A ‘Titanic’ Megafan Has 1,560 Copies on VHS. He Won’t Stop Until He Has 1 Million
William Earl Within 30 seconds of meeting JD, better known as titanicfan97 on TikTok, he’ll introduce you to Jack Dawson, i.e. a large dummy with head of Leonardo DiCaprio’s character of the same name from the 1997 blockbuster “Titanic.” “We got Jack Dawson,” he says over Zoom, pointing to an enormous shrine of the movie behind him. “And ‘Titanic,’ and Captain Smith. You know what’s going on.” JD, a video editor who lives in Florida, is best known for his energetic love of the movie “Titanic” on VHS, and his collection is approaching 1,600 copies of the two-tape set. Although he’s picked up about 300 himself, mostly from thrift stories and yard sales, the rest come from enthusiastic fans mailing him copies over the last year, as he’s documented his growing collection on TikTok to over 108,000 followers.