History WebVideo / SarahZ

[[https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCK-GxvzttTnNhq3JPYpXhqg Sarah Z]] (the Z is pronounced "Zed"--she's Canadian) is a video essayist. From back in May 2018, she started out covering topics like films and television before later focusing more on social and artistic issues, such as the concept of authorial intent, "fast-food twitter", {{Website/Tumblr}} history, and other aspects of Internet culture. Sarah uses she/they pronouns.

[[https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCK-GxvzttTnNhq3JPYpXhqg Sarah Z]] (pronounced "Sarah Zed", not "Sarah Zee") is a Canadian video essayist. From back in May 2018, she started out covering topics like films and television before later focusing more on social and artistic issues, such as the concept of authorial intent, "fast-food twitter", {{Website/Tumblr}} history, and other aspects of Internet culture. Sarah uses she/they pronouns.

* CanadaEh: In her Q&A, she responds to a question asking if she's Canadian by dropping "eh" and "aboot" in a stereotypical accent. The way she pronounces "about" as "aboot" naturally also fulfills the trope. While tearing apart the movie ''Film/{{Idiocracy}}'', she kept on referring to ''[[VerbalTic Soar-ry]] [[Film/SorryToBotherYou To Bother You]]'' as a better movie about a similar concept. And of course, there's her name, which, as [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BRI-A3vakVg this famous commercial]] for Molson Canadian beer pointed out, is pronounced "zed" in Canada, not "zee".

* CatchPhrase:

* FalseDichotomy: Sarah [[DiscussedTrope Discusses]] this in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvP_BLMgYBg&t=1932s "Is Fanfiction Art? (It's Complicated)"]] Sarah thinks the two-sidedness of the fanfiction vs. books debate is silly, as is portraying [[TheWarOnStraw "the other side"]] as either [[StrawCritic "pretentious snobs"]] or [[StrawFan "anti-intellectual babies"]].

* MisaimedFandom: [[invoked]] {{DiscussedTrope}} in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvP_BLMgYBg&t=1932s "Is Fanfiction Art? (It's Complicated)"]]. Sarah points out how some people criticize [[Literature/TheGreatGatsby The Great Gatsby]]'s characters for being rich and morally awful, which she states was the entire point of the novel.

* AnAesop: While her video "Tumblr's Failed Convention: The Story of Dashcon" is mostly chronicling the aforementioned event, she does deliver an additional moral in the conclusion:
-->"Just because someone has the same geeky interests as you, it doesn't necessarily mean they have your best interests at heart."

* OncePerEpisode: She's known for having some sort of a beverage in her hand in all (or ''nearly'' all) of her video essays. Tea, coffee, water, wine, [[TheLastOfTheseIsNotLikeTheOthers cotton candy Faygo with vodka]]....

** When going over fan community nicknames, Sarah states that "Doctor Who fans are called 'Whovians', Glee fans were called 'Gleeks', Star Trek fans are called 'Trekkies', and K-Pop fans are called [[TheLastOfTheseIsNotLikeTheOthers 'terrifying']]".

* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: Her earlier videos were ''Franchise/{{Danganronpa}}'' memes, much before she started doing video essays. And even some of her early video essays were more nitpicky complaining critiques of the ''Series/{{Heathers}}'' TV series, ''Series/ThirteenReasonsWhy'', and ''Series/{{Riverdale}}''.

* GenreShift: Her video essays started out being critiques of bad media like the ''{{Series/Heathers}}'' TV series, ''{{Series/Riverdale}}'', and ''{{Series/Supernatural}}'', but have shifted towards discussing social issues like the ethics of true crime podcasts, whether theatre bootlegs are a bad thing, and parasocial relationships with [=YouTube=] personalities.

* FalseDichotomy: Sara [[DiscussedTrope Discusses]] this in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvP_BLMgYBg&t=1932s "Is Fanfiction Art? (It's Complicated)"]] Sara thinks the two-sidedness of the fanfiction vs. books debate is silly, as is portraying [[TheWarOnStraw "the other side"]] as either [[StrawCritic "pretentious snobs"]] or [[StrawFan "anti-intellectual babies"]].

* MisaimedFandom: [[invoked]] {{DiscussedTrope}} in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvP_BLMgYBg&t=1932s "Is Fanfiction Art? (It’s Complicated)"]]. Sara points out how some people criticize [[Literature/TheGreatGatsby The Great Gatsby]]'s characters for being rich and morally awful, which she states was the entire point of the novel.

--> "Just because someone has the same geeky interests as you, it doesn't necessarily mean they have your best interests at heart."

* FalseDichotomy: Sara [[DiscussedTrope Discusses]] this in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvP_BLMgYBg&t=1932s “Is Fanfiction Art? (It’s Complicated)"]] Sara thinks the two-sidedness of the fanfiction vs. books debate is silly, as is portraying [[TheWarOnStraw "the other side"]] as either [[StrawCritic "pretentious snobs"]] or [[StrawFan "anti-intellectual babies"]].

* GirlShowGhetto: [[InvokedTrope Invoked]] and [[DiscussedTrope Discussed]] in "Everyone's Into ''Twilight'' Again". Sarah notes that many of the criticisms aimed ''Literature/TheTwilightSaga'' during its heyday were laced with shocking amounts of misogyny, due in large part to the franchise's target audience and heavy focus on the teen romance elements, along with homophobia, such as calling the sparkling vampires "gay" and certain characters homophobic slurs for supposedly lacking "masculinity". Much of the series' renaissance, she argues, has been a direct repudiation of this mentality.

-->[beat]
-->'''Sarah, now calmly''': I didn't like it.

* MisaimedFandom: [[invoked]][[DiscussedTrope Discussed]] in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvP_BLMgYBg&t=1932s "Is Fanfiction Art? (It’s Complicated)"]]. Sara points out how some people criticize [[Literature/TheGreatGatsby The Great Gatsby]]'s characters for being rich and morally awful, which she states was the entire point of the novel.

* NarmCharm: [[invoked]]Sarah’s feelings towards [[PatchworkKids Roxel]], the fanon love child of [[Franchise/KingdomHearts Roxas and Axel]], as shown in their “[=MorMor=] and Fanon” video.
-->'''Sarah:''' I fuckin’ ''love'' Roxel. He originated on Deviantart and I mean this in the most supportive way possible when I say you can ''tell''.

--> "This man is Doc from ''Back to the Future,'' but a Chad. This man has been having a mid-life crisis for thirty years straight. This man looks like Mr. Rogers if they sucked all the life out of his body and put it into his glasses."
* RunningGag:

--> "You cannot change my mind."

--> '''On-Screen Text''': "i definitely did not do this no siree not me i definitely did not want a [[FoeRomanceSubtext sexy arch rival]] so we could have that moment where one of us lifts up the other person's chin with a sword and yknow what now that i'm typing this i feel like i already brought this trope up in another video but i'm definitely gonna put it here as well anyway because i definitely did NOT do this and do NOT want a sexy arch rival I can swordfight with NOT ME"

--> "And I'm just sitting there like 'Sir, what do you expect me to do with this information? I'm not going to un-cut my hair'..."

** [[invoked]] Also discussed in "I Was Wrong About Queerbaiting", wherein she describes how the term "queerbaiting" managed to devolve from "corporations using performative or outright fake expressions of queerness to draw in a queer audience [[BaitAndSwitchLesbians then pull the rug out from under them]]" to "queer characters who ''are'' canonically queer but were [[HideYourLesbians heavily censored]]" to "canon queer representation that is canon and not censored but hasn't expressed its canonicity ''enough''" to "the fandom's queer OTP/headcanon didn't turn out to be canon" to "real life celebrity behaving a certain way that could be interpreted as queer or queer-coded while ostensibly being straight or cis" to "real life person being closeted". Sarah ultimately concludes that the term is misused so much that at this point, it'd probably be better to just [[DiscreditedTrope retire it altogether]], especially since its misuse has caused tangible harm to real life queer people.

** [[invoked]] Also discussed in "I Was Wrong About Queerbaiting", wherein she describes how the term "queerbaiting" managed to devolve from "corporations using performative or outright fake expressions of queerness to draw in a queer audience [[BaitAndSwitchLesbians then pull the rug out from under them]]" to "queer characters who ''are'' canonically queer but were [[HideYourLesbians heavily censored]]" to "the fandoms queer OTP/headcanon didn't turn out to be canon" to "real life celebrity behaving a certain way that could be interpreted as queer or queer-coded while ostensibly being straight or cis" to "real life person being closeted". Sarah ultimately concludes that the term is misused so much that at this point, it'd probably be better to just [[DiscreditedTrope retire it altogether]], especially since its misuse has caused tangible harm to real life queer people.

** Also discussed in "I Was Wrong About Queerbaiting", wherein she describes how the term "queerbaiting" managed to devolve from "corporations using performative or outright fake expressions of queerness to draw in a queer audience [[BaitAndSwitchLesbians then pull the rug out from under them]]" to "queer characters who ''are'' canonically queer but were [[HideYourLesbians heavily censored]]" to "the fandoms queer OTP/headcanon didn't turn out to be canon" to "real life celebrity behaving a certain way that could be interpreted as queer or queer-coded while ostensibly being straight or cis" to "real life person being closeted". Sarah ultimately concludes that the term is misused so much that at this point, it'd probably be better to just [[DiscreditedTrope retire it altogether]], especially since its misuse has caused tangible harm to real life queer people.

* YouKeepUsingThatWord: Discussed in "The Horrifying Panopticon of West Elm Caleb", where Sarah notes that a lot of people who do online public callouts will use very serious and pathologizing language even in situations where it clearly doesn't apply, like using "abuser", "toxic", or "gaslighter" as catchall terms for "asshole".

* EndOfAnEra:

** However, she later disowned her previous video on the subject in “I was wrong about queerbaiting”, where she criticizes how the term’s usage has evolved into being used to against celebrities who dabble in gender-nonconformity. Particularly because of the tendency for this usage [[ForcedOutOfTheCloset to force celebrities to admit their sexualities in less than ideal circumstances]] and potentially scare people from experimenting at all.

* [[invoked]]GenreKiller: In "The Rise and Fall of Teen Dystopias", she stated that, while the disappointing ends to the ''[[Literature/TheHungerGames Hunger Games]]'' and ''Literature/{{Divergent}}'' film series killed the young adult dystopian genre, the rise of the UsefulNotes/BlackLivesMatterMovement in the mid-late 2010s and the election of UsefulNotes/DonaldTrump as United States President in 2016 nailed the genre's coffin shut and ensured that it wouldn't receive the sorts of [[PopularityPolynomial ten-years-later nostalgic reappraisals]] that ''Literature/{{Twilight}}'' did. Amidst the political climate of the late 2010s, the simplistic morality and heroic savior protagonists of many YA dystopias increasingly did not ring true to the experiences of young people engaged in activism, for whom such books became relics of a simpler, more innocent time. The genre was soon displaced on the one hand by social issue novels like ''Literature/TheHateUGive'' that more directly commented on real-world problems without cloaking them in the metaphor of a dystopian future, and on the other by YA fantasy series like ''Literature/ACourtOfThornsAndRoses'' that offered similar exotic worlds and romance without the ham-fisted social commentary.

* GirlShowGhetto: [[InvokedTrope Invoked]] and [[DiscussedTrope Discussed]] in "Everyone's Into ''Twilight'' Again". Sarah notes that many of the criticisms aimed the ''Literature/{{Twilight}}'' franchise during its heyday were laced with shocking amounts of misogyny, due in large part to the franchise's target audience and heavy focus on the teen romance elements, along with homophobia, such as calling the sparkling vampires "gay" and certain characters homophobic slurs for supposedly lacking "masculinity". Much of the series' renaissance, she argues, has been a direct repudiation of this mentality.

** In her video on ''Literature/{{Twilight}}'', she argues that the franchise does have many aspects that genuinely deserve criticism, but the problem isn't things like the vampires sparkling, it's things like the racism (for example, the classy, extraordinarily beautiful vampires are all white or extremely pale, while the Native American werewolves are portrayed as aggressive and animalistic).

** However, she later disowned her previous video on the subject in “I was wrong about queerbaiting”, where she criticizes how the term’s usage has evolved into being used to against celebrities who dabble in gender-nonconformity. Particularly because of the tendency for this usage [[ForcedOutOfTheCloset forces celebrities to admit their sexualities in less than ideal circumstances]] and potentially scare people from experimenting at all.

** However, she later disowned her previous video on the subject in “I was wrong about queerbaiting”, where she criticizes how the term’s usage has evolved into being used to against celebrities who dabble in gender-nonconformity. Particularly because of the tendency for this usage [[ForcedOutOfTheCloset force celebrities to admit their sexualities in less than ideal circumstances]] and potentially scare people from experimenting at all.

** However, she later disowned her previous video on the subject in “I was wrong about queerbaiting”, where she criticizes the how the term’s usage has evolved into being used to against celebrities who dabble in gender-nonconformity. Particularly because of the tendency for this usage [[ForcedOutOfTheCloset force celebrities to admit their sexualities in less than ideal circumstances]] and potentially scare people from experimenting at all.

* BiasSteamroller: Happily admits that she has a biased hatred of the ''Literature/HarryPotter'' franchise and that she'll be taking Creator/JKRowling to task.

** Discussed in her video on Queerbaiting, and how the term is often confused with HideYourLesbians (such as ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'', where ExecutiveMeddling prevented the confirmation that the two characters were a couple until the finale) or HoYay (such as ''{{Series/Scrubs}}'', where the characters are clearly straight and their close friendship is PlayedForLaughs).

** In "The Rise and Fall of Geek Culture", she points to the Gamergate controversy of 2014 as the beginning of the end for the mainstream geek culture explosion of the late 2000s and early '10s. In her view, not only did it bring long-standing issues with misogyny and racism prevalent in geek culture to the surface and make them a dramatic fault line within various fandoms (citing the ''Franchise/{{Ghostbusters}}'' [[Film/Ghostbusters2016 reboot]] and the ''Franchise/StarWars'' sequel trilogy as examples), it also marked the moment when the tension between geek culture's historic self-image as bullied, put-upon outsiders and its new image as [[ProudToBeAGeek the cool kids of pop culture]] finally snapped, destroying the idea of there being a single, unified geek culture at all. A series of other individual controversies that followed, such as the ''WesternAnimation/RickAndMorty'' Szechuan sauce debacle, the fall from grace of various big-name figures (most notably Creator/JossWhedon), and the oversaturation of MerchandiseDriven brands of middling quality like Loot Crate, [=ThinkGeek=], and Toys/FunkoPop, further took the shine off of geek culture and increasingly made it seem primarily a domain dominated by ConspicuousConsumption and [[invoked]] PanderingToTheBase, with the year 2019 serving as its death rattle even as "geeky" media itself continued to flourish.