star Trek: First Contact]]''. He was very disappointed when the role went to [[James Cromwell]].

 

* [[Mark Hamill]] was a comics and sci-fi fan before playing the part of Luke Skywalker and becoming a voice actor for characters like [[The Joker]].

* Ryan Weiber, one of the creators of the popular ''[[Star Wars]]'' fanfilms "Ryan Vs Dorkman". While he doesn't work for George Lucas or ILM, he ''did'' work for LucasGames for a time; currently he is doing special effects work in Hollywood, notably on ''[[Heroes (TV series)|Heroes]]''.

* In 2005-2008, Star Wars fan club members competed to write databank entries for obscure characters that weren't covered previously, or covered very slightly. The winning writers of the entries were then rewarded with having their ideas be a part of Star Wars canon.

** And it got even better for some. As of June 2009, three of those authors were later hired by the company to write short fiction stories for the website.

* It's no secret that [[Seth Green]] is a big fan (prime evidence: ''[[Robot Chicken]]''). He recently voiced a one-off character in season two of ''[[Star Wars: The Clone Wars]]''.

** His character has reappeared twice in season three, despite being killed in his original appearance, due to the non-linear nature of many of season three's episodes, and his character being the sidekick to [[Ensemble Darkhorse]] Cad Bane.

** They have come under fire, however. Particularly when Gary Sarli, [[Star Wars]] RPG writer and fellow scientist and ''Star Wars'' aficionado, pointed out the huge inconsistencies that went into making the books, specifically how Saxton's calculations for the Base Delta Zero command underestimated the number of ships involved by at least an order of magnitude, the amount of time required by at least an order of magnitude, and overestimated the thoroughness of the attack by about 3 orders of magnitude. Then he used these massively inflated numbers for the basis for almost everything else.

* Modi is the pseudonym for a Hungarian fan who had been making unofficial maps of the Star Wars galaxy for years. When Lucasfilm decided to publish ''The Essential Atlas'', they hired him to make some draft maps that professional artists would finish. His work ended up being such high quality that they scrapped the "professional artists" plan and just used his maps as is.

 

{{quote|Since ''[[Doctor Who]]'' has been running since 1963 (hiatus not withstanding), there's an entire ''generation'' of people who loved the show enough to be considered fans and work their way into the industry and onto the staff. Some of the more recent fans were even born after the show had started running. Though some of them also ended up [[Running the Asylum]].}}

* Matthew Waterhouse had been a ''[[Doctor Who]]'' fan before he got the role of [[The Scrappy|Adric]] and had a letter published in an early issue of ''[[Doctor Who Magazine]]'' (before getting the part).

* [[Derek Jacobi]], who, when he played the Master in the episode "Utopia", announced being in ''Doctor Who'' was one of his two unfulfilled ambitions. (The other was being in ''[[Coronation Street]]''.)

 

* [[Brad Swaile]], who voiced Kicker in ''[[Transformers Energon]]'', is a fan of ''[[Transformers]]'' and was eager to get a role on the series. [[Creator's Pet|Tough luck, Brad]].

* In something between this and [[Running the Asylum]]: Derrick J. Wyatt, the lead ''character designer'' of ''[[Transformers Animated]]'', is also a huge ''Transformers'' fan.

* There's also Hirofumi Ichikawa, who started off writing [[Fanfic|doujinshi]] and was particularly influential in introducing Japanese fans to the original portrayals of the ''[[Beast Wars]]'', as opposed to the [[Cut and Paste Translation|somewhat less than faithful Japanese dub]]. He has since been hired by Takara to write a fair number of toy bios, comics, and guidebooks, and even got to design toys for the ''[[Transformers Energon|Super Link]]'' and ''[[Transformers Cybertron|Galaxy Force]]'' lines.

* David Willis, author of the ''[[Walkyverse]]'' [[Web Comic|web comics]], is another long-time ''Transformers'' fan, who has been hired by Hasbro to produce convention art. He also got to create [[Transformers: Shattered Glass|Shattered Glass]] Ravage, who has become a canon character.

* Josh Nizzi produced a [[Transformers (film)|movie-inspired]] design for the Constructicon Dump Truck Long Haul. He was not only brought on to Hasbro, but Long Haul was the first new design for the ''Revenge of the Fallen'' toyline and he went on to design several more for the movie.

* [http://www.bwtf.com/ Benson Yee], a [[Big Name Fan]] in the community, was approached on usenet by the ''[[Beast Wars]]'' writers for his expertise in ''[[Transformers Generation 1]]''. He received a consultant credit for key mythology-heavy episodes, and was shot by ''Beast Wars'' Megatron at a convention.

* Joe Hahn, turntablist and music video director for [[Linkin Park]], is well known to be a fan of the series - Transformers can be found Hahn's DJ booths on stage and even some of the band's cover art. [[Even Heroes Have Heroes|So when Linkin Park end up doing the main themes for the Michael Bay movies...]]

 

* Masahiro Inoue, the lead actor in ''[[Kamen Rider Decade]]'', is a long-time ''[[Kamen Rider]]'' fan, especially ''[[Kamen Rider Black|Black]]'' and ''[[Kamen Rider Black RX|Black RX]]'' (Hell, he's even part of the franchise's [[Periphery Demographic]] both before and after ''Decade''). When Decade's journey took him to Black RX's World, Inoue made a blog post in which he effectively geeked out over the entire situation.

** Inoue's co-star Ryouta Murai got this quite literally. As a child he was a huge fan of ''[[Kamen Rider Kuuga]]''; jump ahead nine years, and he gets to '''be''' Kuuga (well, an [[Alternate Universe]] incarnation of the character) in ''Decade''.

* Keisuke Kato was also this, he is a big Kamen Rider fan and landed the role of Kamen Rider IXA in [[Kamen Rider Kiva]] as [[The Danza|Keisuke Nago]].

 

* Many, possibly the majority, of well-known mangaka got their start writing doujinshi; typically starting with fan-fic before moving on to original work. Notable examples below.

* CLAMP, creators of ''[[Cardcaptor Sakura]]'', ''Chobits'', and many other successful manga, started out as a doujinshi circle back in the 80's.

* Eiichiro Oda, author of ''[[One Piece]]'', was a massive ''[[Dragon Ball]]'' fan; heck, he loved all of [[Akira Toriyama]]'s works, and that's what inspired him to become a manga artist. Eventually, he ended up working at Shonen Jump, the same magazine that ''Dragon Ball'' was published in, and even collaborated with Toriyama on a ''DBZ/One Piece'' crossover manga.

* Shiori Teshirogi, the author who writes the ''[[Saint Seiya]]: The Lost Canvas'' manga, is actually a [[Shoujo]] author who once met Kurumada. ''Saint Seiya'' was always her favorite series and she jumped at the chance of making a new story when Kurumada pitched the idea to her, and what was originally thought to end up being a rather brief series has exploded in popularity. To put it simply, she is writing a non-canon doujin, getting ''paid'' for it, ''and'' getting an OVA deal for it. Not bad for someone's first [[Shonen]] story.

** Rather subverted by good ol' [[Vic Mignogna]] (alias the number-one fan of [[Fullmetal Alchemist|Ed Elric]]). [[Incredibly Lame Pun|Don't ever dare to call him "shorty"]].

*** Though he plays the trope straight in a different area—he recently directed an episode of ''Star Trek Phase 2''.

*** Likewise, [[Kei Shindou]] was a [[Cosplay Otaku Girl]] before she became a seiyuu.

* After holding panels at some conventions and posting some essays on the Internet, ''[[Neon Genesis Evangelion]]'' fanboy Sean McCoy was invited by [[ADV Films]] to record some of the commentaries for the Platinum release of the series, giving him three full episodes and two special feature segments to share his [[Everyone Is Jesus in Purgatory|incredibly elaborate theories]] (some might say [[Fan Wank|ridiculously]] [[Epileptic Trees|elaborate]]) about the meaning behind the show's abstract symbolism alongside ADV honcho and English dub director [[Matt Greenfield]]. Strangely, after this "promotion", he has barely been heard from again.

* [[Gackt]] (already mentioned under ''[[Kamen Rider]]'' above) is also a huge ''[[Gundam]]'' fan, having contributed the theme song to the long-dead theme park attraction "Gundam the Ride: A Baoa Qu", recording a remix of "Ai Senshi" from the original series, and even [[Crowning Moment of Awesome|getting a concert audience to chant "Sieg Zeon!" by delivering Garma Zabi's funeral speech from memory]]. In 2010 he finally got to join the ''Gundam'' universe proper by voicing ex-, the [[Original Generation]] [[Final Boss]] of ''[[Gundam vs. Series|Gundam Extreme Vs.]]''

 

 

* [[Nicolas Cage]] is a HUGE ''[[Ghost Rider]]'' fan, who's always wanted to portray the character (he even has him tattooed on his arm). [[Ghost Rider (film)|He got his wish]], even though that meant he had to cover the tattoo to portray the character.

** [[Squick]]tacularly, he's also a huge [[Elvis Presley]] fan who ended up marrying the daughter of the King. He also got to impersonate Elvis himself in ''[[Wild at Heart]]'', and jumped off a plane dressed up as Elvis in ''[[Honeymoon In Vegas]]''.

* Jim Shooter started writing ''[[Legion of Super-Heroes]]'' when he was 13. He's been in the industry ever since, including becoming Marvel's editor-in-chief.

* [[Don Rosa]]. Like so many people of his age he was a big fan of "[[Carl Barks|The Good Duck Artist]]". While he didn't get any education in art or narration, he wrote and painted [[Donald Duck]] series for various fanzines, as well as several LTE:s. He even corresponded to Carl Barks himself from time to time. After a new publishing company got the license to make Donald Duck comics, Don Rosa applied for the job as an artist by sending in a mail. He wrote that he was born to make new Donald Duck stories in the spirit of the old Carl Barks comics. He got the job, added some massive [[Continuity Porn]] to the series (against Barks' wishes) and dedicated all his stories to Carl Barks.

* Mark Waid. [http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=9076 This is his studio.]

** Gruenwald, Bridwell and Shooter are some of Waid's major influences.

* Several people involved in the [[Marvel Cinematic Universe]] qualify, but [[Samuel L. Jackson]] stands out for the way he got the part of [[Nick Fury]]. Marvel approached him to ask for his likeness rights for the [[Ultimate Marvel]] reimagining of Fury, and Jackson said yes - on the condition that he got first chance to play Fury in a movie.

 

* [[Peter Jackson]] started to experiment with special effects as a teenager, inspired by such artists as Willis O'Brien, got all the way to making his own high-budget version of [[King Kong]].

* [[Quentin Tarantino]] - the video store clerk who watched every single movie ever, and then started directing his own [[Shout-Out|original]] [[Reference Overdosed|films]].

* So did [[Robert Rodriguez]], who started with no-budget efforts such as ''Bedhead'' to draw attention, that would help him in making bigger things.

* So did [[Sam Raimi]].

* Tracie Thoms was a [[Rent]][[Fan Community Nickname|head]] in her younger years, and ended up cast as Joanne in the feature film.

* As a child, [[Brian Blessed]] used to play ''[[Flash Gordon (comic strip)|Flash Gordon]]'' with his brother, and used to actually pretend to be Vultan. Then he got to play Vultan in [[Flash Gordon (film)|the movie]].

* [[Jim Carrey]] was a [[Batman]] fanboy as a child. In [[The Nineties]], he got to play The Riddler in ''[[Batman Forever]]''.

* Noomi Rapace is an admitted fan of the films of Ridley Scott and credited him as an inspiration for her acting career. She would then get the lead role in his film ''Prometheus''.

* AJ LoCascio has been a huge fan of the ''[[Back to The Future]]'' films from when he was a kid. He now gets to voice Marty McFly in the Telltale games—and has also gotten to meet Bob Gale, Christopher Lloyd, and even Claudia Wells. He has yet to make contact with [[Michael J. Fox]], though.

* In November 2013, [[J.J. Abrams]] and Kathleen Kennedy [http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/11/21/r2d2_star_wars_movie_british_builders/ selected two British robot-building fans of ''Star Wars''] to be on the official construction crew creating the R2-D2s to be used in the [[Star Wars|final ''Star Wars'' trilogy]].

 

* Famous author [[Isaac Asimov]] became interested in the [[Science Fiction]] pulp magazines sold in his family's candy stores when he was a child. He began writing when he was eleven, and managed to get published when he was nineteen ("Marooned Off Vesta", 1939).

* [[Michael Moorcock]] became editor of the small UK-based pulp magazine Tarzan Adventures when he was just 16

* Kingsley Amis was a noted fan of James Bond, writing a number of books on the subject, and finally was asked to write a canon novel for the series. Similarly, Raymond Benson had been fond enough of the series to write unofficial works before approached to write in canon, and eventually contributed six original novels. Notably, Benson ignored much of the earlier continuity.

 

* Michelle Trachtenberg guest starred in the the episode of ''[[House MD]]'', "Safe". She revealed on the December 22, 2006, episode of ''Late Night With [[Conan O'Brien]]'' that ''House'' is her favorite show, she is friends with one of the producers and she asked to be a guest star. Trachtenberg also said she has a crush on [[Hugh Laurie]], and during the scene in the elevator in which House searches her genital area for a tick, Trachtenberg said she played a joke on Laurie by putting a note between her legs that read "I Love You."

** She also claims to have been a huge fan of ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]'' before joining the cast as Dawn Summers, and was even quoted gushing to [[Joss Whedon]]: "There was never a ''Buffy'' episode that sucked. I love you!" Joss's response: "So, next season, more Michelle, less Nick..."

* [[Demi Lovato]] guest-starred on ''[[Grey's Anatomy]]'', her favorite show.

** [[Taylor Swift]], another big fan of ''Grey's'', had her song "White Horse" featured in one of the episodes.

* Rich Koz, the current [[Svengoolie]], who applied for a writing position and became the show's star in both [[The Revival|revivals]] when the original Svengoolie, Jerry G. Bishop, decided he didn't want the job back and gave Koz his blessing.

* [[Kevin Smith]] spent the early '90s watching ''[[Degrassi Junior High]]'' and ''[[Degrassi High]]'' on [[PBS]] at work, and is a huge fan of the franchise, giving it several [[Shout-Out|Shout Outs]] in his films and even naming a character in ''[[Clerks]]'' after his favorite ''Degrassi'' character. So when the series [[Degrassi the Next Generation|was revived]], Smith jumped at the chance to direct the last three episodes of the fourth season—and he wrote himself into a brief romance with Caitlin Ryan, the character he grew up infatuated with.

* [[Daniella Monet]] grew up a ''huge'' Nickelodeon fan and said in an interview that getting to work on the hit Nick show ''[[Victorious]]'' is like a dream come true for her and she sometimes has to pinch herself just to make sure she's not dreaming.

 

* [[Nirvana]]'s Kurt Cobain was a huge fan of indie rock music and his journals were filled with lists of his favorite bands and albums. After he became famous, made sure to never go an interview without gushing over some obscure twee pop or punk band that he adored. In fact, his love of bands like The Raincoats, [[Beat Happening]], The Meat Puppets, [[Shonen Knife]], Young Marble Giants, Melvins, Scratch Acid, Gang of Four and Millions of Dead Cops gained these bands (many of them long broken up) [[Colbert Bump|a major resurgence and increased album sales]]. His favorite band of all time, Scottish twee pop act the Vaselines, were signed to Sub Pop several years after they broke up for the release of a greatest hits album that was created solely from consumer interest spurred by Cobain's constant praise of the band. He even named his daughter after their guitarist Frances Mckee.

** Cobain also ''averted'' this trope by auditioning to play bass for the Melvins before Nirvana was formed. He was so nervous that he forgot all their songs and ended up settling for being a sometimes roadie for them until his own success. Cobain later co-produced The Melvins' only major label album, ''Houdini'', in 1993.

* Helen Love is a bubblegum pop-punk band that writes about almost nothing but the lead singer's crush on [[The Ramones|Joey Ramone]]. Joey Ramone did guest vocals on their song Punk Boy.

* Ron Wood has stated that when he first saw [[The Rolling Stones]], he said to himself that he wanted to be in that band someday. Years later, he became their lead guitarist.

** Speaking of Reznor, he's a big fan of [[David Bowie]], and was influenced by the album ''Low'' when recording ''The Downward Spiral''. NIN would later tour with Bowie in 1995, and Reznor himself would feature in the video for "I'm Afraid of Americans", which was based around one of his remixes.

* Ed Crawford was a fan of [[The Minutemen]] who heard a false rumor that the band were looking for a new guitarist and vocalist after D. Boon's death, found Mike Watt's phone number, and called to express his interest in trying out. In fact surviving members Watt and George Hurley were still too despondent over Boon's death to even consider continuing to make music. However, Crawford and Mike Watt kept in contact with each other through mail, and Crawford's persistence in wanting the two to keep making music eventually paid off in a big way: He made an unannounced trip from Ohio to California and convinced Watt to let him "audition". He then became the guitarist and vocalist of fIREHOSE, Watt and Hurley's next project.

* Jeremy Deller collaborated with the Williams Fairey Brass Band to create the album ''Acid Brass'', consisting of brass band covers of classic acid house and techno songs. One of the songs they covered was [[The KLF]]'s "What Time Is Love". When Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty of the KLF heard the acid brass version of their song at a live performance, they liked it so much that they contacted Jeremy Deller so they could incorporate it into their satirical comeback performance "Fuck the Millennium". Then when they released the "***k the Millennium" CD single, the acid brass version of "What Time Is Love" was included as a b-side.

 

 

== [[Professional Wrestling]] ==

* Count 'em, just count 'em. [[Mick Foley]] watching Jimmy Snuka jump off the top of the cage, [[Edge]] being in the crowd to watch [[Hulk Hogan]] and the [[Ultimate Warrior]] battle at ''Wrestlemania VI'', [[Shawn Michaels]] and his "Boyhood Dream", every single thing [[John Cena]] says these days... it might be easier to count the wrestlers who ''aren't'' Promoted Fanboys.

* Rob Naylor was a fairly well known name in the internet wrestling community for quite a while before getting gigs doing commentary for various indy promotions. At one point he was namedropped during an episode of Raw by [[CM Punk]] and not long afterwards was officially hired by the WWE. He currently works as the ring announcer for their developmental promotion Florida Championship Wrestling.

 

== Sports ==

* Jon Miller, radio announcer for the San Francisco Giants and former longtime voice of ESPN's ''Sunday Night Baseball'', grew up idolizing announcers like Russ Hodges and Vin Scully and pretending to "call" the simulated baseball games he played on Strat-o-matic as a kid.

 

 

== Toys ==

 

* Tigole and Furor, or Kaplan and Alex Afrasiabi respectively, were famous as elite ''[[EverQuest]]'' guild leaders. Both were hired by Blizzard to work on ''[[World of Warcraft]]'' as game designers.

* Dave "Fargo" Kosak, artist of a ''[[World of Warcraft]]''-inspired webcomic, ''[[Flintlocke's Guide to Azeroth]]'', was hired to become ''[[World of Warcraft]]'''s lead quest designer.

* ''[[Neverwinter Nights]]'' is all about its custom editor. [[BioWare]] regularly skims the community for their most famous works and offers them jobs. Some groups formed around mod-making may also develop into studios, such as Ossian Studios.

* Dominic Armato was a fan of the first two ''[[Monkey Island]]'' games, which may have given him his edge over the other guy when they were casting Guybrush Threepwood's voice actor.

* A few modders that worked on the Xtended Mod for ''[[X (video game)|X3: Reunion]]'' were picked up by Egosoft to develop the mod's "official" release in ''X3: Terran Conflict''.

** And then some modders who worked on ''Xtended for Terran Conflict'' were picked up for ''X3: Albion Prelude''.

* The RPG industry is, by its nature, full of people who started out as customers and 'ascended' to become pro writers, usually by way of lots of unpaid work.

** The 3rd Edition version of D&D's [[Ravenloft]] setting, produced by Arthaus under license from WotC, was crafted almost entirely by Promoted Fanboy writers. Arthaus recruited them from the "Kargatane", a web-based group of fanzine writers. (TSR's original Ravenloft design team took its name from an in-game secret police force, the Kargat, and the Kargatane are their [[Take That Us|brainwashed mook underlings]], so....)

** The best ''[[Exalted]]'' freelance writers come from the forums; by 2011 it'd got to the point that the majority of the writing team and at least one of the developers had started on the forums.

** Before that, the developer Castle was just a normal player that managed to get into the development team and became a popular presence in the forum community. A few years after he joined the staff, the Castle character was created and appeared in one of the comics as well as being permanently added to the game as a trainer in Peregrine Island.

** The player Ascendant became popular in the community for appearing at tram stations at random times and doing elaborate sketches in which Ascendant dealt with cell phone calls to people such as his mother, his agent/uncle, and other people that vexed him. After some time, the devs acknowledged the popularity of the sketches with random NPC dialog that suggested people seeking Ascendant were calling the wrong number. In Issue 19 of the comic, Ascendant appeared (along with fellow Promoted Fanboy Castle) in a short scene with Positron.

** Same game: Actress Lacey Chabert had been a huge ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog]]'' fan for some time before landing a role in the English version: Princess Elise.

*** Considering the [[Obvious Beta|nature of the game they worked on]], Jones lucked out better in the fan reputation department (the game was bashed, but the soundtrack was praised).

* Successful entrepreneurs sometimes succeed in the very themes they wanted to be in since childhood or work on what they've wanted since joining the workforce. Tycho and Gabe of ''[[Penny Arcade (Webcomic)|Penny Arcade]]'' are gamers who now host an exposition for gamers and make games with Hothead Games.

* [[Jack Black]] loves ''[[Psychonauts]]'' and wanted to develop his own game. The result? ''[[Brütal Legend|Brutal Legend]]''.

** In a similar (non-Capcom) vein, arcade stick fanatic Mark Julio, a.k.a. Markman, was hired by controller manufacturer MadCatz to work on their ''Street Fighter IV''-branded controllers. Julio's knowledge of arcade sticks and guidance made the company's FightSticks ''the'' premier American-manufactured arcade stick for fighting games.

** 1UP.com's Neidel Crisan used to simply post his own articles on fighting games on sites like Shoryuken.com and iPlayWinner before being hired to do fighting game reviews for the aforementioned site. His reviews on 1UP.com are now considered to be the only ones worth reading when it comes to fighting games.

* [[wikipedia:DM Ashura|DM Ashura]] originally started out making fan remixes and original stepcharts for ''[[Dance Dance Revolution]]'' simulators, then one of his songs [[Contest Winner Cameo|won a contest to get into an official DDR home version.]] He's had several more songs in DDR since then, plus one in an arcade version of ''[[Beatmania]] IIDX''.

** Although IIDX has still never seen an arcade release stateside, one of the most prominent composers who works on the series visited the Tokyo Game Action arcade in Rhode Island (back when it was still in business) on several occasions to put on a concert for the western fans who were lucky enough to be present. It has recently been discovered that this composer sampled some of the background chatter during this event, and inserted some distorted voice samples into [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSmL4Po29V4 a track called ICARUS] in a subsequent release. If you know what to listen for you can actually hear several US east coast community members get namedropped in the game itself. Which is, you know, ''pretty damn cool''.

** [[Shizuka Ito]] follwed suit, working really damn hard to set herself a role in [[Super Robot Wars]], doing several roles in the [[Mecha]] genre before getting a role as an [[Original Character]] in [[Super Robot Wars NEO]]. Now if she wants a role in Gundam Generation, she will have to be voicing at least one role in Gundam (Only one voice actor of the original cast didn't had a ''Gundam'' related role. Everyone else did at least one major Gundam Role in their careers)

** [[Akeno Watanabe]] also got similar treatment, landing the role of [[Super Robot Wars Alpha|Ibis Douglas]]

* After the ''[[Halo]]'' IP was given to 343 Industries, the writers of the ''Halo''-related blog ''Ascendant Justice'' got hired to work on several articles on ''Halo Waypoint'' concerning ''Halo'' canon.

** Frank O'Connor, head of 343 Industries, is a specific example - he started off as a ''Halo'' fan, and is now practically in charge of the ''Halo'' canon, and was the general director for ''[[Halo Legends]]''.

* In [[Academagia]], the developers have included many player-written Adventures and Events as part of [[Downloadable Content|DLCs]].

* ''[[Escape Velocity]]: Override'' began life as a [[Game Mod|total conversion]] for ''[[Escape Velocity]]'' before Ambrosia Software brought the developers on board and released it as a whole game with a few engine upgrades. Likewise, ''EV Nova'' was a TC for ''Override'' that ended up as a new game (and the first one to be ported to Windows).

* Randall "Frigidman" Shaw, who produced several network maps for ''[[Marathon]] 2'', as well as later contributing to the total conversion ''EVIL'', was hired to do the [[Brutal Bonus Level|Vidmaster's Challenge]] levels for ''Infinity'', along with some of its multiplayer maps.

 

* When the original artist for [[Erfworld]], Jamie Noguchi, left after the end of Book 1, then fan Xin Ye was hired as the new artist after she sent in [http://www.erfworld.com/summer-update-2009-archive/?px=/E022_elddonnemar_ZhopaBasket.png fanart] for one of the intermission updates.

** Also, for each official song that is released a piece of specialized album art accompanies it. Originally all the songs just had the main album artwork, and then there were pictures from the comic itself, but now most of the artwork is drawn by fans.

* Jeffrey Wells wrote an extremely long and suprisingly good fanfic for the [[Narbonic]] comic. It was so good that author Shaenon Garrity not only featured it as filler during most of Narbonic's run but also wound up working with Jeff to write her later comic [[Skin Horse]]. Neither of them are exactly sure how, tho.

* One fan of [[Enjuhneer]] cosplayed one of the characters at an anime convention, ran into the creator of the comic, and was [http://www.enjuhneer.com/archives/484-seeing-double put into the comic] for being the first cosplayer that the creator had heard of.

 

== [[Web Original]] ==

* [[James Rolfe]] is a huge film geek, particularly B and horror movies. He became an amateur filmmaker himself, and after [[The Angry Video Game Nerd|one of his movies involving bashing video games]] turned him into an internet hit, most of his productions are available on his website, and he does film reviews and countdowns on both his site ''and'' Spike TV!

** He's also making a short appearance in the upcoming remake of Plan Nine From Outer Space.

* Arglefumph, famous for his ''[[Nancy Drew (video game)|Nancy Drew]]'' walkthroughs, entered a photo contest to have a cameo in the remake of "Secrets Can Kill." The results of said contest? Well, check out [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViTLKEHGdRI this video]. Also qualifies as a funny moment.

 

== [[Western Animation]] ==

** Including a ''[[Death Note]]'' parody for the recent Treehouse Of Horror, which managed to win an Eisner Award.

** She is currently writing ''Yokaidan'', a comic published through Del Ray Manga.

* Anika Noni Rose has stated that working for Disney, in any part at all, was her big dream. Then she is given the part of Tiana, main character of ''[[The Princess and the Frog]]'' and also an official [[Disney Princess]], which means that Tiana will forever be in the line up with [[Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (Disney film)|Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs]], [[Aladdin (Disney film)|Jasmine]], [[The Little Mermaid|Ariel]], [[Beauty and the Beast|Belle]], [[Mulan]], [[Pocahontas]], [[Sleeping Beauty (Disney film)|Aurora]] and [[Cinderella (Disney film)|Cinderella]]. Magnificent.

** Similarly, [[Chuck|Zachary Levi]] stated in [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79ia4UL2N8o this] making-of video for ''[[Tangled]]'' that getting to play the hero in a Disney film is like a dream he's still scared he'll wake up from.

* [[Jason Marsden]] is a big fan of Disney, he even named his pets after Disney characters, and he got to play Kovu in ''Lion King 2''. At the end of 'behind the microphone' type-thing, he was really jazzed about how he 'can't believe he gets to be in a Disney movie!'

** He also got to be Max Goof in ''[[A Goofy Movie]]'', a role that he continued in for years.

** The episode's [[Credits Gag]]: "[[One-Episode Wonder|Please Mail Your Unsolicited Manuscripts Along With A Self-Addressed Envelope To: Some Other Show!]]"

* [[Lauren Faust]], who was a fan of ''[[My Little Pony]]'' toys as a child, was eventually hired to create a cartoon based on the toys, ''[[My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic|My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic]]''. It's even been said that [[Patchwork Fic|the characters personalities are the ones she gave them while playing with the toys]].

* At various times on the bonus features of the ''[[Batman: The Animated Series]]'' DVDs, the various crew members admit to being "hardcore comic book geeks" who appreciated the old comics. [[Your Mileage May Vary]], but one could say that the fact that they tried to make the series more like the comics they so loved was the main reason that the series is so well-done and fondly remembered.

 

* Ryan O'Connell used to drink lots of wine and read books about wine and, despite a total lack of formal training, he now operates [http://ovineyards.com/english/ascended-fanboy-tvtropes-winemaker/ O'Vineyards] in the south of France and runs a wine blog that allows him to hang out with all the famous winemakers and wine writers he admired from afar.

* In 2005, Steve Wade, a Tasmanian-based Saab fan, launched a blog about his favourite car. Six years, 5400 articles and 50,000 comments later, Saab formally credited [http://www.saabsunited.com SaabsUnited] with helping to save the company, and employed him in their newly-formed global social media marketing team (based in Melbourne, Australia).

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Unisex Tropes]]

[[Category:Trivia Trope]]

[[Category:Show Business]]

[[Category:Fandom]]