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selenakI had every good intention to get myself acquainted with Alias yesterday, but after a visit to the next video/DVD store ended up with the first season of Six Feet Under rented instead. Having seen the first two episodes...
...I think I like it. Not surprising since I liked American Beauty which Alan Ball also wrote as well. It's morbid and satirical, and the characters come across as real, which few satires manage. Incidentally, the recent discussions at![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
ds9agogo and in ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
hobsonphile's lj brought up the question of whether a TV show is able to present characters who happen to be gay instead of token Gay!characters; I'm happy to report that David in Six Feet Under falls definitely in the former category. By making him the conservative, restrained brother as opposed to prodigal (heterosexual) hipster Nate the show avoids an obvious cliché, and neither brother gets idealised. The sister, Claire, comes across as a real teen (like Janey in American Beauty) does, too.
Scattered observations and questions:
- Evelyn Waugh would have loved the advertisements in the pilot
- and the show, methinks
- will the father appear, Harvey-fashion, throughout the series?
superplin wonders about the tendency to whitewash favourite characters here, down to excusing each and every action and insisting they're always in the right. I think I first encountered the phenomenon in my early days of internet fandom, in Highlander circles (you could call it Methos the Fluffy Horseman, I suppose), recognised it again in Blake's 7 (here you can illustrate it with two categories of stories: PGPs in which Blake apologizes to Avon since, you know, it was Blake's fault that Avon shot him, and post-Orbit stories in which it is revealed that Avon knew where Vila was all the time and never would have gone through with it anyway). Then I met it again, with a vengeance, in Jossverse circles. Doesn't matter whether the character in question is Spike, or Faith, or Lilah, or Lindsey, or Wesley, or Xander. The character is always right, and/or misunderstood, in any given situation, and any character who doubts it can only be wrong/evil/self-righteous/heartless/any of the above.
It occurs to me that two of my fandoms seem to be somewhat free of this tendency, but then again, I have not read nearly as much postings relating to them. Bearing this caveat in mind, I'm not aware that any of the Babylon 5 characters made it into sainthood in the eyes of the fans, or that there is bashing of other characters to elevate or excuse him/her. Similarily, Deep Space Nine from what I can tell doesn't have these character wars, either. I mean, from what I can tell some stories might go overboard with the Julian worship but not at the expense of any of the other characters. If I'm wrong, feel free to mention it in your comments.
I wonder whether this relative fannish peace and lack of need to whitewash is related to the fact that both shows aren't just ensemble series (that's true for BTVS and AtS as well) but that they are multiple pov narratives? Because book-wise, there is something similarily going on in the Potterfandom. I find Snape highly interesting myself and would like it if JKR gave us more three-dimensional Slytherins other than him and Phineas Nigellus, but (literally) cleaned up Romantic Hero!Snape smacks of whitewashing just as much as the tendency to just reverse the Gryffindor/Slytherin bias from the novels into making the entirely of Slytherin House a convent of Misunderstood Saints and all Gryffindors into Cruel Bigots. And HP, while offering a huge ensemble of characters, is firmly Harry-centric in its pov, just as Highlander is mostly Duncan-centric, BtVS is Buffy-centric, and so on. And not so coincidentally, the canon pov character is more commonly than not singled out to bear the ire of the whitewashers.
Babylon 5 and Deep Space Nine, on the other hand, do have leading men as far as the credits are concerned but do not necessarily have them as the focus of the overall narrative. This might also be why they're spared the related phenomenon of hero-bashing. Multiple pov narrative is a tricky thing, and possibly the reason why both of these shows fought for their ratings while on the air, but the result was that on DS9, you didn't have more shows centring on Sisko than, say, on Kira, or Odo, or Quark. And on Babylon 5 you don't have to be a Centauri-phile like myself to regard the Londo & G'Kar arc as the heart of the show; JMS has said so himself. Yet neither of them is the hero in the sense of leading man, or the villain in the sense of primary antagonist. And they certainly aren't the sidekicks or romantic interests, either.
(Of course there are first season shows with G'Kar as the villain, and there are second season shows with Londo as the villain; similarly, you have shows in all seasons with them as the heroes in the sense of main characters. But I'm talking of the overall story.)
Maybe whatever psychological need causes the need to whitewash certain characters and to bash others does not arise when the original text offers more than one or two focal points for the overall narrative?
One last related link:fernwithy (author of the Star Wars and HP stories I praised on various occasions before) on heroes, villains and the rejection of the "but he was cooler when he was evil" phenomenon, here.
...I think I like it. Not surprising since I liked American Beauty which Alan Ball also wrote as well. It's morbid and satirical, and the characters come across as real, which few satires manage. Incidentally, the recent discussions at
ds9agogo and in hobsonphile's lj brought up the question of whether a TV show is able to present characters who happen to be gay instead of token Gay!characters; I'm happy to report that David in Six Feet Under falls definitely in the former category. By making him the conservative, restrained brother as opposed to prodigal (heterosexual) hipster Nate the show avoids an obvious cliché, and neither brother gets idealised. The sister, Claire, comes across as a real teen (like Janey in American Beauty) does, too. Scattered observations and questions:
- Evelyn Waugh would have loved the advertisements in the pilot
- and the show, methinks
- will the father appear, Harvey-fashion, throughout the series?
superplin wonders about the tendency to whitewash favourite characters here, down to excusing each and every action and insisting they're always in the right. I think I first encountered the phenomenon in my early days of internet fandom, in Highlander circles (you could call it Methos the Fluffy Horseman, I suppose), recognised it again in Blake's 7 (here you can illustrate it with two categories of stories: PGPs in which Blake apologizes to Avon since, you know, it was Blake's fault that Avon shot him, and post-Orbit stories in which it is revealed that Avon knew where Vila was all the time and never would have gone through with it anyway). Then I met it again, with a vengeance, in Jossverse circles. Doesn't matter whether the character in question is Spike, or Faith, or Lilah, or Lindsey, or Wesley, or Xander. The character is always right, and/or misunderstood, in any given situation, and any character who doubts it can only be wrong/evil/self-righteous/heartless/any of the above. It occurs to me that two of my fandoms seem to be somewhat free of this tendency, but then again, I have not read nearly as much postings relating to them. Bearing this caveat in mind, I'm not aware that any of the Babylon 5 characters made it into sainthood in the eyes of the fans, or that there is bashing of other characters to elevate or excuse him/her. Similarily, Deep Space Nine from what I can tell doesn't have these character wars, either. I mean, from what I can tell some stories might go overboard with the Julian worship but not at the expense of any of the other characters. If I'm wrong, feel free to mention it in your comments.
I wonder whether this relative fannish peace and lack of need to whitewash is related to the fact that both shows aren't just ensemble series (that's true for BTVS and AtS as well) but that they are multiple pov narratives? Because book-wise, there is something similarily going on in the Potterfandom. I find Snape highly interesting myself and would like it if JKR gave us more three-dimensional Slytherins other than him and Phineas Nigellus, but (literally) cleaned up Romantic Hero!Snape smacks of whitewashing just as much as the tendency to just reverse the Gryffindor/Slytherin bias from the novels into making the entirely of Slytherin House a convent of Misunderstood Saints and all Gryffindors into Cruel Bigots. And HP, while offering a huge ensemble of characters, is firmly Harry-centric in its pov, just as Highlander is mostly Duncan-centric, BtVS is Buffy-centric, and so on. And not so coincidentally, the canon pov character is more commonly than not singled out to bear the ire of the whitewashers.
Babylon 5 and Deep Space Nine, on the other hand, do have leading men as far as the credits are concerned but do not necessarily have them as the focus of the overall narrative. This might also be why they're spared the related phenomenon of hero-bashing. Multiple pov narrative is a tricky thing, and possibly the reason why both of these shows fought for their ratings while on the air, but the result was that on DS9, you didn't have more shows centring on Sisko than, say, on Kira, or Odo, or Quark. And on Babylon 5 you don't have to be a Centauri-phile like myself to regard the Londo & G'Kar arc as the heart of the show; JMS has said so himself. Yet neither of them is the hero in the sense of leading man, or the villain in the sense of primary antagonist. And they certainly aren't the sidekicks or romantic interests, either.
(Of course there are first season shows with G'Kar as the villain, and there are second season shows with Londo as the villain; similarly, you have shows in all seasons with them as the heroes in the sense of main characters. But I'm talking of the overall story.)
Maybe whatever psychological need causes the need to whitewash certain characters and to bash others does not arise when the original text offers more than one or two focal points for the overall narrative?
One last related link:
fernwithy (author of the Star Wars and HP stories I praised on various occasions before) on heroes, villains and the rejection of the "but he was cooler when he was evil" phenomenon, here.
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On Deep Space Nine
Date: 2004-01-18 10:27 am (UTC)This makes me so sad and sick I can't tell you. I can't think of a character on many shows who was as contemptible as he was and yet saw himself as justified.
Perhaps some people just don't want to think that there is anyone out there in the world who is truly evil, and so they try to explain away things that evil TV characters do. I'm not saying that there are people out there who are truly unredeemable, only that it's sad and sick to look at the evil people do and try to find some way to white-wash it into good instead of being able to recognize evil when you see it.
Not having met a Dukat apologist, either...
Date: 2004-01-18 10:53 am (UTC)Mind you, even Dukat in earlier seasons while leaving room for ambiguity would have deserved a prison sentence at any point of the show; the fact that back then, the writers allowed him some shades of grey doesn't change that.
Re: Not having met a Dukat apologist, either...
Date: 2004-01-18 05:47 pm (UTC)Re: On Deep Space Nine
Date: 2004-01-18 12:37 pm (UTC)DS9?
Date: 2004-01-18 12:43 pm (UTC)And, o' course, canon so whitewashed the Prophets...
Re: DS9?
Date: 2004-01-18 01:18 pm (UTC)Actually, potential Weyoun whitewashers have an obvious alley of excuses open to them since the Vorta with their genetic obedience to the Founders only have a limited claim on free will, which could lead to interesting debates on whether categories of good and evil apply if there is no free will to make a decision. Still, I imagine that's not what the porn is about.*g*
Kira and Odo: by all means, but that's not done via bashing other characters, is it?
(Though... I'd love to see a fanfic in which, say, Rom confronts Odo with the fact Odo was perfectly willing to let him die. Or Quark does, since Rom is too nice to do it with the proper bite.)
Prophets: ah, but canon whitewashing is another chapter entirely - I'm after what is going on in the fannish mind, not the creators' minds.*g*
Re: DS9?
Date: 2004-01-18 03:42 pm (UTC)Odo. Weyoun-6, usually. I've read some Weyoun/Winn too, can't remember where that is.
Dukat Apologists are doing it for two reasons: they find Marc Alamo dead sexy (whereas I find him dead repulsive), or they want Dukat/Kira. The other reasons they'll give is that the character is ambigious, and I don't hold water with that. He was ambiguoisly in a place of power to do the right thing with the Bajorans, and although he claims he wanted to, we never saw any physical evidence. (Until Kira's mother, and that was a personal thing, since he was also fucking her.)
You can only be a shade of grey by actions, I think, not by intent.
Re: DS9?
Date: 2004-01-18 05:43 pm (UTC)Re: DS9?
Date: 2004-01-18 05:38 pm (UTC)Julian whitewashing sometimes has Worfhate. Like, they have to invalidate Worf/Dax by dissing The Worf as part of their plan to make Julian's girly crush on Jadzia seem like True Love.
Re: DS9?
Date: 2004-01-18 02:23 pm (UTC)Six months for attempted genocide. I might have added on a year or two myself, I have to say.
Re: DS9?
Date: 2004-01-19 12:26 am (UTC)Still, it's an odd system in which Kasidy Yates gets the same time for providing the Maquis with food and medicine that Garak gets for attempted genocide...
Re: DS9?
Date: 2004-01-19 01:11 am (UTC)BTW, my take on Women Who Love Dukat is that it's to do with wanting to tame a bad boy: "All he needs is the love of a good woman..."
no subject
Date: 2004-01-18 03:17 pm (UTC)I think it may well be the other way round... people who are mature enough to appreciate complex narratives with three-dimensional, shaded characters simply don't feel the need to see everything in terms of black and white. They're aware that life is rarely that clear-cut, and don't feel the need to 'improve' canon by making it more so or to make their fantasies fit in those boxes. It's a different kind of audience that shows like B5 and DS9 attract, IMO. (I have this friend (sort of) who dislikes both DS9 and B5 and he's someone who very much sees things from his pov, and his only, and judges them accordingly. Cultural relativity, e.g., isn't a concept he's comfortable with.)
no subject
Date: 2004-01-18 06:15 pm (UTC)X-Men comicverse is a universe with POV characters who number well into the hundreds - some are more prominant than others, but just about everyone has had a story told from their perspective at one time or another. Yet it still has an unfornuate amount of character-bashing and elevation of certain characters to sainthood.
I think the corrolation you see may have to do not only with multiple POV in the source material, but also with the moral complexity that tends to introduce into the narrative, something that isn't in huge supply in the Marvel Universe, sadly.
I was in B5 fandom when it was on originally
Date: 2004-01-18 11:49 pm (UTC)The only B5 character who seems to attract outright hatred among certain fans is Marcus Cole, but that isn't due to seeing him as the antithesis of some other character. Rather it seems to be a perceived lack of character depth and flaws (I've heard the M*** S** tag applied, which seems unfair given that he was never the primary character in any subplot).