This Sounds Terribly Familiar...

[shipperx]

While talking w/ shapinglight about the 'bad boy never gets the girl' trope (which despite fanboy and Mutant Enemy cries of how it's such a horrible cliche that happens so often, in my experience with tv fandoms and with TV Shows, very, very rarely is the 'redeemed bad boy' actually allowed to win the girl 'for realz'.  Even if they do, it ends up with "but he's never good enough for her..."  in perpetuity.  Or you can end up with cases such as LOST's Sawyer where he's sent to someone else who I liked more anyway so I was okay with that. )

Anyway, the recent issue of the BtVS comics with Spuffy in the 'friend zone' brought up the discussion and at some point I mentioned that by now  I find myself rooting for the pairing of Captain Hook/Emma Swan* on Once Upon a Time,  not so much for them per se, but because I'm rather tired of the fact that the anti-hero in perpetual unrequited love never seems to win the girl's romantic love.  Since shapinglight isn't a Once watcher, I googled YouTube for reference material, and look what turned up...

Listen to that voice over.

That voice over isn't from Once.  That voice over is familiar!  It's very familiar.  In fact...It's SPIKE!

That is Spike's Spuffy monologue for goodness sakes!

Since it's unattributed in the vid, I suppose they think that the shared accent and similar voices makes it seem sort of Capt. Hook-ish.  But not only have I watched too much Buffy but I've listened to too many Dresden Files audio books not to recognize that voice.

That's Spike talking.

* In the "Once" universe, Emma Swan is the daughter of Snow White and Prince Charming.  And Peter Pan is straight-up narcissistic evil.

Comments

[petzipellepingo.livejournal.com]

Yup, that's Spike all right.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

I recognized it immediately. Very -- Heeeeeyyyyyy! Hold on a minute...! :D

[eilowyn.livejournal.com]

you can end up with cases such as LOST's Sawyer where he's sent to someone else who I liked more anyway so I was okay with that.

Sawyer and Juliet completed me. It made the square just WORK, though Skate fans were probably pissed off.

And I don't actively watch OUAT - I have problems with Emma being a too stereotypical Strong Female Character - but if I were going to ship anything on the show, it would be Captain Swan, to nobody's surprise I'm sure.

Oh, and you can add the Sookie Stackhouse books to the "redeemed bad guy loses girl to nice guy" list. It was like the point of the entire series was subverted in a single book, just to please Bander Sam/Sookie fans. We'll see how True Blood ends, but I'm not expecting anything pleasing. Sookie will end up with Bill, and I'll vomit in my mouth a bit.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Suliet ending. All the happy tears!



Never fails to make me tear up.

[eilowyn.livejournal.com]

There are rumors of a Lost reuinion at Comic-Con this year, and I'll be there wearing my "the finale satisfied me emotionally" t-shirt because I cry at the thought of all those happy sideways-verse *moments*

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I'm one of the people who LIKED the Lost ending. I'll take the "and everyone completed their emotional journey and they all were loved..." ending, thank you very much.

[eilowyn.livejournal.com]

I can see where everyone who preferred the Breaking Bad ending is coming from, but don't they appreciate warm fuzzies when given them?!

[wildrider.livejournal.com]

I liked it, too. (I've been going all "Lost" crazy lately... maybe it's the missing jetliner... and the 10th anniversary stuff.)

[txvoodoo.livejournal.com]

2.5 seconds in, or less, YUP - SPIKE.

[hobbituk.livejournal.com]

I recognised it as soon as he started speaking... now I am going to have to track down the OUAT episodes with Captain Hook in it to see what he sounds like!

ETA - Oh, he sounds just my type for an onscreen woobie... Bad boy oozing sex appeal. *sobs* I now have to finish watching season 2 of OUAT don't I?

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Since he's been a regular for two seasons... that's a lot of episodes. (And, frankly, he does sound somewhat similar to Spike).

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Just start start with Season 3. Season 2 kind of sucked.

[ww1614.livejournal.com]

Hook=Spike. And when Jane writes him, he's 100% Spike-ish. I have major flashbacks to BtVS with this show because like BtVS, I hate the blonde heroine and love the bad boy woobie and I want him to get what he wants, which is the stupid blonde heroine. I despise JMo. Ugh.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

I struggle with the actress because I didn't care for her on House and I LOATHED her character on "How I Met Your Mother". I can't think of anything that Emma has done to truly piss me off, but she wasn't my favorite actress to be cast in the role.

And, yeah, it's the unrequited thing that sort of gets me in the end. After a while, requite already!

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Although, to be fair, I'm not sure you can call Neal/Baelfire the good boy...there's a lot of bad boy in that character, and the actor is known for playing cute villains or bad boys.

I mean come on...Baelfire abandoned Emma, and set her up to take the fall for him. She ended up serving prison time. Prior to that, he taught her how to steal.

Also, not entirely sure, you can call Angel...a good guy either.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Oh, I don't have anything against Neal/Baelfire. I think there was a lot of potential there. I just think that there's been problematic execution on that front. The writers don't seem to have a direction.

His choice to leave Emma in jail should've been something that they discuss, argue about, have as an issue. Relationships in stories work off of these sorts of things. Instead of using that as material, they had him having 'moved on' with Tamara (and until she was 'evil' his not having a great deal of ambivalence over it). Then they've now gone twice to having Neal MIA. The sum of which is the writers have had a year and a half to make some sort of story for the two of them... but the truth is that the writers simply haven't developed them in relationship to one another very much. After a while it's a bit like comics Spuffy, you've sapped momentum out of it. More and more it feels like they don't really have a plan of what to do with them.

Re: Angel, it's going to be a question of WHICH Angel we're talking about. BtVS Angel was basically just assigned love interest who would go evil or walk away as required. AtS Angel I like, but he's not in relation to Buffy there. Angel of the comics is a narcissistic douchenozzle. The only thing that all three versions share is that he's got "Hero" written on him somewhere like "Matel" is stamped on Ken Barbie's butt. It doesn't really matter what Angel actually does, it's going to swing around to his being lauded as the long-suffering hero at the end, and the comics have made that pretty obvious and barf-worthy. I have to think back through to AtS to remind myself that I actually LIKE the guy (heck love him). I just don't like the way that Dark Horse and Mutant Enemy hire people who all but fanboy genuflect to him.

And I truly have nothing against "good guy" characters. The truth is, I think writing a straight up good guy who doesn't turn into a self-rightous twat of a hypocrit is a bigger challenge. Genuine good guys are difficult to create and even more difficult to maintain. I think that's one reason I like Ichabod Crane and Charming. It's really difficult to be the noble guy and not be turn a hypocrit or kill-joy.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

RE Neal/Baelfire: I think there was a lot of potential there. I just think that there's been problematic execution on that front. The writers don't seem to have a direction.

I agree. It's annoying. Because both the actor and the character are rather interesting. But the writers don't appear to know how to fit the character into their story? It's admittedly an issue I have with OUAT. The uneven writing. Some bits are written quite well, others not so much.

There's so much lost potential there. On paper - Baelfire is actually more complex and interesting than Hook, who let's face it is basically the bad boy with the heart of gold cliche on paper. But on screen? Hook's more interesting and compelling than Baelfire and better written, and far more layered. So what happened???

I bring this up, because I saw the exact same thing happen with Angel and Spike. On paper from an objective standpoint - Angel is actually a much more interesting character. There's more back story, and lot more layers. Plus he's a bit of an egnima. Spike - is again, let's face it on paper - the bad boy with the heart of gold cliche. BUT on screen, he's the more interesting and compelling of the two, and better written, and more layered. Again? What happened???

Do writers just have troubles writing Angel and Baelfire characters well?
Is it a subconscious identification thing? Is it the actors playing them?
(Except Michael Raymond James (Baelfire) is the better screen actor - so I don't think it is that. I think it's the direction and screen writing.)

I'm wondering if it has to do with humor? It's admittedly more fun to write for humorous characters who have great one-liners and are "COOL!" then brooding, troubled, complicated, dark characters who don't have much to joke about and aren't "COOL". And that may well be the problem?
I don't know.

The truth is, I think writing a straight up good guy who doesn't turn into a self-rightous twat of a hypocrit is a bigger challenge.

And difficult to act apparently. I agree. Riley in As You Were is an excellent example. Dudly Do Right...too often is what happens.
I think this may be why a lot of romance novelists go for the bad boy trope and/or the asshat trope, it's easier to write. Nice guy romantic love interests are hard.

They do exist though. But they are difficult to make interesting.

The trick, I think, is to realize that no one is entirely one thing or another. And to write people sort of in between the two extremes. Charming is a good example, as is Icabode Crane, of how that can work.

Angel, it's going to be a question of WHICH Angel we're talking about. BtVS Angel was basically just assigned love interest who would go evil or walk away as required. AtS Angel I like, but he's not in relation to Buffy there. Angel of the comics is a narcissistic douchenozzle.

Well, it's probably worth noting that I gave up on the comics in 2010, about 4 years ago...partly because of how they were writing Angel. A clear case of letting plot and theme destroy character in my opinion. So comics Angel doesn't exist in my head. ;-)

BTVS Angel - I actually think had more depth...he really wasn't just a love interest. Some of Angel's best episodes weren't with Buffy, he had some great scenes with Xander, Spike, Dru, Faith, and Giles. I love the scene with him and Xander in Prophecy Girl. Also his interactions with Faith in S3 - are amongst my favorites. Boreanze is actually a fairly good actor when he's given something to do. And the character worked as an ironic foil to Buffy at various points.

I don't think a lot of male tv writers are good at romance. They seem to have problems with it? Whedon in particular has issues with romantic fiction - he sneers at it. Which happens a lot in these series - the male writers don't see "romance" as cool. There are exceptions - Ben Browder from Farscape..comes to mind.