I think some of it's just perception, though. At least with Leverage, I thought from my flist that OT3 was one of the biggest relationships, but a couple people pulled up stats on the fandom and it's actually not popular at all.

That said, there are definitely fandoms where OT+ is one of the most popular relationships. It seems to be common in various music fandoms, and those tend to be all guys. So I don't think "it's just slashers trying to appear less misogynistic" is the explanation.

Edited 2010-04-07 06:34 pm (UTC)

I wonder how much of it is because people are a little more self aware, and therefore no longer feel comfortable killing off, ignoring, or demonizing the female characters in order to pursue a slash pairing.

My exposure to OT3s started in SG-1 fandom, where there was a long-running Battle Over Jack's Penis (tm Katie_m); OT3 seemed to be one way of solving the problem. Of course, we usually had to destroy the world (apocathreesome!) or strand them offplanet to make it work. Canonical OT3s are much harder to justify, I feel. (Which doesn't mean I won't read them.)

Of course, none of this addressed the sad failure of much of the fandom to include Teal'c in all the sexing, for which there is no excuse, especially since Teal'c canonically got more sex than any of the other characters over most of the show.

I also think that it's mostly an attempt by slash fans to have their m/m when they recognise the potential gender issues with ignoring/killing/bitchifying the canon female partner. Also I think that it's the new thing for self-conscious sexual libertarians and "transgressive is good" types now that same-sex attraction is a bit more openly included in canon ships.

And there have been actual cases of creators playing up three-way innuendo in canon, most notably with Nine, Rose and Jack in the first season of New Who, not to mention Simon, River and Kaylee in the final scene of the Firefly movie.

There's been an uptick in Fraser/Ray/Ray fics in due South fandom over the past few years, which is definitely a mmm threesome. I think some folks may be writing those stories as an effort to resolve the painful split in the fandom between OTPers of Fraser with Ray #1 and OTPers of Fraser with Ray #2. But it's so not my fandom so probably I have that wrong ...

I know that Harry/Ron/Hermione was fairly popular in certain HP circles when I was active there. I've been out of the fandom a while now, though, so I don't know if people are still writing it. (there was also some James/Sirius/Remus and James/Lily/Sirius and James/Lily/Remus and James/Lily/Sirius/Remus, but those were mostly one time things and not posited as ongoing three- (or four)-way relationships.)

Oddly enough, Xander/Willow/Buffy never seemed to get much action that I could see, though it certainly makes sense if you like OT3s, nor Xander/Oz/Willow. Otoh, I think there was a certain amount of Buffy/Angel/Spike, and of course, canonical Angel/Spike/Dru/(Darla).

I was never in PotC fandom, so I don't know if it was actually popular, but there were a number of people on my flist who wrote Jack/Will/Elizabeth.

Currently, in addition to Leverage and White Collar, I've seen some Kirk/Spock/Uhura (which I don't read because I don't like Kirk/Spock), which I think *is* on some level about gender and race issues, and not disappearing Uhura in favor of the white male penis.

I feel old. My examples of OT3-dom are from years ago, in which they were both m/m/m and m/m/f. (Never m/f/f of f/f/f, because there was never another woman on the planet besides Scully.) It wasn't that big a genre, compared to the het and slash OTP KGBs then in effect, but it existed.

As an OT3 (and OT4) fan, I've seen three guys OT3 for a long time now and pretty consistent and growing two guys and a woman OT3, esp. what with I Saw Three Ships and trends in SG-1, PoTC and such.

What I am noticing more is larger parts of my flist being vocal OT3 fans (which is probably a function of 1) getting a flist and 2) self-selection) and more long-term polyfic OT3s, I think, which I am all in favor of.

In Old Skool Blakes7 slash, there was a very popular (and lengthy) series called The Dome Series that's Blake/Avon/Vila (m/m/m).

In Hornblower fandom, Horatio/Archie/Edrington and Horatio/Archie/Bush threesomes (all m/m/m) are, if not common, then not exactly rare either. I've written both.

wow; late to this party but fascinating!