As of late, there has been an odd trend in the film industry—movies based on fanfics and popular YA books. It started as smaller budget productions with unknown actors on platforms like Netflix rather than being released in theaters. But as this niche genre has grown, these movies are now being made with A-listers such as Anne Hathaway and Blake Lively with high budgets and lots of advertisement. 

The most recent and interesting example of this is a movie called The Idea of You which is set to be released on May 2nd this year. The trailer premiered about two weeks ago and many people online had thoughts about how they were getting such famous people to star in such niche and non-traditional films. Many people have likened the situation to Dakota Johnson’s role in the movie Madame Web where she did not like the film or talk about it but still starred in it and did a decent amount of press.

The most interesting part of The Idea of You, however, is its origin. It was based on Harry Styles fanfiction from the popular reading and self-publishing platform called Wattpad. The fan fiction itself actually has a large following on the site, and many fans feel strongly about the characters and the ending. It is a very interesting strategy to make money—find these groups that love the original and make it into a big box film with big actors to expand your audience, thus making more money.

Currently, there is a running production of the film adaptation of the novel It Ends With Us by Colleen Hoover. The novel has become largely popular in recent years due to TikTok and similar platforms. It is seen as a sort of “gateway” book before really getting into reading for enjoyment. Because of this book’s status, a lot of people are aware of its film production—making it the perfect candidate for a new movie with A-list actors to put in theaters. Ever since the pandemic, the entire movie industry has changed, and this new sub-genre is one way that filmmakers are adapting- finding people’s newfound interests and capitalizing on them. 

Yorba Linda high school senior Nikole Galea (12) commented, “I read It Ends With Us during the pandemic and was pretty interested when they announced the film, I definitely think that making more movies that fit into this type of category will attract audiences that might not usually go to the movies. This idea seems to be pretty consistent with the way things are going and I am very interested to see how these movies perform after they release.”