Long Rambley *Unedited Stream of Consciousness* Stuff on Genre Stories, Endings, and Answers

[shipperx]

:
Warning: Spoilers for BSG finale, very vague but possibly spoilerish LOST finale, Spoilers for Star Wars, and, oh hell, Buffy, Angel, Farscape, and the BtVS comics too

So I've been thinking about the Lost finale (I know. But... I can't help it. Actually, I think it's a good sign that it's continued to intrigue me) and I've popped over to TWOP where they've got some fast and furious discussions about answers and what was or wasn't satisfying and whether or not it held true to the rest of the story...and much like when reading BtVS stuff, sometimes you walk away thinking that we really did watch different shows!

One of the discussions that struck me was some guy saying. Oh heck, I'm not going to paraphrase. It's easier just to hunt it down and quote it as it's what

Star Wars did right what LOST did wrong. Lucas did not leave us with nagging mysteries left over from the first trilogy. He knew the story would not be satisfying unless he carefully explained how The Force works (midichlorians), the sociopolitical and economic conditions precipitating the Clone Wars, the inner workings of the Jedi council, and the specific points of differentiation between the dark and light sides. Explanations make stories more better.

Oh my! Let's ignore Lost for a moment. Let's talk about Star Wars for a bit...

Good God! Talk about opposing world views! The second trilogy did something other than tarnish memories from my childhood?! I really wonder about the age of the guy posting because in my experience people who have a lot of love for the second trilogy tend to be people who grew up with it. People who grew up with the first trilogy tend to be less affectionate of the second set of stories.

I will say that if the second trilogy was the 'answer' then I damn well wish that Lucas had kept his 'answers' to himself!

First off, I didn't know that there was all that much that was important that I didn't get with the first trilogy. I went along happily for many decades without those answers. I mean, sure there were things left out there that we could think upon, read tie-in novels abour or, if we were inclined, dream up fanficcy scenarios for -- the fall of the Jedis, the fall of Anakin Skywalker, etc. But I can also say that the answers in my head were a damn sight more satisfying to me than the ones that Lucas provided. And, I'm sorry, but midichlorians were non-sensical CRAP!! I hated it. I really hated it. I hated it so much I was re-writing Episode 1 in my head while I was still in the theater watching the damn thing! (This has only happened twice in my life. Episode 1 of Star Wars was so damn boring and I don't know. It was just so bad that, whenever I wasn't thinking about the poor bastards left sitting at computers having to run a render program for the endless number of marble floors and walls on prominent display, I kept re-editing the story in my head as I watched, thinking "It would've been so much better had they just done this or that or that or even that instead.) The only other movie that ever did that to me was Alien: Resurrection (that I didn't discover until years later was largely a Joss Whedon script. I know he doesn't lay claim to it and says they changed it, but somewhere, sometime I read what he considers "his" part of it and... yep. That's the part that I hated. (And no, I don't remember the details of what it was that I hated so badly. I've only watched the movie once since, and I still hated it. One issue I had basically had to do with the depiction of the mad scientist character. I thought the writing had gone the most trite way possible. But that wasn't my only issue. I just no longer remember what they were).

Anyway, back to midichlorines and why I hated them. It's a two-fold reason why I hated it.

First, they made no damn sense. See, the problem is if you're going to float an answer as faux science-y 'realistic' answer then you really, really have to make stuff logical. There are hard science fiction writers. And I can enjoy them. I like science. A lot. But to make it 'scientific' then it really needs some logic to it. I consider things like 'The Adromeda Strain' to be science fiction. It's jumping off point is actual science that is then extrapolated into a story. It stretches the premise, but it's starting with an investigation of the science. And it usually requires that the writer either have a technical background (for example, Michael Crichton who wrote "The Andromeda Strain" actually graduated med school) or be someone who is actually very interested in science. It requires some level of knowledge to do very well. Things that use sci-fi simply as a setting I put in the category of either soft sci-fi or Science Fantasy. Star Wars is very, very much Science Fantasy. It was really a fantasy book placed in space and given flashy special effects. Actually, though far closer to science fiction than Star Wars ever was, I consider Farscape To be science fantasy as well. I say that because so much of Farscape was darn near just 'magic' (see the episode about Maldus. There was no effort at science there. And none at Aeryn's resurrection in Season of Death. It is essentially... magic). Yes, Farscape has John Crichton running around talking about wormholes... but most of the time it may as well be Narnia's Wardrobe. The science in Farscape was to facilitate the story, not to ponder actual bits of science (exception: the episode Unrealized Reality which actually did have some interesting points about the nature of time). Doctor Who is also science fantasy. I do actually somewhat agree with the current headwriter that Doctor Who has more to do with fairy tales than with science fiction. And let me say this loud and clear, there is not a darn thing wrong with soft science fiction or science fantasy. I love them both.

However (back to midichlorines), technobabble/technojagon does not a real answer make. Midichlorines wasn't an answer for anything. It didn't make a damn bit of sense genetically. It didn't explain the ability to mind-warp people, levitate things, or saber fight while blindfolded. Another person in the TWOP thread in question said that Trek had faster than light warp drives but they explained that with dilithium crystals and... WHAT?! I do consider Trek to, more often than not, be science fiction. TNG did often like to take science tidbits and extrapolate them into stories. But, faster than warp drives were not explained by dilithium crystals. It didn't explain it. No, it really, really didn't. And if you think it did, you don't fully comprehend what faster than light entails. For that matter, 'red matter' didn't explain wormhole opening or black holes created in place of Vulcan, either. Red Matter = something JJ Abrams made up out of thin air that had as much to do with science as Harry Potter's wizard wand) It actually sort of reminds me of the infamous "serial killer lover" incident with David Fury over on The Bronze. The gist of the argument (that I never felt that Fury understood) was that the 'soul' was just a way for the show to make Angel 'okay' for Buffy. It was a fictional construct. It was how they could have Angel go evil and bring him back. It was a MacGuffin. It only meant what the writers of the show wanted it to mean and if they could do that with a soul they could do the same thing with a chip or a home-grown conscience with Spike. It was like I was screaming heresy at the top of my lungs (I don't know. Maybe Fury is religious so he took the soul thing really seriously as something other than a made-up plot device). The point being "soul" was a name they gave to accomplish a purpose in a story. Technobabble or Technojargon is often the same thing. If it's meaningless technojargon, it's the writers holding up a shiny object somewhere to your left to distract you from the fact that was is going on is essentially... magic.

Unlike the poster quoted above. I didn't consider "midichlorines" to be an answer for anything. I considered it meaningless twaddle. What's worse, it was meaningless twaddle that actually made "The Force" less interesting. Unlike the quoted poster, I thought it was better with the question mark. "The Force" could be interpreted as perhaps having to do with the physical universe. Perhaps it was physics... or perhaps it was philosophy... or perhaps it was theology. And, "The Force" being potentially any or all of the three gave it... mystery. It gave it narrative power. Slapping a quasi-genetic component to it didn't make that any better, and I'm not sure it didn't make it seem less interesting and less powerful. Because sitting in the theater then, I stopped wondering about "The Force" in a big way and started analyzing it under a mental microscope about "how in the fucking hell does that work?!" I stopped looking at it on a big scale and started looking at it as a small one. And seriously, ameoba of the body isn't nearly as satisfying as a philosophical/quantum physics/indecipherable force. It's taken from something to ponder to a quantifiable number of little micro-organisms. It rendered it... mundane. Might as well be dust-mites now.

Now, I know what the guy was arguing. He was not happy with where and how Lost ended. And I know that there are those who reacted quite negatively. I followed a link yesterday to an LJ which flat-out said "Fuck you, LOST!" over the finale. Most of my own flist was far less critical ranging from having liked only parts of it and to others having really liked where it. And I can understand many of the reservation of those that didn't like it.

I can understand feeling betrayed by a story. Let's take Season 8 comics for example. I still have a difficult time (in fact I refuse) to accept the change in mythology that happened there. On the TV show we were given a story about how vampires were created by the last Old One out the door infecting a human, creating a hybrid that are vampires. And we were freaking shown that Slayers were infected with an aspect of the demons. And were explicitly told by Whistler that the powers had never seen Bangel coming... and then in Season 8 it's suddenly a sentient universe planning for Buffy/Angel to be a perfected intelligently designed evolution and they were meant in big letters of FATE... and, I'm sorry. That's just throwing out their own mythology and replacing it wholesale.

I know that there are some people running around screaming that the ending of LOST was "not the show they were watching" (And reading some of the rants, it really really wasn't). And, in some small way I can even sympathize. After all, LOST wasn't presented by ABC in the early years as a genre show. I remember back in Season 1, there being some interview by someone about LOST trying to always have a pragmatic answer as well as a unscientific on. So, I do sympathize that there were some mainstream non-genre fans who got suckered into a very, very genre show. That said...um... it had a MONSTER in the premiere episode! No matter what they said it was kind clear from inception that we weren't talking realism here. I don't know how in the hell someone could've gotten six years into with the show where it became ever more increasingly obvious that they were nowhere NEAR Kansas anymore and still some people thought that somehow, someway there was going to be a practical answer to what was going on. LOST departed the 'normal world' on day one. And though I grant that ABC tried its best to launch LOST as not being a genre show, I can't help but think you'd have to be blind, deaf, and dumb not to have caught on ages ago that it WAS genre. Also, technojargon isn't really an 'answer' either. If Lost said that LOSTEES were infected by midichlorines and that's why they were on the island... that's not really an answer either. It would be just as much of a MacGuffin as anything else.

Which isn't to imply in any way that even genre fans couldn't have big issues or couldn't be dissatisfied with the answers and non-answers given. It's perfectly possible to love genre fiction and to dislike the final twist. But those criticisms are slightly different. Disliking something in a writing sense or a philosophical sense or due to its execution or for it just not being adequate is a slightly different than wanting it to be rational (even if 'rational' is just meaningless techonbabble. Apparently quasi-science gibberish is more valuable than touchy-feely crap... and okay, maybe I took offense at the dude who said that only women who liked lollipops and unicorns and were crazy-cat-ladies could like it because, dude, whether you know it or not, that's some sexist shit you said. Also, meaningless technobabble is not, simply by right of sounding vaguely sciencey, superior to touchy-feely characterization 'crap.' It's like the BSG guys that obsessed about military stuff or the trekkies to have exact plans for the decks of the enterprise. These are not 'more rational' ways of watching a television show ... just because it feels reassuringly unemotional and vaguely male).

I digress.

Let me stress that I am NOT saying that people couldn't have wanted more or different or different kinds of answers. All of that is perfectly valid and I can definitely see where people can feel that way. I was just somewhat taken aback by a TWOP poster or two who insisted that they wanted 'hard' answers and categorize midichlorines as being an example of both a rational and satisfying answer while stressing that they hadn't been watching a show that had all this mythology and philosophy in it. Did they really not notice significant number of characters named after philosophers?! And how one misses a HUGE HONKING STATUE OF AN EGYPTIAN GODDESS standing (or ruined) on the island, I honestly don't know. I guess it's possible to have ignored those things to concentrate on the mechanics of the island if you didn't like them, but I find it somewhat mindblowing to see rage-filled rants claiming that that philosophical crap hadn't been part of the show they were watching. Um...yes it was.

Look, I can understand having issues with the ending. I truly, honestly do. So I'm not criticizing that reaction. I'm not. You don't have to like the ending. You can take issue with it in a number of ways. And I can understand either feeling that there were things unanswered, or just straight-up disliking the answers that were given or the kind of answers given. The twist could be a disappointment or a twist too far and I can see feeling that it was all too sentimental.

I just don't quite understand the fraction who say that they were never watching a show that was dealing with philosophy and mythology and wanted a scientific (or at least faux-scientific) answer. Honestly, I don't think a real quantum physicist could cook up a scientific answer that would sound plausible, much less understandable. And a bunch of writers sure as hell weren't going to be able to invent a scientific explanation for everything that was going on. Science is great. Science is awesome. Science can encompass some mind-blowing things that exceed our imaginations. But it wasn't going to adequately cover all the bases of a 6 year TV show without also having some huge honking plot holes in it also. I can understand not liking the nature of the answer or wanting more and/or different answers. But I also don't think that of technobabble as qualitatively better than Harry Potter or Harry Dresden claiming "Magic!" Even if a glowhole was described as midichlorines, we'd still be talking about a glowhole.

That said, I also speak as one of the few -- the very few -- that wasn't much bothered by the BSG finale. I mean, I had issues Starbuck, Six, and Baltar being freaking angels being the most prominent of them. Seriously, THESE FOLKS, where angels?! Oh good grief. I can't buy it. I just can't buy it. {pause} Nope. Still don't buy it. But the two things that seemed to most wig everyone out, honestly didn't bother me much, if at all.

The whole mitochondrial Eve thing really flipped people out, and I've never quite understood why. Mitochondrial Eve =/= Genesis Eve. It didn't and never did mean that people didn't already exist. Nor did it mean that mitochondrial Eve had to hook up with mitochondrial Adam. In fact -- she didn't. So no one was sentencing the tot to marry a cave man. That's not what the term even meant. Mitochondrial Eve really boils down to being a mathematical equation. MtDNA is a string of DNA that is passed on unchanged along a maternal lineage. It had a distinct sequence and isn't changed via reproduction any changes are spontaneous substitutions/mutations. And they happen at a certain rate (approximately one ever 3500 years)... which means it's possible to calculate backwards to the statistical mitochondrial Eve. It also means that at some point in history there was either a near-extinction or (more likely) a population pinch-point occurred. It never meant she was the "first" human. It also never meant that she had kids with Y-chromosomal "Adam"... who is determined by a similar mathematical equation. In fact, based on calculations mitochondrial Eve is somewhere between 150,000 - 200,000 years ago. Y-Chromosomal "Adam" is only 50,000 - 80,000 years ago. And, honestly, I never got what the big problem was in saying that Hera was the mitochondrial Eve. At least not when you have Angel Starbuck running around and Baltar -- BALTAR! -- as a freaking angel. That was a far greater WTF?

The other big flip-out point in the BSG finale seemed to be the bucolic nature of it. It was the whole "technology bad" thing. And, I can understand why people dislike that. But, again, I was unbothered because I considered it a necessary by-product of the chosen ending... and I didn't blame them for the ending. Let me mention at this point that I was not an enthusiastic fan of BSG. I found the show as a whole to be quite nihilistic in a way that wasn't to my taste (Hell, I'm writing a post-apocalyptic WIP and had feedback once about how my post-apocalyptic world isn't hopeless. I actually quite liked that feedback. The fic might be post-apocalyptic, but I don't want it to be nihilistic. (I think this is why I liked the City of Ember book series. It was a weirdly optimistic post-apocalyptic world).

Anyway, as a series, I thought the BSG reboot was quite nihilistic. The thing started with blowing up humanity and then pointedly told us that there were not enough surviving humans for adequate genetic diversity for the human race to survive. And that was the premise. Then they proceeded to make their humans so horrible and unlikable (to me) that I reached a point where I would've been okay had their human race completely died out. (Seriously, I felt BSG became very misanthropic. It was a show that had a very, very dark view of human nature.

By the time they reached earth and found that it had been blown up real good, I was basically prepared for a "rocks fall, everyone dies" ending. To me, by that point there was no point. In anything in that fictional universe. They hadn't had enough genetic diversity to save mankind at the beginning and they'd killed a shit load of humans since then. And even if the Cylons kicked in their genetic diversity, there was only a hand ful of willing models, and all the models combined wouldn't have been enough. From the point of finding destroyed Earth, there was no further point (So long, Dee! I could understand the suicide even as I thought it was a waste.) Technology dies. They were on a death ship in a death fleet. They had limited fuel, limited food. Sooner or later they were going to run out of metaphorical gas or starve to death. Fun. So, at that point BSG had two choices, they could go the "rocks fall, everyone dies" ending (which, given the tone of the show is what I was expecting.) Or they could do what they did. Having chosen there being an Earth II...well, at least there'd be a continuation of mankind. I guess that might be good? Sorta. But that meant, as a premise that technology had to be jetisonned. If our earth was Earth II then there couldn't be evidence of BSG. Sooner or later its orbit would degrade and it would crash on earth. And given the premise, you couldn't be discovering space ships in pre-historic earth. So by choosing the 'new earth' ending, they pretty much sealed "must jettison technology." And, given the mitochondrial DNA explanation above, it didn't matter if there were people on earth already. Hera as Eve didn't preclude that.

So the big "I hated it stuff" that most people point to didn't bother me too much. Only the whole "God did it and Starbuck, Six, and Baltar were ANGELS! really annoyed and seemed rather silly in the context of such a misanthropic show. But, still, shrug. I wasn't that bothered.

All of which is to say, that even if a show gives answers, that doesn't mean that folks will be happy with the answers they are given. BSG fans pretty much feel that the answer was awful (and inasmuch as it involved Starbuck and Baltar angels, I agree. But the whole mitochondrial Eve part of it actually was a quasi-science answer... and it was hated by a big slew of fans.

Buffy's finale "Chosen" had answers of a sort. I mean, yeah, the whole eye of Botox thing several episode earlier was never addressed again. And we had deus ex machina glow champion amulet. But it was all pretty transparent. That didn't necesarily make it good either. Frankly side by side, I vastly prefer the vague, open-ended AtS finale of "Not Fade Away" with the characters going into the fight because that's what they do as opposed to the BtVS ending which, quite frankly, just left me depressed. (On the other hand, I would have been quite happy with "The Gift" as a finale, so... I don't even have a point.)

So, point, point. I need to have a point. I guess it's that what satisfies us, satisfies us, and what doesn't... doesn't. (Hey, I didn't say that the point would be deep!) One person can find midichlorines an adequate, fulfilling answer and another can find it to be a crock of shit. I can understand hating the AtS finale (even though I don't), and I can see why there are people who love "Chosen" (though, I admit, that I still kind of hate huge chunks of it.) What people need to feel that a fictional journey was adequately nourishing varies greatly from person to person.

And, wow, this got way, way, way longer than I had intended, so I put it behind a cut. Sadly... I don't even think I'm through. I actually have some more to say. But I'll do that later.

Comments

[sockmonkeyhere.livejournal.com]

That said...um... it had a MONSTER in the premiere episode!

And a POLAR BEAR. On a TROPICAL ISLAND. A real polar bear would have been dead of a heat stroke there within days. Which meant that this was a magic polar bear. Bye-bye, logical science!

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I was rather astounded that anyone anywhere thought that there would still be a 'realistic' answer. The show swerved into magic pretty much from day one. I can see not liking 'heaven' but if they were expecting something that made it 'realistic' they were nuts.

[rahirah]

See, I never expected a scientific explanation which would explain how everything worked in 'reality.' Obviously the science of LOST, such as it was, was fantasy science. And since I'm pretty sure they were pulling stuff out of their asses for at least 75% of the show, I knew it was too much to ask for that they'd tie up all the loose ends.

But I still hoped for an ending which tied up most of the major loose ends. And the more I think about it, the more I'm irritated that they basically wasted half a season on "And they all went to heaven and lived happily ever after." I mean, yeah, it's nice to know that they all go to heaven and live happily ever after, but... what I'm interested in is what happens to them in this world, not the next.

It's like, fine, be character driven - but don't try to tell me that you can't have good characters AND good plot. They're not mutually exclusive.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

I'm not actually talking about people being upset with they all went to heaven as the answer. I can understand disliking that.

This person was arguing that "midichlorines" is a more substantial 'hard' answer which... I don't actually think it is. I think it's just another form of glossy distraction. That said, while there are answers not answered with LOST and plot holes aplenty (there were!) for myself... I really can't think of any answers that I needed. I mean, I know that there are things there that aren't answered. But call me unimaginetive, fanwanky or unattentitive, I can't think of any burning questions that I have that I have much need to be answered (i.e. Walt being "special." That was in no way answered. But, maybe I'm too well trained by a lifetime of soap operas. Once Walt left and it became apparent that the timeline wouldn't work with him because that little actor now looks like a full grown adult, I just sort of stored that away as 'dropped plotline' and I haven't thought about it much. I don't have any sense of urgency that it be answered.) Most stuff I can just fanwank.

And, I tend to think that they more or less told us what happened in this world and it...wasn't really happy. People died. Unjustly. Unfairly. Too young. etc. 'Real' life is messy and doesn't necessarily have happy ending (though I'm assuming that Rose and Bernard as well as quite possibly Desmond/Penny did). That's what happened.

What I actually find interesting at this point is re-thinking the sideways which, I freely admit that I had never thought to analyze in the light it was finally presented. It's interesting.

Sawyer (the con man) and Miles (the guy who stole stuff) became Cops. Was that indicative of change? Wish fulfilment? Atonement? All three? Whatever it is, it's pretty funny. I understand why Sun and Jin cracked up.

And thinking back, one reason that I feel that Desmond did get a happy ending is that he didn't seem to be working through sideways issues. In fact, upon thought, I think Desmond wasn't atoning. I think Widmore was. This time Widmore accepted Desmond. Rather than imprisoning Desmond, he made him rich and well travelled. And he pretty much aimed Desmond right towards Penny.

Eloise is now raising the son that she killed.

This was why Ben in Sideways was caring for his father, the father he murdered. And it's why that father, who was so negligent of him, is now dependent on him. And yet, this time his father loved him. And Ben couldn't go into the church and leave because he's still working his issues through with Alex and Rousseau. Rousseau gets to raise her child. Alex gets her life. He's atoning to them.

It's all fiction so Sideways is as "real" as the "island" and really whatever the physics are metaphysics, they essentially function as levels/tests to be worked though on the way to enlightenment...to their best selves.

It's actually making me re-examine all the stuff we've seen in the sideways, trying to figure out what purpose it served -- guilt they carried, baggage they had difficulty shedding. Are they atoning...or is it that someone like Ben is atoning to them? Or... failing to do so (Keamy!)

I actually think it's far less purgatory or limbo or heaven than a more hindu-like reincarnation thing where people work through successive planes of existence. And whether the island was LITERALLY purgatory is almost moot. It more or less functioned as one.

I'm not saying that there weren't holes to drive a truck through, because there were. And it was by no means tightly plotted. Much of it is disjointed and it meanders off the trail at a number of locations. So I truly do understand a ton of criticisms and being quite vexed with many things.

[rahirah]

Agreed, the midichlorians thing is bizarrely off base. If only because it's an anser to a question that no one was asking in the first place. I can't think of a single person who walked out of the first trilogy saying "But how does the Force work?!"

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Honestly, at first, I thought he could not be serious! The things he mentioned were all things that I hated. All he needed to do was add "And Jar-Jar Binks!" and I would be certain it's a troll.

Seriously, the obvious and ponderous political stuff? First, it wasn't that hard to figure out. It really wasn't that darn complicated. And mostly -- I did. not. care. The workings of the Jedi Council? Yawn. And midichlorians were just silly.

What I wanted, but didn't get, was a real emotional journey for the fall of Anakin Skywalker. I wanted big, Greek tragedy, darnit.

Instead I got midichlorians.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

(cont'd)

That said, in retrospect, I find the sideways rather nifty and worth examination. I do think that LOST works better as an allegory. You're right that the plot goes off in erratic directions. But, as I said, what we need to feel satisfied varies from person to person. I know if I look too hard, the cracks are there. And I know there are things that aren't answered. I was shocked and saddened when I realized what was going on and that they're all dead... But, despite all of that, I'm not disatisfied. I can understand feeling disatisfied. I do. Strangely, the more I've thought throught the sideways-verse, the more that it works for me. I do understand not feeling that way. So I'm not saying you should.

I was just rather hacked off with the TWOP poster who thought that being satisfied equated to unicorns and crazy-cat-ladies and then his holding up midichlorians as a 'good' explanation when it was just really obvious MacGuffin bullshit that really didn't mean anything. The plot holes are plot holes regardless. Midichlorines isn't qualatiatively different than a devine glowhole.

[eilowyn.livejournal.com]

Um . . . you write lots. And make lots of good points. And so you make commenting kind of intimidating, LOL! Anyway, WORD to the midichlorians (have you seen the three-part review of Episode I youtube, as told by a creepy, misanthropic guy? It's brilliant, and he clearly states the WTF of midichlorians), the IT'S AN EFFING GENRE SHOW!, um . . . and other stuff you said. And this was one of the better explanations for the BSG finale I've ever seen. Yeah.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Hee! I talk a lot. 99% of it is crap. This was just a really disorganized stream of consciousness. So, please comment away.

Do you have a link for the youtube thing? (Although, honestly, I've never watched Episode 1 a second time so I don't know what I'd even remember. Didn't watch Episode 2 at all. Did see Episode 3, but was somewhat underwhelmed. It wasn't as bad as the first one. But really, I think I liked the questions better than the answers in Lucas's world.

[eilowyn.livejournal.com]

http://www.youtube.com/user/RedLetterMedia#p/u/19/FxKtZmQgxrI

The infamous Star Wars: Episode 1 review (part 1 of 7). Damon Lindelof actually praised this pretty highly on his Twitter account, and I really recommend you watch the whole thing because it's absolutely hilarious, as well as being an absolutely valid critique of the film. The other parts should show up alongside the video, or you can just go to his main page and see all the other films he's reviewed in his own unique way.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Bwha! Awesome. I even watched all of the Clone Wars one. I've clearly a geek too because I totally cracked up at "Fuck you, Rick Berman! Wait. It's a different Rick. What's wrong with Rick's?"

[liliaeth]

I think that the big difference between Chosen and the Gift is the characters.

By the end of the Gift, it's possible to be hopeful and inspired by every single one of the characters. They're all shown at their best, doing the right thing for the right reasons. It's hopeful in a way.

Chosen might have a 'happy' ending, but all the characters who end up surviving come out looking like assholes. I have never forgiven Joss for that ending, with the scoobies joking over the graves of everyone who died in Sunnydale. That lack of caring, that lack of even vaguely giving a damn... that killed any liking I ever had for any surviving char other than Buffy, because she at least cared.

Compare that to NFA, which might have a bleak ending, but all the characters care. They're facing immediate death and still they all take a moment to mourn Wesley. I couldn't even stand Wesley, yet that very moment humanised every single character in that last stand and made me want to see them survive.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

I completely agree with you about Chosen and The Gift. When the Gift was over, I loved all of them. When Chosen was over, I was wishing that buss to drive over a cliff.

[flake-sake.livejournal.com]

I'm still pondering if I should watch Lost so I only skimmed parts od your post. I just wanted to throw in my two cents about endings.

I think to me it matters how much did the story toy with the questions it raised? Did it stylize them to be of great importance? Because if it did, then I want some kind of answer. Shows that focused on the questions would be BSG, B5, Neon Genesis Evangelion (an anime no one ever knows) and so on.
With star wars I never even asked myself were the force came from, hence the answer was quite superfluous and silly, but when the questions are at the center of the plot, I do like to have answers and they are the reasons why I'll always thing of B5 as way way better than BSG or NGE.

Buffy or Angel never focused so hard on the questions so I didn't mind that some of them were left open. It just wasn't all that important and I was happy that the emotional closure worked, but now with S8 that is running for 35 issues on unanswered questions now, I'll probably be very dissatisfied if those answers are bad (science or otherwise).

I think if you play on mystery to keep the viewer insterested you have to cash in at the end and better have good plan. If you don't have one, don't focus too much on it.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

I actually didn't give the twist in LOST in the post (though I think it probably could be guessed). It is mentioned in Rahirah's and my responses. And I'll hopefully respond to your post tomorrow. Have to head to bed right now. :)

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

I think to me it matters how much did the story toy with the questions it raised? Did it stylize them to be of great importance? Because if it did, then I want some kind of answer.

I'm not going to lie and say that they didn't leave some significant plot threads dangling. I can think of three off hand that had no hard answer. But of those three, one doesn't bother me primarily because it hasn't been mentioned in years. It is, without a doubt, a dropped plot. However, I can pretty easily see how it would have worked into the ending had it not been dropped when the actor left/was let go. I can understand, with all the myriad of returning touchstones and long departed characters why this issue/character not being addressed irks people. That's legitimate, but since it was something that went away so long ago, I didn't have an urgent 'need to know.' It wasn't high on my priority list.

The second dropped plot is similar to the first. But, the truth is... I can kind of fanwank that one. Yes, it's fanwank. And if I had rewatched the episode that set the premise for it, I might consider it a shaky fanwank. But, I haven't rewatched that episode in years and the thread of it hasn't been mentioned in years, so with a fuzzy memory of the details I can fanwank it as misdirection and in that light, I can sorta consider it 'solved.' In the harsh light of day, I think it's a dropped plot thread, but if I look at it from a slightly different angle, I think it was obliquely addressed, though perhaps with a different answer than had been originally intended.

Third non-answer/big plot point, I actually think is really, really easily fanwanked. It's a rather deus ex machina answer, and I can see being irked by being handed a deus ex machina as an answer. But if you accept the deus ex machina that was offered, it's super easy to reach an answer to that question without any effort.

A slightly more spoilery expansion on the topic

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Also, I think some questions are things I thought were answered. For example, "But they never explained why the numbers were on the hatch!" No. They didn't. They never said "The numbers were the serial number on the hatch because _____" However, they did tell us explicitly what the numbers represented. Knowing what the numbers meant was enough for me. I never thought about the mechanics of how or why they arrived as a serial number. To me, it's sort of like the question of "Why did the characters keep crossing paths?" Again, no one ever explicitly says "This is why..." But I absolutely think that the answer is obvious. I consider that question answered. I honestly do, to the point where I scratch my head wonder "What do you mean that wasn't answered?"

But not everyone sees it that way.

That's what I meant about different people walking away feeling like they were watching different shows. I've been similarly struck by discussions in Buffy fandom. It's easy to get into discussions with people and realize that we watched the exact same thing and drew entirely different conclusions. (Witness the kerfuffle last week about post-As You Were Spuffy. Different people saw that in some radically different ways).

Another example: All the Egyptian stuff that popped up in LOST. I've seen people say "But they never explained what it meant! How did any of that stuff get there?" Again, I wonder, "You really want an explanation?" I honestly, do not consider it unsolved. We've been told, explicitly, that the island is ancient. There is no question whatsoever that it goes back thousands (plural) of years and that time and time again people have been drawn to the island. Isn't that explanation enough?

As for "What did heiroglyphs mean?" We're given multiple examples of people grafting their own belief systems onto the mysteries of the island. What did the Egyptian stuff 'mean'? Well, for one thing, it's one of many examples of people grafting their own belief system onto the island. It's just that straight-forward. In that sense, an ancient Egyptian's rationalizations are irrelevant. Their answers wouldn't work for us and weren't the answer. They wouldn't 'solve' anything. Their 'meaning' was to show that these questions have been going on a very, very long time and the answers are somewhat mythological in nature. And... I kind of thought that was obvious for quite some time now. I'm a little shocked by people saying it wasn't explained.

But I think some of it goes back to the question of "what show were you watching?" The posters on TWOP saying that they weren't watching a show about mythology and philosophy are, I think, understandably unhappy. They really, really didn't get what they wanted. On the other hand, looking back at my own LJ posts on LOST, the posts that weren't "WTF?!" or 'squee!" or gleeful shadenfreude over Jack misery, were about mythology and philosophy. And, though I guessed many, many things wrong, I'm bit giddy that I may have read a few things right(true, they were thematic. But they were things!) The episode where I thought, 'This entire episode is about how myths are built! And how they're subjective!' I now think I read correctly.

I understand being upset with the kind of answer they gave. And being so for any number of reasons. But I do think there was a theme and that the ending fits that theme. I am happy with it, though I understand why others are less so.

That said, no way would something like "midichlorines!" have satisfied me. But, I realize mileage on this varies. Wildly.

Re: A slightly more spoilery expansion on the topic

[flake-sake.livejournal.com]

I have hard time judging if it would satisfy me. The examples you brought would be fine by me I guess, ok, island is ancient, some egyptians dropped by once. But it also depends on how much drama they made about the hyroglyphes and what they mean in the earlier series.

I don't know for example if I would have found BSG as bad as I did in the end, if they hadn't made such a fuzz about the opera house dream, or Starbuck, or head six/baltar. Especially for the last one they had tons of theories on the show and then went for the single most lamest sorry-we-forgot-to-plot-something-here answer. Everything would have been better than the angel solution.

I though the Midiwhatevers where stupid for two reasons, they explained nothing whatsoever and there never was an explanation for the force needed, it was magic, end of story.

On BSG there was a need for an explanation who the head people really were and at that point I really would have preferred a chip or some other less esoteric answer than the show gave.

I think pseudoscience and leaving things open/mythic are both not the optimal solution. The best thing is to start with something in mind and then play it for what it's worth and amaze with the answers, not with the question.
I really think B5 is the best example for that, where you have this time travel episode that makes no sense at all and then a season later, there's the other half of it and suddenly it all clicks together in brilliance. Stuff like that makes me squee and that's always what I hope for in mystery series. Those moments where past events are filled with meaning give me a lot of satisfaction.

Re: A slightly more spoilery expansion on the topic

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

I have hard time judging if it would satisfy me

From what you've said, I suspect that LOST maybe too sloppy to satisfy because I don't think it was tightly plotted,. In fact it's downright baroque. It piles on, and delights in mystifying. (Keeping with the art theme) it's expressionist instead of impressionist. In Impressionism, you can stand up close and only see dots, but when you step back you can see the picture whereas in expressionism, the object isn't to express objective reality at all but to evoke emotion and the sense of 'being alive.' If the finale put a fine point on anything, it's that Lost prioritized emotion.

And I do think BSG and Lost played with some of the same crayons. There is overlap but also great divergence. It's hard to discuss without getting into specifics but I can at least discuss the BSG part of it.

I freaking hated the angels in the BSG finale. It came from out of freaking nowhere. As I stated before, I had no problems with the mitochondrial Eve bit or even the whole 'jettison technology' bit that bothered some people. Those two aspects of the finale bothered me not at all, even though they did a lot of people. What I did have issues with in the BSG finale was its combination of implying an almost literally interventionist god doing lab experiments, setting up little pockets of life over and over, even though these 'angels' didn't do anything but expect humanity to just destroy itself again and again. Not only did it have heavy implication of an interventioned and -- darnit -- I can't help but think a somewhat sadistic god, but the series as a whole had a nihilistic view of humanity. People destroyed the whole freaking world over and over again. I didn't actually find much particularly redeemable in the BSG world, and that was long before the finale. I found BSG in general to be intellectually interesting. It had interesting concepts, but I think I mostly hated BSG's outlook. I found it almost misanthropic. And having this horrible, misanthropic view of humanity in conjunction with "oh, they're just gonna destroy this world too. Perhaps not... but probably." (which was the impression that I left with) and a god running the same experiments over and over again was about like Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy revealing that the meaning of life is '42' and that the earth was nothing more than a giant computer run by mice working for all these years to generate that answer.

Basically, I didn't much care for the world in BSG's philosophy. :)

Re: A slightly more spoilery expansion on the topic

[flake-sake.livejournal.com]

I think my biggest hate factors in the finale where the three angels and of these, especially Starbuck, because I really liked the character.
I was very indifferent to Hera, just thinking that it was no worth the fuss they made around her.
And I thought the ditching tech idea was beyond stupid.

The whole history repeats itself story was fairly lame, also because it sucked in the details. It just didn't make sense with the cylons and later on with the cylons from the last cycle.

That the BSG god was such a sadist was the one little thing that redeemed the whole thing a bit for me and I wish they played a bit more on it. Had they played it as a Prometheus story where the humans at least attempt to break out of the lab, I might have loved it.

I wonder if they'll go into it more on Caprica. It's very believeable that the BSG god finds it totally awesome that teenagers blow themselves up for him.

Re: A slightly more spoilery expansion on the topic

[probablecylon.livejournal.com]

If they played on the idea that the 'BSG god was such a sadist', it would have had a man-behind-the-curtain 'see? here is the sadistic divinity!' declarativeness to it. Instead, you have a deus absconditis, into whom most people read their own fears or anger or aspiration. It's a part of the cylons' evolution (and by extension ours) to learn that the annihilation of the humans was not in fact God's intent.

Re: A slightly more spoilery expansion on the topic

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

That the BSG god was such a sadist was the one little thing that redeemed the whole thing a bit for me

See? Fandom differs. It's always amused me that so many BSG fans were so unhappy with the finale that they retroactively hate large chunks of the show when as much as I hate, hate the angels bit, I wasn't all that bothered by the finale. What I Strike>hated somewhat disgusted me (to the point that when that episode was over I swore to not give a shit about anything that happened on the show) was the episode where they found Earth and it was destroyed.

Conceptually I have no problem with it. It's even a neat idea... especially for a Twilight Zone episode. My problem with it was that having come after everything that had gone before, the colony turned Nazi death camp with terrorism (even though I actually rather liked that plot), the pronouncement that there wasn't enough genetic diversity for the BSG humans to continue to exist as a species, etc. That the episode where the twist was that they had found earth and it was barren because people had destroyed it had me throw up my hands and say that everything in the BSG-verse was pointless. It was a long slow trek towards extinction. The End.

For me, the series had basically ended right there.

The new Earth thing was improbable, but my only real surprise in the finale was the shocking realization that it wasn't going to be "rocks fall, everyone dies." I really went into the finale thinking that now they all die. And I was okay with that. Heck, almost looking forward to it.

My personal experience with BSG was that I found it quite intellectually intesting, but emotionally it left me dead cold. I rarely cared much. It never hit me in the solar plexus and made me feel much. It was all quite detached for me.

On the other hand, I watched most of Lost with fully brain disengaged. I was there for the roller-coaster ride. The few things that engaged me intellectually were philosophical in nature. So that they gave me highly, even baroquely, emotional conclusion with some bit philosophy worked satisfactorily for me. Having watched the show in that manner, I can accept that sort of conclusion. Had I watched it trying to solve things (I tried that with the X-Files. Never again! And I still effing love the X-Files, but trying to solve its mythology was pointless, and I found that out way late in the game). Anyway, had I actually watched trying to figure out all the 'clues,' I probably would have been far less satisfied.

It really does vary with 'what show were you watching?'

Re: A slightly more spoilery expansion on the topic

[flake-sake.livejournal.com]

Yeah it really does. When BSG started out I was completely in love with it, I found very emotionally engaging and thought it was extremely well plotted, but the longernd more convoluted suicidal and irrational it got the less I cared about the characters and by the end I was pretty much there for the plot alone and then that fell flat. Like you said about X-files, never again!

I think the mindset you watched lost in, is probably the best and if I'll ever watch it, I'll focus on the personal stuff too probably. It's muh easier if you know ahead that getting too involved into putting together clues is pointless.

Re: A slightly more spoilery expansion on the topic

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

I have to say that it's one of the few shows where I wouldn't warn anyone away from shipping. Where shipping was concerned, LOST turned out to be a slut handing out big wet kisses. :)

[calturner.livejournal.com]

Can I just say how much I'm loving these posts?

One of the reasons why the finale of Lost works so well for me is the fact that it gives you things to think about long after you've finished watching it. I'll definitely be seeing it through different eyes when I rewatch S6 again.

Not got time to say much more than that at the moment, but just wanted to let you know how fascinating I'm finding your posts!

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I've found that I keep thinking about the finale, and I can't belp but think that that's a good thing.

[probablecylon.livejournal.com]

The finale of BSG said nothing about whether technology was bad -- in fact, by keying into the idea that a divine intelligence is continuing to run a scenario in which humans continually arrive at creation of artificial life & artificial intelligence, the show suggests that this, itself, is a good, but that it's the human will that's the problem. And the end is absolutely open-ended, keyed into the current state of our technology, asking whether we can avoid being consumed by our own creations.

Nor was any pseudo-profound explanation offered -- the irony of learning that Baltar's companion had spoken the truth, but that we really know nothing about either the angels or about God, also leaves the show open: God ("You *know* he doesn't like to be called that") is himself running an experiment, seeking a different result, without knowing its issue -- so this is an Alfred North Whitehead process-theology sort of divinity, one who is not going to reveal him/itself as a defined substance at all.

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

I didn't ever take it as "technology bad". I'm just talking about the criticisms I've seen from people I've read who hated the finale. As I said, I was actually okay with that aspect of the finale. I think for the ending chosen, it was necessary. I don't think it was saying anything about technology, it was a byproduct of the kind of story they chose to tell.

That said, Starbuck as an 'angel' will never cease to bug me.