Color War: The Post-Game Wrap-Up

[jlh]

Isn't it cool? I found it here, via tumblr.

I started the color war to give everyone a little happy because the fannish alternative bracket things are often so divisive and disappointing for many. I thought having a bracket over something that people cared about but that didn't have a higher significance would be fun. Thanks to all of YOU, it was! So thanks to everyone who voted!

My replies to the comments were delayed because I noticed a trend really early on and didn't want to tip my hand about it. But now that it's over, I'm ready to reveal all!

The secret is: You guys really like the color blue.

"Well, duh, Clio," you say. "Midnight blue won." But it was bigger than that. Observe below. (I've made mini-brackets for visual aids and everything!)

See, it isn't just that you like blue, but that you really don't like orangey-yellow. I'll start with the places where it's easiest to see:




Granted, I had to put a bunch of greens in the yellows, and maybe next year I'll make different choices (the pale browns, for example). But that color that won the yellow bracket is not yellow.




Similarly, half the greens were blues here—but it was a blue that ultimately prevailed. (This is another thing I might switch next time.)




Orange was more about "no orange," so we got the brownest orange.




Brown is the same—the orangier and yellower browns lost.




While violet is a little bluer than plum, plum is deeper, and orchid is the purpliest of the pinks.




And then there's blue, and I dunno, midnight blue seems to be some kind of cult with you guys, so I'm going to leave it at that.

The other two, I admit, are a little more of a stretch.




But Red is the bluest of the reds—in that lipstick, blue-red as opposed to orange-red or pink-red sense.




And silver, like midnight blue, has a whole thing, but periwinkle and silver was a pitched battle, and silver is arguably the "coolest" of all the neutrals, so there's that.


After that the whole thing was moot—green > orange, silver > brown, plum > red, midnight > blue green; plum > sea green, midnight > silver; and then midnight > plum but just barely, folks. Just barely.

My apologies to all of you who don't really like blue, or like yellow and orange, or like warm colors generally. I think, and this is just a theory, that we were mostly voting for colors that we can wear. But yeah, it's all about cool colors, and really not about warm ones.

So here, for your printing and admiring pleasure, the FINAL BRACKET (click to enlarge), and thanks again to ali_wildgoose for making all of the brackets!

Comments

[ignaz]

This was fun ... even if my colors TOTALLY LOST :(

[jlh]

I'm so pleased you had a good time! Most of mine did too. I really only had Plum by the end, but it was fascinating watching how people voted!

[alwayswondered]

I'm actually mourning the loss of violet red so early. I really wasn't feeling the cool colours as a rule; I was always drawn to the warmer ones over the cooler ones and then ended up having to vote between one cool colour and another in lots of the later rounds. Bah! :D

[jlh]

Yeah, while I wasn't surprised that blue itself did well, I was surprised that even for non-blue colors the bluer color did well. Next time I'll switch the groups around and see what happens!

[alwayswondered]

I'll be interested to see what happens next time. This was really fun! :)