Once Upon a Time bosses honor Star Wars and Swan Queen with this week’s fan art challenge selection!

Each week the Once Upon a Time creative team in Los Angeles gather weekly entries of Once Upon a Time-themed fan art submitted by fans from all over the world. The tradition started in season 4, when creator Adam Horowitz took to Twitter to thank the many artists within the fandom for employing their talent to honor the Once Upon a Time universe.

Since last year, the creatives take time on Friday afternoons during the season to narrow down the weekly selections to 10 top picks before choosing one overall winner and one runner up. The entries range from individual character portraits, group photos, and most popular of all canon and non-canon ships!

This week’s selection got the Once Upon a Time fandom talking when Adam Horowitz announced that a piece focusing on a non-canon couple — Swan Queen — was the one that won.

The awesome mash-up art work created by SwanQueen fan, Mike (@Radziczek007) combined two wildly popular fandoms to secure this week’s win! The subtitle of the movie poster reads, “The Fandom Awakens,” which is fitting due to the outcry of response the artist’s entry received. Why did this leave a bad taste in some peoples’ mouths? Because two very different fandoms were mashed up? No, because a non-canon couple was prominently featured.

Most of the support on Twitter was positive.

SwanQueen fans, those who ship Emma Swan and Regina Mills, are often the targets of hate on various social media sites. To have a co-creator publicly acknowledge, not confirm, a ship’s existence means a great deal to a lot of fans. It is a little tip of the hat that says, “We see you, and we appreciate your dedication.”

Creators, for the most part, are happy to see fans taking characters they feel a connection to and making something much bigger than the show ever could hope to attempt. From fan art to fan fiction, artists of all kinds spend their time and talent building upon worlds that they love with as much care (and hopefully) as much love as the creators themselves. But fandom has a dark side — pun intended.

Shipping wars within fandoms often lead to abusive online interactions that steer fans away from expressing what they love or do not love about a show. Tagging posts with hateful comments and issuing threats are all too common within fandoms. Some fans tend to take personal offense when someone does not enjoy the same aspects of a show, whether it be a couple, a character, or a single episode. To some it is taken as an attack on their personal character. That should never be the case, yet for so many people it is a daily reality.

Luckily, for some fandoms, including Once Upon a Time, the creators are not afraid to offer a polite nudge to those who do not appreciate the hard work of others and the collective fandom experience.

They want fans to feel safe, included, and free to express themselves whether that is through cosplaying, writing alternate universe fan fiction, or simply turning on the television each week and talking about a show with friends and family.

The fear of discrediting a portion of a fandom, and the subsequent backlash, sets limits on what types of conversations creators, actors, and fans engage in. To some, the best way to stay out of the blast zone is to tiptoe around topics that will set off a ship conversation. Ships are an important part of every show, but they are not the be all end all.

Let’s see more ship fan art in the #OnceArtFriday top 10!

Congratulations to Mike, and all the SwanQueen shippers in the Once Upon a Time fandom! Love what you love!

Watch Once Upon a Time season 5, episode 5, “Dreamcatcher,” Sunday, October 25 at 8:00 p.m. ET on ABC.