Subscribe

I'm part of the toxic Bargain Hunt fandom, and it's f**king great

By Joanna Kramer, online warrior for the very soul of Bargain Hunt

OUTSIDERS could never understand how it feels to be in the warm embrace of a thoroughly toxic fandom. For example, myself and the Bargain Hunters. 

It’s hard to remember who I was before I became one of them. How I passed evenings when I wasn’t locked in furious argument online, going through that day’s show frame-by-frame looking for evidence of the showrunners’ vicious colonialism.

Today my whole life is built around it. Delivering smackdowns to the Dickensonians here, moderating comments by the Wonnacottites there, releasing my rage at the low price a chipped Lladro achieved onto subreddits. It’s so fulfilling.

It’s my passion, which is why it’s perfectly excusable for me to know the producers by name, stalk them on social media and send them abusive messages when Red are cheated of victory by an auctioneer who was so clearly a f**king plant.

After all, without me and the other Hunters the show wouldn’t have been running for 26 years. We’re the ones watching it every day. We’re the ones making GIFs of key moments and fan edits of every Golden Gavel. We’re the lifeblood of the show.

Yes, I have occasionally said ‘if they’re going to make such a f**king mockery of this they should f**king cancel it and if I see Eric Knowles in person he is f**king dead’, for which I was unfairly banned from Stafford Showground. But like I said, passion.

By ignoring us or putting us on watchlists, the BBC has shown its contempt for ordinary obsessed fans. Really it should be inviting us to act as consultants, apart from that dickhead ClockCollecta who knows nothing about the show and would ruin it.

So next time you hear of a toxic fandom, consider perhaps they’re the ones who are really right and the casuals are all wrong. Now I’ve got Mark Stacey-Raj Bisram fan fiction to finish. This chapter features a 1772 clockwork ivory strap-on.

Sign up now to get
The Daily Mash
free Headlines email – every weekday
privacy

Jack and Rose of Titanic, and other cinematic couples who wouldn't have stayed together

SHE liked diamonds and Picasso paintings. He slept under bridges and sketched caricatures for cash. It was a holiday romance with an unfortunate iceberg, and these wouldn’t last either: 

Rose and Jack, Titanic (1997)

Rose would’ve banged anyone on that boat. But if she hadn’t hogged the door, New York would have been a rude awakening. He’d get nothing fencing the jewel, she’s got no skills other than ballet, they’d be living in a slum tenement in Hell’s Kitchen while he sold sketches door-to-door. Note how she married into wealth after Jack. He was a fling.

Sam and Annie, Sleepless in Seattle (1993)

You know who gets obsessed with a man after hearing him on the radio once, travelling to his home city and watching his house? A stalker. They have a perfect night together and the next morning she matter-of-factly mentions the messages Mossad sends her through her fillings. Turns out she’s known to the authorities. Too late for Sam.

Kathleen and Joe, You’ve Got Mail, (1998) 

Another Hanks-Ryan pairing but this time he’s the sociopath. He discovers she’s who he’s been corresponding with, destroys the business she inherited from her beloved mother, puts her out of work, then aggressively moves in on her life. It’s a bad relationship with a happy ending when she kills him with a pair of scissors.

Danny and Sandy, Grease, 1978

Learning that if you become a hot, smoking slut you’ll become socially acceptable to a man is a poor basis for love. Also cars can’t fly. And however happy they were aged 18, eventually Sandy would demand to move back to Brisbane because no Australian girl can resist the siren call of sun-baked suburban boredom.

Carrie and Charles, Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994)

They’ve only met six times, including her wedding, his wedding and a funeral. She cheated on her elderly fiancé and ditched Charles after every shag which suggests repeated disappointments. Sooner or later he’ll realise Kristin Scott Thomas is that special posh kind of dirty.

Lloyd and Diane, Say Anything… (1989)

Standing outside a woman’s bedroom blasting the song that played while you f**ked is usually the basis of a court case, not a lasting relationship. By the end Lloyd is accompanying studious Diane to England. Theirs is a future of resentment, drizzle and sharing Tesco meals for two in student accommodation. Nothing survives that.

Next story ›