Observations
Jun. 24th, 2015 11:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
madimpossibledreamerLong, rambling look into a bunch of different things, mostly Buffy related, that sounds like an extended 'let's click on this youtube link' session where you end up somewhere completely random and actually is a look into my kangaroo-like mind. No, really, my mind usually goes on tangents like this. I'm trying to prevent it from happening to my characters too, which probably will happen in editing because it's just a thing that happens. See, even this intro is getting away from me. And this is why some most people, when I actually say what I'm thinking instead of sitting there listening to a conversation and coming up with a good response ten minutes later, have trouble following conversations with me.
Includes: let's argue rationally with examples and well-written argumentative paper style, the ambiguity of Buffyverse, tropes gone wrong, why I like Xander, but don't hate everybody, Yosuke gets involved. Apologize for possible tired hyper.
Okay, this all started when I saw I Robot, You Jane on OnDemand and was like "let's watch this." And it was all fun and camp and stuff. And then I looked up reviews, and the one saying that it's so terrible it's fun in a 'this was made right for MST3K' was fun to read.
And then it led to reading of the Buffy forums and other posts, and that was not of the good. Well, maybe it was, because it provoked thought, but not all of it was happy fun times thought.
First and foremost, let me say that Uni has spoiled me for actual good argument. You know, the kind you stick in your paper with lots of quotes to back up your points, complete with dictionary definitions showing your readings are ones that a sane person could come to, and a thoughtful, acknowledging other points may exist and, sometimes, gasp, may actually be valid. Or the ones you have in respectful in-class discussions. (I've been told that my university experience has been ridiculously good on this point. I've friends, including one of my betas, who have had very different experiences, to the point that basically the 'if you think like this you must be a Nazi supporter' assertion came out. This, given that we've talked about some of the very same controversial topics, i.e. feminism, sexual portrayal in fiction, the law and morality/philosophy/cultural relativism/moral absolutism, etc.) Without resorting to badly done pathos appeals or logical fallacies.
Politicians are not good examples of how argument, rational argument done by human beings trying to actually have an intelligent dialogue, an exchange of ideas, is supposed to happen. (And see, here, I'm making a sweeping generalization. Which means that generally, you should adhere by a Star Wars quote that I am ashamed to admit I don't remember who said it. I'd say Qui Gonn Jinn but I'd love to credit him with a lot because as bad as the prequels were I'll admit he's my favorite character. Quote as follows: Absolutes are rarely true. So try not to use them. Unless you have to use them. Or...something. I don't know, I might not be completely coherent here. I swear I'm trying.)
So I will admit that if you just throw assertions at me but don't back them up (maybe saying something like 'the show speaks for itself') I'll look a little for evidence for your point, but if you actually give me a well-reasoned argument, I might not agree with it, you might not change my mind, but you're far more likely to get me to agree or change my mind than otherwise. And if neither of those happen, I'm likely to at least say 'well, this is an opinion that I could see an intelligent person who's thought through their position having'. (I don't think that, a lot of time, it's not that the individuals involved aren't intelligent. It's just that, a lot of the time, I've seen people reacting off just instinct and not examining their beliefs either at the time or later. People's emotions and instincts are/can be very different, so your automatic reaction to a character who's just been introduced, never mind been on a show for seasons and seasons can be very different from mine.
As a couple of people have pointed out, the episode Lie to Me introduces an ambiguity into the show. Or, rather, highlights it. Who's good? Who's bad? It's seemingly clear early on-Scoobies good, vamps bad, Slayer stakes vampire, everybody else lives happily ever after. But, like a lot of writers, Joss and the other Buffy writers aren't interested in staying in this simple black and white film playground. They play with issues like Angel vs Angelus or Angel = Angelus (which will probably be argued forever). This also gets more complicated when we see demons like Clem and Lorne, or see vampires (Angel, Spike) who we get to know as individuals. Is it okay for Buffy to stake Clem? He's a demon, yes. From what I remember from at least a year ago (which I might be misremembering) he also eats kittens. Is that and the demon status enough to label him as 'evil', 'must be staked'? But he's also nice, watches Dawn, passes along information to Buffy. There are those who see Buffy as a savior, liberating them from others of their kind or other oppressors or...something. That actually showed up in my brief foray into Season 8 because I needed research stuff for Shadowed Suspicion. (Suddenly I kind of want a demonic Buffystown along the lines of the Jaynestown episode of Firefly.) And there are definitely evil humans. Warren for one. But does that mean that his death is 'justified'? Probably part of your answer, and I'm not actually sure on this question, depends on whether or not you believe in the death penalty. Should Buffy police the human community, especially the ones that the police clearly can't handle, as well as the supernatural one? Does she have the authority to be judge, jury, and executioner? Should *anyone* have that ability?
All very good questions that I think the show raises, but doesn't definitively answer. Which I like in a show/book/whatever. We shouldn't just be handed all the questions without even a guidebook, a sense that 'some people think this might be the right answer', but on the other hand if you answer all the questions, especially the questions on morality, as a writer, it usually comes off as condescending, a morality play.
I can see the people who argue that Buffy is black and white. Good guys wear white hats, bad guys wear black hats. I tend toward the 'universe is morally grey but it's when you hurt others that you get put in at least the morally questionable corner' myself, but then, even that's a hard thing to 'prove'. Which I'm okay with.
I'm glad I kind of wrote a 'points I was going to speak about' thing at the top, because otherwise I would've totally lost track of what I was trying to say. Right. The 'tropes gone wrong' thing. Which kind of goes with the 'too many cooks in the kitchen' thing. I don't think it spoiled anything or made it totally inedible, but it definitely wasn't 100% consistent. Buffy is a show that you love despite its flaws. Or ignore the flaws, but that's both whitewashing (look up the book by Twain, it's not a reference to ethnicity originally thanks) and a little sad. There's something to the fact that there were a lot of writers over the course of the show. They tried to have continuity, but as it kept going there was a lot to keep track of, and not everyone tried. Or they tried, and failed. I don't really know, I wasn't there, but with regards to character, it really depended a lot on who was writing this week's episode. Some of the writers liked a character. That showed. Some didn't. That also showed. There's something to be said for the academic practice of not just looking at the story, but looking at it in a meta way. Most people treat Buffy as cut from a single cloth. It's more like a patchwork quilt, people. And I kind of wish that was acknowledged more often.
Okay, now for the trope thing. One of people's biggest issues (generalizing from the pages I've read bashing/defending Xander) with Xander is that he's supposed to be the Nice Guy. The Everyman. Or that he spends so much time critiquing his friends.
I like http://www.btchflcks.com/2012/08/buffy-the-vampire-slayer-week-xander-harris-has-masculinity-issues.html, because it does a good job explaining that Xander isn't the carbon-copy of the trope. Or at least, he shouldn't be. He grows up. He's problematic, which is a problem for most of the apologists I'd read, because they refuse to see this. But he also has a lot of good things, which get glossed over by the people who hate him.
People do things for multiple reasons. Yes, he doesn't like Angel. He's got jealousy issues. He's also seen no good examples of good vampires (because Angel's supposed to be the first good example we run into). He still has trauma issues about staking his best friend Jesse in the pilot (why does nobody remember this???), so of course he's invested in the belief that Vampires Suck because if that isn't true, then Jesse could've been good, and that might mean that he killed his best friend. In self defense, mind you, but it'd still make him feel awful.
There are a lot of moments that I wish I could shake him and go "what are you thinking, Xander" but in the end, he's a teenager. Who's growing up. Who's had awful role models. Who's insecure as to who he is (what teenager isn't?). Whose brain isn't finished maturing to the point he actually thinks things through properly (not that he always does, but as he ages, he does it more). Part of why teenagers make stupid decisions-their brains aren't mature yet. http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-24173194, search brain maturity and you'll get lots of results if you don't like the link I picked.
Problem is, the writers often forget this, the fact that they're writing a multifaceted character. It works out in the end, but the things that people hate the most about him are the moments he ends up filling a designated plot role. He's there to say What the Hell, Hero? or slightly less versions of this. And yes, criticism of the hero, in this case, Buffy, isn't always needed/wanted, and he kind of critiques everyone. But here he's a mouthpiece of the writer more than anything. Sometimes it works-jealousy, insecurity, feeling that nobody else is paying attention or willing to say it, so he has to. Sometimes it doesn't.
If they're trying to write him as a Nice Guy, they kind of failed. I quote "He won't engage in jerk-like behavior". He might have good reasons for it, but it's still jerk-adjacent. The writers don't always seem to realize this. Sometimes they make him seem entitled (because he's the Nice Guy so he deserves all the rewards for that, right? The rewards that he doesn't get, so he moans about it. Because he deserves it). And again, I'd chalk that up to bad writing, or inconsistent, or something. The writers want something from the character, but don't realize that what they've written is not what is in their head. It's a common problem that a beta or an audience or setting something aside and reading it a while later usually but not always fixes. (Given the tight TV schedules, from what I've heard, that might not have been possible. Still.)
As for Everyman, he's not blank slate enough for everyone to identify with him. Obviously. Or people wouldn't be viciously arguing about it. On purpose or not, the writers defined enough traits to make people happy or dislike him intensely.
So, yeah, I chalk a lot of this up to the multitude of writers/not agreeing with each others' visions of characters, etc/trying and failing to write particular tropes or succeeding, but generally to the detriment of the show.
/deep breath
Okay. I think the Xander Harris Has Masculinity Issues article covers a lot of why I like Xander. Like Lady T, I definitely like/identify with the character type (Yosuke, anyone?). And some of the things that also annoy me about Yosuke (just played through Marie's dungeon, and the post-rescue hotsprings scene? Yeah, that's the only cutscene I've ever skipped because it's just so stupid) I also chalk up to bad writing. Or missed writing opportunities. For example, why is it required to have a 'comedy' hot springs episode complete with peeping? It was bad in Persona 3. I know people who loved it, but it's cringe-worthy for me and I'm not looking forward to the point I get there. It's an anime trope that apparently people like or it wouldn't keep getting written, but the story as a whole, in my opinion, would be a lot better without that. And the whole girls vs guys thing that keeps getting shoved in your face, because you as a player cannot decide that as your guy character might want to just be friends with girls and that friendships between girls and guys are not completely different creatures than friendships between just guys and just girls or that yes, the girls may be in the right, but mean-spirited retaliation without a twinge of guilt is okay and...okay, yeah, both the guys and the girls are at fault at times which gets annoying after a while because I'm not a fan of that. I'll get to that in a minute though. It'd be amazing to portray, for once, that friendships aren't suddenly different because of gender but actually, gasp, DEPEND ON THE PEOPLE INVOLVED or. You know. All sorts of fun stuff that some of the best fanfics actually explore.
(Yosuke, at least in Golden, suffered even more from the inconsistent writing syndrome and I'm not sure why.I don't think I can even blame it on different people writing the character. EDIT: Actually, I take this back. Given that there was a writing team, it's very possible. One day he'd be mature and intelligent and actually thinking about what he says before he says it and I'd be all proud of him and the next he'd be the same whiny child he started as at the beginning. I guess the biggest gripe I have with the inconsistent writing is that it threatens to wipe away any character development. Not to say that someone growing up will, one day, wake up 100% mature and never have an immature comment ever again. That's not how it works. But I (and most people, I imagine) would like to think that, as a whole, we become better people over time. We figure out our mistakes, our failings. We might deny them, or we might face our Shadows and resolve to overcome them. It doesn't magically get better. It's a struggle every day. But we try. And they don't show enough of this, especially with inconsistent writing. It should also be noted here that Yosuke is a teenager and I imagine he's a lot more mature when he's an adult. Which is something I plan on playing with in Personatown. Back to Xander.
This is part of what I want to play with in Shadowed Suspicion. We're seeing an older, more mature Xander, hopefully. I'm going to attempt to write him like Joseph. He's more mature than our part II Jojo, but that doesn't mean that he won't be a jerk or make mistakes. He's far from perfect. He's got powers and the spotlight for once. And he's, at least when thinking clearly, probably a better general than Buffy is on most days (because on most days, he's learned to let his natural compassion rule, so he'd take care of the troops, but he's also shown that like Giles he won't hesitate in the icky morality gray zone if it'll protect someone he cares about). He's sharing the spotlight, though. A lot. And he'll go back to playing second banana after the story's over. I struggle with giving Xander powers because while I love it I also love how he's brave and selfless (well, when he isn't being too busy going me me me like many teenagers) while being Joe Normal. I'm trying to write him like Captain America-guy with powers who is essentially still mentally Joe Normal on the inside. Courageous Joe Normal who stands up to Angelus with no hope of stopping him if the vampire decides to blow past him.
Working on my metaphors.
It's been said that, for Buffy fans, you can tell who someone's favorite characters are by seeing who they'll pardon for their stupidity and who they bash. I don't know what it says about me that I have, at one point or another, said that ALL the characters are acting stupid. I'm still not certain how Xander managed to be my favorite character, considering I spent a good part of the watch-through with my friends wanting to shake some sense into him. But that went for most of the characters. (It'd probably been a very different viewing experience if I'd seen it, for the first time, while I was a teenager myself rather than being in college at the time.) And yet I excuse most of them for their stupid behavior, because they're good, flawed human beings who are generally complicated and therefore not cardboard cut-outs (or, in some cases, just terribly written because they're not real, they're fictional characters, and fiction, even good fiction, has its issues because no fiction is perfect). Even characters that occasionally drove me insane (Buffy's angsting, Angel's brooding) I loved in principle or in different situations or in fiction but not always on the show.
Then again, I really, really dislike the fanfics that require bashing to validate an author's opinion. Which is why I'm trying to give Rise a fairer shake than so far presented in my Unbreakable Ties works, because while her behavior in Golden was oogy and that needed to be addressed, it really needs to not be bashing either. Like I said, I'm working on it.
Maybe part of the reason I dislike it so much is that I like ensemble works. Always have. TMNT was one of my favorite shows growing up. The turtles may argue, sometimes big, 'I hate you' blowout fights (never mind April and Casey, and now that I think about it, Casey might be the first exposure I had to this beloved character type...*see, Mulder, everything does go back to childhood!) but in the end, they still are family. I like UNIT and to some extent SHIELD (no **Agents of Hydra spoilers), superteams, etc. So maybe it's just hardwired into me that, when there's an awesome family dynamic, even if it's just 'the family you choose' dynamic, things that break this apart completely are to be disliked/hated. Squabbling is one thing. Having Xander abandon his friends because he can't deal with being treated as the Zeppo another minute is quite another, and one I disliked instinctively before I really sat down and thought about it. Ensemble dynamics can work if a bunch of idiots or just people who make bad decisions sometimes/judge each other/a few other actions are working together, but it's a lot harder for it to work if you (the reader, the writer, the character) hate another one. It can work. Well. It's just harder to pull off. And with the ensemble thing I like to have something sacred that doesn't get touched-like the superheroes' base or something. Everything else can blow up in their faces, but there has to be something that's safe. That's part of why Caleb was so much scarier than the First or anything else in S7. So I like Willow, even though she can be an idiot. And Buffy, even though she can be an idiot. And Giles, even though she can be an idiot. And Xander, even though he can be an idiot. And Dawn, even though she can be an idiot. And Angel, even though he can be an idiot. And Cordy...you get the picture.***
*This is a joke, by the way. But is interesting nonetheless.
**I know it's Agents of SHIELD. I dislike the 'any organization has to be evil or has to have been infiltrated by evil' trope that's so prominent these days. Also a friend commented after the Winter Soldier that Agents of Shield, as a show, had another season (that I have yet to see) coming and I was like "wait, but...what just happened, how does that even work?" and they commented that maybe it should be called Agents of Hydra and that was funny enough to stick.
***Generally, Oz and Tara are exceptions. Oz did have that one episode with the female werewolf, though. I think that was another 'writers being stupid for the sake of drama' writing failing, but I could be wrong.
Includes: let's argue rationally with examples and well-written argumentative paper style, the ambiguity of Buffyverse, tropes gone wrong, why I like Xander, but don't hate everybody, Yosuke gets involved. Apologize for possible tired hyper.
Okay, this all started when I saw I Robot, You Jane on OnDemand and was like "let's watch this." And it was all fun and camp and stuff. And then I looked up reviews, and the one saying that it's so terrible it's fun in a 'this was made right for MST3K' was fun to read.
And then it led to reading of the Buffy forums and other posts, and that was not of the good. Well, maybe it was, because it provoked thought, but not all of it was happy fun times thought.
First and foremost, let me say that Uni has spoiled me for actual good argument. You know, the kind you stick in your paper with lots of quotes to back up your points, complete with dictionary definitions showing your readings are ones that a sane person could come to, and a thoughtful, acknowledging other points may exist and, sometimes, gasp, may actually be valid. Or the ones you have in respectful in-class discussions. (I've been told that my university experience has been ridiculously good on this point. I've friends, including one of my betas, who have had very different experiences, to the point that basically the 'if you think like this you must be a Nazi supporter' assertion came out. This, given that we've talked about some of the very same controversial topics, i.e. feminism, sexual portrayal in fiction, the law and morality/philosophy/cultural relativism/moral absolutism, etc.) Without resorting to badly done pathos appeals or logical fallacies.
Politicians are not good examples of how argument, rational argument done by human beings trying to actually have an intelligent dialogue, an exchange of ideas, is supposed to happen. (And see, here, I'm making a sweeping generalization. Which means that generally, you should adhere by a Star Wars quote that I am ashamed to admit I don't remember who said it. I'd say Qui Gonn Jinn but I'd love to credit him with a lot because as bad as the prequels were I'll admit he's my favorite character. Quote as follows: Absolutes are rarely true. So try not to use them. Unless you have to use them. Or...something. I don't know, I might not be completely coherent here. I swear I'm trying.)
So I will admit that if you just throw assertions at me but don't back them up (maybe saying something like 'the show speaks for itself') I'll look a little for evidence for your point, but if you actually give me a well-reasoned argument, I might not agree with it, you might not change my mind, but you're far more likely to get me to agree or change my mind than otherwise. And if neither of those happen, I'm likely to at least say 'well, this is an opinion that I could see an intelligent person who's thought through their position having'. (I don't think that, a lot of time, it's not that the individuals involved aren't intelligent. It's just that, a lot of the time, I've seen people reacting off just instinct and not examining their beliefs either at the time or later. People's emotions and instincts are/can be very different, so your automatic reaction to a character who's just been introduced, never mind been on a show for seasons and seasons can be very different from mine.
As a couple of people have pointed out, the episode Lie to Me introduces an ambiguity into the show. Or, rather, highlights it. Who's good? Who's bad? It's seemingly clear early on-Scoobies good, vamps bad, Slayer stakes vampire, everybody else lives happily ever after. But, like a lot of writers, Joss and the other Buffy writers aren't interested in staying in this simple black and white film playground. They play with issues like Angel vs Angelus or Angel = Angelus (which will probably be argued forever). This also gets more complicated when we see demons like Clem and Lorne, or see vampires (Angel, Spike) who we get to know as individuals. Is it okay for Buffy to stake Clem? He's a demon, yes. From what I remember from at least a year ago (which I might be misremembering) he also eats kittens. Is that and the demon status enough to label him as 'evil', 'must be staked'? But he's also nice, watches Dawn, passes along information to Buffy. There are those who see Buffy as a savior, liberating them from others of their kind or other oppressors or...something. That actually showed up in my brief foray into Season 8 because I needed research stuff for Shadowed Suspicion. (Suddenly I kind of want a demonic Buffystown along the lines of the Jaynestown episode of Firefly.) And there are definitely evil humans. Warren for one. But does that mean that his death is 'justified'? Probably part of your answer, and I'm not actually sure on this question, depends on whether or not you believe in the death penalty. Should Buffy police the human community, especially the ones that the police clearly can't handle, as well as the supernatural one? Does she have the authority to be judge, jury, and executioner? Should *anyone* have that ability?
All very good questions that I think the show raises, but doesn't definitively answer. Which I like in a show/book/whatever. We shouldn't just be handed all the questions without even a guidebook, a sense that 'some people think this might be the right answer', but on the other hand if you answer all the questions, especially the questions on morality, as a writer, it usually comes off as condescending, a morality play.
I can see the people who argue that Buffy is black and white. Good guys wear white hats, bad guys wear black hats. I tend toward the 'universe is morally grey but it's when you hurt others that you get put in at least the morally questionable corner' myself, but then, even that's a hard thing to 'prove'. Which I'm okay with.
I'm glad I kind of wrote a 'points I was going to speak about' thing at the top, because otherwise I would've totally lost track of what I was trying to say. Right. The 'tropes gone wrong' thing. Which kind of goes with the 'too many cooks in the kitchen' thing. I don't think it spoiled anything or made it totally inedible, but it definitely wasn't 100% consistent. Buffy is a show that you love despite its flaws. Or ignore the flaws, but that's both whitewashing (look up the book by Twain, it's not a reference to ethnicity originally thanks) and a little sad. There's something to the fact that there were a lot of writers over the course of the show. They tried to have continuity, but as it kept going there was a lot to keep track of, and not everyone tried. Or they tried, and failed. I don't really know, I wasn't there, but with regards to character, it really depended a lot on who was writing this week's episode. Some of the writers liked a character. That showed. Some didn't. That also showed. There's something to be said for the academic practice of not just looking at the story, but looking at it in a meta way. Most people treat Buffy as cut from a single cloth. It's more like a patchwork quilt, people. And I kind of wish that was acknowledged more often.
Okay, now for the trope thing. One of people's biggest issues (generalizing from the pages I've read bashing/defending Xander) with Xander is that he's supposed to be the Nice Guy. The Everyman. Or that he spends so much time critiquing his friends.
I like http://www.btchflcks.com/2012/08/buffy-the-vampire-slayer-week-xander-harris-has-masculinity-issues.html, because it does a good job explaining that Xander isn't the carbon-copy of the trope. Or at least, he shouldn't be. He grows up. He's problematic, which is a problem for most of the apologists I'd read, because they refuse to see this. But he also has a lot of good things, which get glossed over by the people who hate him.
People do things for multiple reasons. Yes, he doesn't like Angel. He's got jealousy issues. He's also seen no good examples of good vampires (because Angel's supposed to be the first good example we run into). He still has trauma issues about staking his best friend Jesse in the pilot (why does nobody remember this???), so of course he's invested in the belief that Vampires Suck because if that isn't true, then Jesse could've been good, and that might mean that he killed his best friend. In self defense, mind you, but it'd still make him feel awful.
There are a lot of moments that I wish I could shake him and go "what are you thinking, Xander" but in the end, he's a teenager. Who's growing up. Who's had awful role models. Who's insecure as to who he is (what teenager isn't?). Whose brain isn't finished maturing to the point he actually thinks things through properly (not that he always does, but as he ages, he does it more). Part of why teenagers make stupid decisions-their brains aren't mature yet. http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-24173194, search brain maturity and you'll get lots of results if you don't like the link I picked.
Problem is, the writers often forget this, the fact that they're writing a multifaceted character. It works out in the end, but the things that people hate the most about him are the moments he ends up filling a designated plot role. He's there to say What the Hell, Hero? or slightly less versions of this. And yes, criticism of the hero, in this case, Buffy, isn't always needed/wanted, and he kind of critiques everyone. But here he's a mouthpiece of the writer more than anything. Sometimes it works-jealousy, insecurity, feeling that nobody else is paying attention or willing to say it, so he has to. Sometimes it doesn't.
If they're trying to write him as a Nice Guy, they kind of failed. I quote "He won't engage in jerk-like behavior". He might have good reasons for it, but it's still jerk-adjacent. The writers don't always seem to realize this. Sometimes they make him seem entitled (because he's the Nice Guy so he deserves all the rewards for that, right? The rewards that he doesn't get, so he moans about it. Because he deserves it). And again, I'd chalk that up to bad writing, or inconsistent, or something. The writers want something from the character, but don't realize that what they've written is not what is in their head. It's a common problem that a beta or an audience or setting something aside and reading it a while later usually but not always fixes. (Given the tight TV schedules, from what I've heard, that might not have been possible. Still.)
As for Everyman, he's not blank slate enough for everyone to identify with him. Obviously. Or people wouldn't be viciously arguing about it. On purpose or not, the writers defined enough traits to make people happy or dislike him intensely.
So, yeah, I chalk a lot of this up to the multitude of writers/not agreeing with each others' visions of characters, etc/trying and failing to write particular tropes or succeeding, but generally to the detriment of the show.
/deep breath
Okay. I think the Xander Harris Has Masculinity Issues article covers a lot of why I like Xander. Like Lady T, I definitely like/identify with the character type (Yosuke, anyone?). And some of the things that also annoy me about Yosuke (just played through Marie's dungeon, and the post-rescue hotsprings scene? Yeah, that's the only cutscene I've ever skipped because it's just so stupid) I also chalk up to bad writing. Or missed writing opportunities. For example, why is it required to have a 'comedy' hot springs episode complete with peeping? It was bad in Persona 3. I know people who loved it, but it's cringe-worthy for me and I'm not looking forward to the point I get there. It's an anime trope that apparently people like or it wouldn't keep getting written, but the story as a whole, in my opinion, would be a lot better without that. And the whole girls vs guys thing that keeps getting shoved in your face, because you as a player cannot decide that as your guy character might want to just be friends with girls and that friendships between girls and guys are not completely different creatures than friendships between just guys and just girls or that yes, the girls may be in the right, but mean-spirited retaliation without a twinge of guilt is okay and...okay, yeah, both the guys and the girls are at fault at times which gets annoying after a while because I'm not a fan of that. I'll get to that in a minute though. It'd be amazing to portray, for once, that friendships aren't suddenly different because of gender but actually, gasp, DEPEND ON THE PEOPLE INVOLVED or. You know. All sorts of fun stuff that some of the best fanfics actually explore.
(Yosuke, at least in Golden, suffered even more from the inconsistent writing syndrome and I'm not sure why.
This is part of what I want to play with in Shadowed Suspicion. We're seeing an older, more mature Xander, hopefully. I'm going to attempt to write him like Joseph. He's more mature than our part II Jojo, but that doesn't mean that he won't be a jerk or make mistakes. He's far from perfect. He's got powers and the spotlight for once. And he's, at least when thinking clearly, probably a better general than Buffy is on most days (because on most days, he's learned to let his natural compassion rule, so he'd take care of the troops, but he's also shown that like Giles he won't hesitate in the icky morality gray zone if it'll protect someone he cares about). He's sharing the spotlight, though. A lot. And he'll go back to playing second banana after the story's over. I struggle with giving Xander powers because while I love it I also love how he's brave and selfless (well, when he isn't being too busy going me me me like many teenagers) while being Joe Normal. I'm trying to write him like Captain America-guy with powers who is essentially still mentally Joe Normal on the inside. Courageous Joe Normal who stands up to Angelus with no hope of stopping him if the vampire decides to blow past him.
Working on my metaphors.
It's been said that, for Buffy fans, you can tell who someone's favorite characters are by seeing who they'll pardon for their stupidity and who they bash. I don't know what it says about me that I have, at one point or another, said that ALL the characters are acting stupid. I'm still not certain how Xander managed to be my favorite character, considering I spent a good part of the watch-through with my friends wanting to shake some sense into him. But that went for most of the characters. (It'd probably been a very different viewing experience if I'd seen it, for the first time, while I was a teenager myself rather than being in college at the time.) And yet I excuse most of them for their stupid behavior, because they're good, flawed human beings who are generally complicated and therefore not cardboard cut-outs (or, in some cases, just terribly written because they're not real, they're fictional characters, and fiction, even good fiction, has its issues because no fiction is perfect). Even characters that occasionally drove me insane (Buffy's angsting, Angel's brooding) I loved in principle or in different situations or in fiction but not always on the show.
Then again, I really, really dislike the fanfics that require bashing to validate an author's opinion. Which is why I'm trying to give Rise a fairer shake than so far presented in my Unbreakable Ties works, because while her behavior in Golden was oogy and that needed to be addressed, it really needs to not be bashing either. Like I said, I'm working on it.
Maybe part of the reason I dislike it so much is that I like ensemble works. Always have. TMNT was one of my favorite shows growing up. The turtles may argue, sometimes big, 'I hate you' blowout fights (never mind April and Casey, and now that I think about it, Casey might be the first exposure I had to this beloved character type...*see, Mulder, everything does go back to childhood!) but in the end, they still are family. I like UNIT and to some extent SHIELD (no **Agents of Hydra spoilers), superteams, etc. So maybe it's just hardwired into me that, when there's an awesome family dynamic, even if it's just 'the family you choose' dynamic, things that break this apart completely are to be disliked/hated. Squabbling is one thing. Having Xander abandon his friends because he can't deal with being treated as the Zeppo another minute is quite another, and one I disliked instinctively before I really sat down and thought about it. Ensemble dynamics can work if a bunch of idiots or just people who make bad decisions sometimes/judge each other/a few other actions are working together, but it's a lot harder for it to work if you (the reader, the writer, the character) hate another one. It can work. Well. It's just harder to pull off. And with the ensemble thing I like to have something sacred that doesn't get touched-like the superheroes' base or something. Everything else can blow up in their faces, but there has to be something that's safe. That's part of why Caleb was so much scarier than the First or anything else in S7. So I like Willow, even though she can be an idiot. And Buffy, even though she can be an idiot. And Giles, even though she can be an idiot. And Xander, even though he can be an idiot. And Dawn, even though she can be an idiot. And Angel, even though he can be an idiot. And Cordy...you get the picture.***
*This is a joke, by the way. But is interesting nonetheless.
**I know it's Agents of SHIELD. I dislike the 'any organization has to be evil or has to have been infiltrated by evil' trope that's so prominent these days. Also a friend commented after the Winter Soldier that Agents of Shield, as a show, had another season (that I have yet to see) coming and I was like "wait, but...what just happened, how does that even work?" and they commented that maybe it should be called Agents of Hydra and that was funny enough to stick.
***Generally, Oz and Tara are exceptions. Oz did have that one episode with the female werewolf, though. I think that was another 'writers being stupid for the sake of drama' writing failing, but I could be wrong.
