There was a time when being a fan was relatively straightforward – you just had to watch the movie, then buy the album, follow the TV series or wait for the next game. The thing you loved usually existed in one place, and keeping up with it rarely required much more effort than showing up for the next release. But nowadays, that version of fandom is disappearing.
Today, following a major entertainment franchise can mean watching a theatrical release, subscribing to a streaming service, playing a video game, following actors and creators online, collecting merchandise, watching fan theories on YouTube and occasionally stepping into an experience that barely resembles the original product.
The franchise is no longer the movie or the game. It is the ecosystem surrounding it.
Star Wars offers an obvious example
Few franchises illustrate the shift better than Star Wars.
For decades, its cultural milestones were primarily theatrical. Fans waited years between films, and although books, comics and games expanded the universe, the movies remained the centre of gravity.
That structure has changed considerably.
The Mandalorian began as a streaming series before Din Djarin and Grogu made the jump to cinemas in 2026. Their story has simultaneously existed through merchandise, LEGO collaborations, games, theme-park attractions and countless pieces of online fan culture.
Someone discovering Grogu today doesn’t necessarily discover him by sitting down to watch The Mandalorian. Their first encounter could be a LEGO set, a meme, a Fortnite collaboration, a YouTube clip or merchandise in a store.
That changes what it actually means to be a Star Wars fan.
The franchise is no longer asking audiences to follow a single medium. It is giving them dozens of possible entrances into the same fictional universe.
Gaming franchises are moving in the opposite direction
Interestingly, gaming is arriving at the same destination from the other side.
Hollywood once had a notoriously poor relationship with video-game adaptations. Today, gaming IP has become some of the entertainment industry’s most valuable
The 2026 and upcoming slate includes Resident Evil, Street Fighter, The Legend of Zelda, Sonic the Hedgehog 4, Minecraft 2, Elden Ring and Call of Duty adaptations, among others.
The important change isn’t simply that Hollywood is making more movies based on games. It is that successful gaming properties are increasingly expected to exist beyond the game itself.
A person might first encounter a character through a film and later buy the game. Someone who has played a franchise for 15 years might watch its adaptation with family members who have never touched a controller.
The boundaries between “movie fan” and “gamer” consequently become harder to define.
Fandom now follows people everywhere
The smartphone accelerated this transformation.
Entertainment used to compete within relatively clear boundaries. Television competed with television. Games competed with games. Movies competed for cinema audiences.
A phone puts almost all of those things on the same screen.
During the twenty minutes between two episodes, someone might scroll TikTok, watch a trailer, play a mobile game, browse Reddit or shop for merchandise related to the series they’re watching.
The activity changes. The fandom doesn’t necessarily stop.
This has created enormous opportunities for entertainment companies because there are now many more ways to maintain someone’s attention after the credits roll.
It also explains why franchises increasingly appear in places that would once have seemed unrelated.
Fashion brands launch licensed collections. Fortnite turns movie releases into playable events. LEGO converts fictional worlds into physical sets and games. Theme parks transform screen franchises into places people can physically visit.
Even gambling entertainment has become part of this wider licensing economy, with familiar movies, mythology, celebrities and entertainment properties appearing across casino games.
For adults interested in that part of digital entertainment, geography adds another complication. Availability and operators differ considerably between markets, meaning Canadian users, for example, may need tocheck this trusted list with Canadian casinos rather than assume that a platform or game promoted elsewhere is equally available to them.
It is a small example of a much bigger change: entertainment discovery increasingly happens across platforms, industries and borders.
The franchise is becoming more important than the format
This may ultimately be the biggest shift.
Previous generations tended to identify entertainment by format. You watched a television programme. You went to see a film. You played a game.
Younger digital audiences increasingly encounter the franchise first and the format second.
Consider how many different ways someone can engage with Marvel without sitting through every MCU movie. Games, comics, animated shows, YouTube explainers, collectibles, social media clips and theme-park attractions can all maintain a connection with the same universe.
The same applies to Pokémon, Harry Potter, Star Wars, DC and increasingly major video-game properties.
The format becomes interchangeable while the intellectual property remains constant.
That is enormously valuable.
A movie has a runtime. A game eventually gets completed. A television season ends.
An entertainment universe doesn’t have to.
Fans have become participants
There is another difference between traditional and modern fandom: audiences aren’t merely consuming anymore.
They rank characters. Build wikis. Produce reaction videos. Create fan art. Debate theories. Modify games. Attend conventions. Collect limited releases. Cosplay. Stream themselves playing.
Sometimes the community generates more daily content around a franchise than its owner does.
This changes the relationship between creator and audience.
A franchise can now remain culturally active for months or years without releasing a major new instalment because its fans continue producing conversations around it.
In other words, fandom itself has become content.
That helps explain why entertainment companies increasingly invest in communities rather than simply audiences.
An audience watches something.
A community sticks around.
There is a downside to being everywhere
Expansion does not automatically make a franchise stronger.
There comes a point when an entertainment universe can demand too much from the people following it.
If understanding the next movie requires watching three streaming series, playing a game and remembering something introduced six years earlier, participation begins to resemble homework.
Marvel has encountered versions of this problem. Star Wars has faced it too.
The irony is obvious. Companies expand franchises because they want fans to spend more time with them, but excessive expansion can make casual audiences feel that they are too far behind to return.
The challenge for the next generation of entertainment franchises may therefore be less about expansion and more about accessibility.
Every new format needs to add something without making every other format mandatory.
The next blockbuster may not be a blockbuster at all
The entertainment industry’s traditional measure of a franchise was relatively easy to understand. How many tickets did the movie sell? How many copies did the game move? How many people watched the show?
Those numbers still matter, but they capture less of the relationship between modern audiences and entertainment properties.
A successful franchise can now generate revenue through streaming subscriptions, games, licensing, merchandise, advertising, live experiences, collaborations and countless other extensions.
That makes the individual movie, show or game part of something much larger.
Perhaps that is why the idea of the “standalone fandom” increasingly feels outdated.
Fans haven’t stopped loving movies, games, comics or television. If anything, they have more ways to engage with them than ever.
What has disappeared is the assumption that their interest ends when they put down the controller or leave the cinema.
The credits roll.
The fandom keeps going.
