Candice Patton Talks on the Fandom for The Flash

Candice Patton who play Iris West on The Flash had an exclusive interview with the press at Dragon Con this past weekend and ComicBook.com were there.

During the press interview, Patton spoke about her character and her role for season 2 of The CW series, along with talking about the fictional aspect of the television series, she also spoke on The Flash fandom, such as the Barry/Iris shippers and how she handles their comments, along with the negative comments she received regarding her character through social media.

On Barry/Irish Shippers:

She was then asked if she was aware of the popularity of the Barry/Iris “shippers” and how she has an almost “Britney Spears type of army”.

“You know, I’m unaware of most of it and try to stay off of it and reading comments. You just learn as any public figure to not engage in that type of stuff,” she replied. As far as West/Allen fans, it comes down to people really wanting to respect that…it’s a story, none of this is real, and so we should all be having fun, right? Everybody should be light-hearted and kind about it. I think [fans] are just passionate and you can’t fault them for that.”

On fans negative responds to her character through social media:

A question was then asked about how Patton felt about social media’s treatment of Iris in the past season and how she reacted to fans online. “Yeah, that’s tricky. This is my first big show and a show that also has a huge social media following, which has a lot of polarizing opinions. When you choose to be on Twitter or Facebook or Instagram, I’m fully aware I’m going to be the target of all sorts of love, hate, and somewhere in between. It can be quite frustrating and to be completely honest, it was very frustrating in the beginning to feel like people didn’t understand your character, or wasn’t rooting for your character, or whatever. Time goes on and you stop giving a crap. I don’t care if you don’t like my character. I care about doing a good job. I don’t write the show, so all I can do the best with what is written. It’s the same with any character. Villains aren’t loved all the time, but nobody cares and you do what’s written and do the best you can with that.”

“I know that with fandom-any fandom on TV-there’s a sense of divisiveness and that’s frustrating. I do not control that unfortunately. It’s hard because you want people attached to your show, but there’s this thing with the Internet where you can use your favorite TV show to bully.” Patton then mentioned how he has always tries to be as positive as possible and tries to not say anything negative on the Internet or to bring another person down. “There’s no reason to do that.”

To read the full interview head over to ComicBook.com.