This 'ship, that 'ship...
Jan. 11th, 2008 04:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenakThe reason why I haven't been doing the character meme making the rounds again on my flist recently is that most of the questions are either 'shipping-centric - "Which are your five favourite/least favourite 'ships" or go in the "which characters do you love/despite" region. And my problem is what with many of my fandoms, those questions don't apply. Take Firefly or Farscape or Blake's 7. I basically like all the characters, in varying degrees, admittedly, but I can't say I really hate a character or a relationship. (No, people we're supposed to boo-hiss like Niska or Simon and River's parents or Grayza don't count.) And if you asked me this about Babylon 5 or DS9, I could maybe come up with one relationship and one character I genuinely dislike (and wasn't meant to), but not more, and one loved relationship plus lots and lots of well-liked ones are equally unsuitable for this meme. I'd have to fib. It ties with me being a gen person at heart, I suppose; I'm not in a show/film/book for the romances or even the subtext, though of course individual relationships, platonic or otherwise, can become an important reason why I enjoy a show/film/book. The Londo/G'Kar relationship, for example, is of course a major reason why I fell in love with B5 back then and love it to this day. But it never was the only reason, and while after a decade of not finding any slash about those two I wrote some myself, I don't have to see their relationship as a romance in order to enjoy it; it's fascinating without (or with) a sexual aspect.
There are fandoms I could do the meme for, but the relationships/characters in the "despise" category would probably be mostly fanfic creations. Heroes comes to mind. Hiro/Charlie aside, I don't think any of the on screen romances were particularly well done - as opposed to the family relationships, friendships and marriages - , but I don't hate or despise them. I don't have any strong feelings about them one way or the other. On the other hand, the fact that season 2 made me suddenly care for and be interested in Mohinder also resulted in me realizing that I've stopped finding Sylar/Anyone relationships funny and have moved to being genuinenly creeped out by and loathing the very existence of Sylar pairings. (Well, except Sylar/Mary Sue. That is STILL funny.) It's not that I can't see where the Mylar comes from - they do have chemistry, and Sylar is undoubtedly obsessed - but Mohinder, Parasite aside, is rather healthily unobsessed with Sylar. He's not interested in killing the guy himself (which leads to such things as phonecalls to the police (The Hard Part) or luring Sylar in front of security cameras (Powerless) if he is forced to deal with him), he's not thinking about him when he's not around, and he doesn't show anything but negative reactions when Sylar is. Which means I really can't see passionate enemy sex any time soon, and don't even get me started on scenarios in which Mohinder makes Molly, whose parents were killed by Sylar, live anywhere near him. As for Sylar/Claire or Sylar/Peter... I'll see your "ew" and raise you a "yuck". So my "five pairings you despise" list for Heroes would probably sound like this: Sylar/ *insert list of other Heroes characters* But, and this brings me back to the start of this paragraph, all these pairings aren't actually creations of the show. They're fanfic creations. And I'm absolutely aware that some fanfic pairings I enjoy would be considered disturbing, creepy or rantworthy by someone else. So, glass house, stones, etc.
To go back to on screen romances: the very few that have made me feel something like genuine dislike verging on hate, or on the other hand really passionate love (as opposed to indifference on the one hand and various degrees of mild fondness but not love on the other) are probably saying something about what works and doesn't work for me in terms of a show, too. Oddly enough, the Jossverse, which arguably gave a lot of screentime to its various romances, doesn't come to mind, and I love BTVS and AtS and am very fond of Firefly. But all the romantic relationships there qualify only for the "varying degrees of fondness" definition - the relationships I loved were non-romantic, with the exception of Angel/Darla, which, err, wasn't exactly a romance, either.
However, I do love the Lois/Clark - or if you look at the way it was written for the first two seasons, Lois/Clark/Superman - relationship in Lois & Clark, and to this day this remains for me my favourite incarnation of those characters and their romance. Looking back on the show, I can't figure out why this worked for me whereas Ned/Chuck in Pushing Daisies never gets out of the mild indifference zone, because both relationships are written as romantic comedies and definite pairings, i.e. while the leads might however temporarily consider other candidates in their minds, the narrative leaves no doubt they're meant for each other and will end up with each other. Perhaps the difference to me is that I do adore these particular incarnations of Lois Lane and Clark Kent as individuals, too, and Ned and Chuck never get more than benign indifference from me, either (as opposed to Olive, Emerson et al).
On the "canon romance invoking passionate dislike/hate" side of things, well. Three examples come to mind, and in all three cases, they're limited to a specific time period, and don't apply to the entire duration of the show. And again, I'm not counting something like Dexter/Lila, which was written to evoke hostility; I'm talking about on screen romances that were meant to evoke emotional support for the lovers. So, my three hated canon romances:
1) Kara/Lee (BSG). I'm currently rewatching season 3, and I really have to press the button as soon as their scenes come up (pre-Maelstrom, that is - I do like their scenes there), otherwise I get into hate and ranting mood again. I'm all for interestingly messed up relationships, but that one was dreary, it brought out the worst in each character - Lee came across like a self-absorbed, self-pitying twit, and Kara as a selfish and abusive child - and it didn't contribute anything to the overall narrative. Say what you want about Baltar and Six, but their affair actually had a function in the overall plot from the start and continued to have it all the way through - whereas you could cut out every single Kara/Lee scene from mid-season 2 onwards and not a single plot point would be rendered incomprehensible. Lastly, the writing for each character got ever so much better as soon as they finally broke it off that the show should be forbidden from ever letting them go near romance territory again.
2) Sydney/Vaughn in season 3 of Alias. Not before, not after, but in season 3, their scenes together are of the same dreary, insufferable quality as the pair mentioned above. Vaughn worked quite well as Sydney's emotional support in s1 and 2, and s4 acknowledged they had issues, let them overcome them and most importantly showed why they were actually good for each other as a couple. But s3 - it wasn't Vaughn's marriage that was the problem, it was that he behaved like a selfish twit and Sydney like a mooning teenager (complete with use of the word "soulmate") which made the pairing so obnoxious to me, during that period. Thank JJ for Sydney's scenes with people not Vaughn (i.e. Will, Weiss, Jack and Sloane!) which allowed me to retain my affection for her, and of course for all the Jack and Arvin scenes in that season anyway.
3) John/Aeryn in season 4 of Farscape. Same thing, again, repeat. Not before, not after. It's also the difference between well plotted angst with emotional pay off and gratitious angst with cheap resolution, when you compare it with season 3, where the two Johns arc provided a good reason for the John/Aeryn divide in the last third, and came across as heartbreaking, yet inevitable. But in s4, the difficulties used to separate Farcape's main couple were introduced and then never resolved - Aeryn bringing Scorpius on board, John taking the Laka - with the end of "Mental as Anything" as the cheapest resolution without any pay off ever; Aeryn who in previous seasons had had her own relationships and her own agenda now was All About John, but it was hard to see how their relationship was good for them. It only seemed to make them both miserable, and not in interesting ways. Again, this isn't true for previous seasons, and it's definitely not true for The Peacekeeper Wars which makes John and Aeryn into a functional couple again, but in season 4, I hit the fast forward button every time when they're alone together.
Preliminary conclusion from all of this: I think that the three disliked pairings have in common, and what separates them from a loved pairing like Lois and Clark, is this: during the time period I hate the pairings, their participants were presented as having no other agenda but each other, not caring about anything else but each other, and also being generally useless. Whereas the Lois/Clark romance might have been the central narrative of Lois & Clark, but Lois being a reporter was central to her being, and she never forgot that, Clark/Superman was more laid back but as invested in being a reporter, and they were about the scoop, finding out the truth and sure, fighting evil as much as about each other. As soon as BSG gave Kara and Lee quests of their own again, as soon as Farscape made John and Aeryn into "Butch and Sundance" again, a fighting team that did care what was going on in the Unchartered Territories, my feelings of violent hostility ceased. In short, all you need is not love. Love is important, but if that's all, you annoy me, character. Whether in canon or in fanfic.
There are fandoms I could do the meme for, but the relationships/characters in the "despise" category would probably be mostly fanfic creations. Heroes comes to mind. Hiro/Charlie aside, I don't think any of the on screen romances were particularly well done - as opposed to the family relationships, friendships and marriages - , but I don't hate or despise them. I don't have any strong feelings about them one way or the other. On the other hand, the fact that season 2 made me suddenly care for and be interested in Mohinder also resulted in me realizing that I've stopped finding Sylar/Anyone relationships funny and have moved to being genuinenly creeped out by and loathing the very existence of Sylar pairings. (Well, except Sylar/Mary Sue. That is STILL funny.) It's not that I can't see where the Mylar comes from - they do have chemistry, and Sylar is undoubtedly obsessed - but Mohinder, Parasite aside, is rather healthily unobsessed with Sylar. He's not interested in killing the guy himself (which leads to such things as phonecalls to the police (The Hard Part) or luring Sylar in front of security cameras (Powerless) if he is forced to deal with him), he's not thinking about him when he's not around, and he doesn't show anything but negative reactions when Sylar is. Which means I really can't see passionate enemy sex any time soon, and don't even get me started on scenarios in which Mohinder makes Molly, whose parents were killed by Sylar, live anywhere near him. As for Sylar/Claire or Sylar/Peter... I'll see your "ew" and raise you a "yuck". So my "five pairings you despise" list for Heroes would probably sound like this: Sylar/ *insert list of other Heroes characters* But, and this brings me back to the start of this paragraph, all these pairings aren't actually creations of the show. They're fanfic creations. And I'm absolutely aware that some fanfic pairings I enjoy would be considered disturbing, creepy or rantworthy by someone else. So, glass house, stones, etc.
To go back to on screen romances: the very few that have made me feel something like genuine dislike verging on hate, or on the other hand really passionate love (as opposed to indifference on the one hand and various degrees of mild fondness but not love on the other) are probably saying something about what works and doesn't work for me in terms of a show, too. Oddly enough, the Jossverse, which arguably gave a lot of screentime to its various romances, doesn't come to mind, and I love BTVS and AtS and am very fond of Firefly. But all the romantic relationships there qualify only for the "varying degrees of fondness" definition - the relationships I loved were non-romantic, with the exception of Angel/Darla, which, err, wasn't exactly a romance, either.
However, I do love the Lois/Clark - or if you look at the way it was written for the first two seasons, Lois/Clark/Superman - relationship in Lois & Clark, and to this day this remains for me my favourite incarnation of those characters and their romance. Looking back on the show, I can't figure out why this worked for me whereas Ned/Chuck in Pushing Daisies never gets out of the mild indifference zone, because both relationships are written as romantic comedies and definite pairings, i.e. while the leads might however temporarily consider other candidates in their minds, the narrative leaves no doubt they're meant for each other and will end up with each other. Perhaps the difference to me is that I do adore these particular incarnations of Lois Lane and Clark Kent as individuals, too, and Ned and Chuck never get more than benign indifference from me, either (as opposed to Olive, Emerson et al).
On the "canon romance invoking passionate dislike/hate" side of things, well. Three examples come to mind, and in all three cases, they're limited to a specific time period, and don't apply to the entire duration of the show. And again, I'm not counting something like Dexter/Lila, which was written to evoke hostility; I'm talking about on screen romances that were meant to evoke emotional support for the lovers. So, my three hated canon romances:
1) Kara/Lee (BSG). I'm currently rewatching season 3, and I really have to press the button as soon as their scenes come up (pre-Maelstrom, that is - I do like their scenes there), otherwise I get into hate and ranting mood again. I'm all for interestingly messed up relationships, but that one was dreary, it brought out the worst in each character - Lee came across like a self-absorbed, self-pitying twit, and Kara as a selfish and abusive child - and it didn't contribute anything to the overall narrative. Say what you want about Baltar and Six, but their affair actually had a function in the overall plot from the start and continued to have it all the way through - whereas you could cut out every single Kara/Lee scene from mid-season 2 onwards and not a single plot point would be rendered incomprehensible. Lastly, the writing for each character got ever so much better as soon as they finally broke it off that the show should be forbidden from ever letting them go near romance territory again.
2) Sydney/Vaughn in season 3 of Alias. Not before, not after, but in season 3, their scenes together are of the same dreary, insufferable quality as the pair mentioned above. Vaughn worked quite well as Sydney's emotional support in s1 and 2, and s4 acknowledged they had issues, let them overcome them and most importantly showed why they were actually good for each other as a couple. But s3 - it wasn't Vaughn's marriage that was the problem, it was that he behaved like a selfish twit and Sydney like a mooning teenager (complete with use of the word "soulmate") which made the pairing so obnoxious to me, during that period. Thank JJ for Sydney's scenes with people not Vaughn (i.e. Will, Weiss, Jack and Sloane!) which allowed me to retain my affection for her, and of course for all the Jack and Arvin scenes in that season anyway.
3) John/Aeryn in season 4 of Farscape. Same thing, again, repeat. Not before, not after. It's also the difference between well plotted angst with emotional pay off and gratitious angst with cheap resolution, when you compare it with season 3, where the two Johns arc provided a good reason for the John/Aeryn divide in the last third, and came across as heartbreaking, yet inevitable. But in s4, the difficulties used to separate Farcape's main couple were introduced and then never resolved - Aeryn bringing Scorpius on board, John taking the Laka - with the end of "Mental as Anything" as the cheapest resolution without any pay off ever; Aeryn who in previous seasons had had her own relationships and her own agenda now was All About John, but it was hard to see how their relationship was good for them. It only seemed to make them both miserable, and not in interesting ways. Again, this isn't true for previous seasons, and it's definitely not true for The Peacekeeper Wars which makes John and Aeryn into a functional couple again, but in season 4, I hit the fast forward button every time when they're alone together.
Preliminary conclusion from all of this: I think that the three disliked pairings have in common, and what separates them from a loved pairing like Lois and Clark, is this: during the time period I hate the pairings, their participants were presented as having no other agenda but each other, not caring about anything else but each other, and also being generally useless. Whereas the Lois/Clark romance might have been the central narrative of Lois & Clark, but Lois being a reporter was central to her being, and she never forgot that, Clark/Superman was more laid back but as invested in being a reporter, and they were about the scoop, finding out the truth and sure, fighting evil as much as about each other. As soon as BSG gave Kara and Lee quests of their own again, as soon as Farscape made John and Aeryn into "Butch and Sundance" again, a fighting team that did care what was going on in the Unchartered Territories, my feelings of violent hostility ceased. In short, all you need is not love. Love is important, but if that's all, you annoy me, character. Whether in canon or in fanfic.
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no subject
Date: 2008-01-11 03:01 pm (UTC)If it makes you feel better, I'm that way for basically all of my shows, and I'm definitely into slash and 'ships... though when it comes down to it, I am more an OTC girl. I latch onto a character, and then while there's generally one character I like to see them paired with more than usual, I'm still cool with seeing that character paired with others. (Except Sparrow/Norrington, for some reason. It's not that I'm all, "ZOMG but they are made for each other1111," but just that I'm not super-interested in seeing them with other people. Though there was that awesome story that was Norrington/OFC-mermaid. Mermaid! Okay, it wasn't really shippy. But it was awesome. Now I'm rambling.)
And the only character I've ever hated was S3-5 Dylan from Andromeda. Because they turned him from a nice guy into an icky guy.
re: Farscape
I still have no idea what happened in S4. I watched it during the original run and I seriously have no idea what was happening. Aeryn was a robot? Because her hair was straight? Something? What? *mind explodes*
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Date: 2008-01-11 03:11 pm (UTC)Alas, poor s4 Aeryn. She really comes across as a pod person, doesn't she?
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Date: 2008-01-12 11:16 am (UTC)Ways and Wiles (http://community.livejournal.com/_norrington/435199.html) by
After his ship goes down, Norrington thinks he's hallucinating. How else to explain the mermaid? Fantastical and charming, with a darker undercurrent running beneath.
The definitive mermaid story, at least for me ;-)
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Date: 2008-01-12 04:31 pm (UTC)Wasn't Aeryn a bioloid or whatever it was called at some point in S4? Like, there was, literally, a pod-Aeryn at some point?
That season confuses me.
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Date: 2008-01-12 06:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-12 07:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-11 03:03 pm (UTC)By season four, though, I was so ready for them to finally work it out - and knowing already that it was the final season probably added to that - that everything just seemed to move too slowly, the obstacles seemed forced and unnecessary, and the one quality that had always made them so very awesome - that, no matter where they were in the "will they or won't they" cycle, they were fun together, they kicked ass together, and, well, they were just so very together - seemed like it was missing from their relationship. (I still haven't seen Peacekeeper Wars - I have an awful habit of putting off watching the very end of shows I love - but I'm looking forward to seeing them kick ass together again.)
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Date: 2008-01-11 03:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-11 03:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-11 03:28 pm (UTC)Considering how old the show is, it's amazing how much fanfic there is around for it, and how much is still being written, most of it surprisingly porn-free and by a much older fan base than (for example) the Buffyverse. The big archive at http://www.lcfanfic.com is well over 3000 stories and still growing. I've even written some myself, because for some reason it's possible to care about this version of the characters, whereas most of their other incarnations are way too perfect or unlikeable, one way or another.
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Date: 2008-01-11 04:17 pm (UTC)But after "Remnants" and "Full Disclosure," I expected to see Sydney pulling herself together, and Jack had already had the "fish or cut bait" conversation with Vaughn. That was the point where I needed both of them to get proactive, and instead it got really drippy for a while.
I must preferred the seriously screwed-up S/V of S4.
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Date: 2008-01-11 05:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-11 07:21 pm (UTC)S/V of s4: absolutely. I remember watching the season opener and thinking, yes, that works for me, because the show acknowledged that having sex with each other didn't mean they had resolved any issues, watching Ice and thinking "a Vaughn episode and... I like it? What happened?!?" .
This being said: I would have had no problem with Vaughn staying dead in s5, though I can see why they brought him back, given they intended to kill off Jack and Irina.
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Date: 2008-01-11 05:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-11 06:11 pm (UTC)Vaughn-Syd: I'm currently rewatching Alias, and I was astonished to see how likable I found Vaughn in S1 and 2. Now, granted, the reason why I came to despise him had a lot to do with him somewhat replacing Dixon as Syd's mission partner, but in hindsight, a lot of it has to do with the way they portrayed him in S3. As for Syd - always had a soft spot for her and that stayed true throughout the series, but using the word "soulmate" in earnest strained a lot of that goodwill.
They weren't as bad for me as Lee-Kara, though, since while I was never that interested in Vaughn, I used to love Lee, and I felt the writers treated him as the classical "just love interest" for two seasons, while Kara still had plenty of other interesting stuff going on. This is a fascinating connection between these two pairings, since both are non-traditional for treating the guy as the "just love, no plot" person, but I do think the concept is fundamentally flawed even in a gender-swapped way - not to mention that it slowly eroded all interest I ever had in Young Mr. Adama.
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Date: 2008-01-11 07:15 pm (UTC)Very true, and that was especially glaring in season 3. However, the last four episodes really brought my interest in Lee back. Joining Baltar's defense team might have been an emergency rescue (for Lee, not Gaius), but it worked for me. (Mind you, if in s4 they repeat old mistakes, my reawakened interest will fade again, but the fact he's still in civilian clothes in the publicity shot gives me hope they'll continue with Lee-the-civilian-and-lawyer, which is interesting.)
Vaughn: I had no objection to him in s1 and 2, either, and as you know, the Dixon replacement grated on me, too, but yeah - season 3 made the difference. That said, I found him interesting in the first half of s4 because there they didn't try to sell him as the ideal love interest and "soulmate" anymore and adressed what he had done in s3.
...you won't be surprised if I tell you that the most interesting Syd/Vaughn scene in s3 to me was the one where in her dream he turns into Sloane mid-kiss, will you?
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Date: 2008-01-12 06:12 pm (UTC)I agree, that was the first time I liked Lee since the Pegasus trilogy. Lee as a lawyer might be interesting not least because it could mean they'll finally look at the civilians a bit more. I'd really love to see what kind of society they've created by now. Do they even have a justice system which is independent from Galactica? Baltar's trial would make it seem so, and since Lampkin apparently had work, Lee should be able to find some as well.
That said, I found him interesting in the first half of s4 because there they didn't try to sell him as the ideal love interest and "soulmate" anymore and adressed what he had done in s3.
I clearly have to watch Season 4 again, since I don't seem to remember much of it. (Like you, I really liked the episode with Kelly MacDonald, though. Not her character so much, but what it did for Vaughn.)
...you won't be surprised if I tell you that the most interesting Syd/Vaughn scene in s3 to me was the one where in her dream he turns into Sloane mid-kiss, will you?
*g*
no subject
Date: 2008-01-11 09:24 pm (UTC)Cut tags for spoilers, please.
Gen girls of the world, unite!
Date: 2008-01-11 11:25 pm (UTC)Individual characters, on the other hand, get lots of love from me, especially if they fit into that favored Innocence Threatened archetype of mine. *g* And warmly platonic friendships are also distinctly enjoyed. Overall, fandom for me is pretty much an asexual universe.
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Date: 2008-01-12 07:58 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-12 08:24 am (UTC)Re: Cameron hate - Yes, I don't get it either.
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Date: 2008-01-12 08:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-12 02:07 pm (UTC)I think one of the really unique things about Lois/Clark in that respect, because they are definitely partners, is that you have a lot of interplay along that dynamic. They have separate character arcs and goals, without any real desire to convert the other party to their own. A lot of the tension is actually in trying to keep things separate. Typically, for romances, the effort is all toward trying to make things the same, because (of course) it's impossible to have a romance if you aren't on the exact same page.
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Date: 2008-01-14 08:43 am (UTC)*g* I think what saves the Petrellis for me is that despite their emotional co-dependency, they're either given conflicting agendas, as in season 1, or fate messes with them, as in s2, but in either case, they get to have relationships with other people, too. Arguably Nathan at the start of s2 is at his most Peter-fixated, but even in the season opener, he gets his scenes with Angela and the phonecall with Claire, which tell us something about the way he relates to them, and with the second episode, he meets Matt and the investigate the Elders plot kicks in. If Nathan had spent every episode he was in brooding over Peter, I'd have grown as impatient with him as with John and Aeryn in s4 or with Kara and Lee in s3. But we got to see him interact with other people, do other things, try to make some sense of what happened to him, so that those scenes when he did display his spectacular co-dependency as the one with the shrine or his instantly going from horror to joy in the middle of the devasted New York vision in the one moment he thinks he has Peter back came across as emotionally intense and touching instead of gratitious and annoying.
Lois & Clark: very true.