Fandom is wacky: Smallville edition
Oct. 5th, 2006 03:39 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
butterflySo, I've been reading the TWoP boards for Smallville (which is kinda crazy, but I started going back over there for... Battlestar Galactica and the Supernatural boards are good (though the first season recaps of the show suck -- second season is looking up, because they're being written by the guy who wrote the recap for the pilot and not the Supernatural-hating hack that recapped the rest of the season... dude, at least try to be amusing when you hate)) and ran across this theory called 'Chlois'.
Which baffles me. Did this theory exist back in season three (which is the last time that I visited the Smallville boards)? I don't remember it, though the Chloe-worship is... familiar.
Apparently, there is a group of people who think that Chloe is going to change her name to Lois, dye her hair, change her personality, pretend not to know Clark, and then become the love of Clark's life (because he's not going to notice that Lois has gotten a lot shorter... because he's a "Big Dumb Alien" who isn't worthy of her Radiant Goddess Glow and... why do they want her with him again?).
Or I guess they think that Chloe is already like Lois Lane which... baffles me more. Chloe is soppy. Lois Lane is not soppy. Lois Lane is the opposite of soppy. I mean... I don't have anything against Chloe, I've always mostly liked her (she was my favorite female on the show in seasons 1-3, before Lois showed up and stole my heart (as she does)), but how is she anything like Lois Lane? Chloe is an underdog. She has, like, eighty-gazillion fans (note: number may or may not be exaggerated) because she's an underdog.
Lois Lane isn't an underdog.
I can't ever imagine Chloe staring down her boss and saying that she didn't write a mood piece because she "wasn't in the mood" (I can imagine SV's Lois saying that, though -- only the news that she's interested in, thank you). Lois is confrontational, pushy, and (gasp!) kinda bitchy. She steamrolls over people when she's figuring out what to do and then is annoyed at them for not being fast enough to move out of the way.
Not everyone likes Lois Lane. That's always been true. It amuses me how many people on the "Chlois" thread bash Lois and Clark's Lois, who strikes me as a classic Lois in the tradition of the better comics and the first two movies. Dude, y'all don't even like Lois. Why do you want your favorite character to turn into her? Is the love of Clark that wonderful and amazing?
I love Smallville's Lois Lane. Like the other classic comic characters (Clark and Lex), they took the basic character profile and twisted it so that Lois was actively fighting against her future.
But all three of them have the essence of what will one day make them their Iconic character (It took me forever to figure out that ILL stood for "Iconic Lois Lane", btw.). Lex has the will to power, Clark has that need to help, and Lois has the guts to stand up to both of them. All three of them are coming by those essences differently than the various other versions of themselves, but that's all right. That's comics. There are many worlds, many versions. They don't cancel each other out, nor do they necessarily lead into each other.
The comics are not the movies are not Lois and Clark is not Smallville. There's pre-Crisis and post-Crisis. Silver and Gold Age. Superman Returns and The Adventures of Superman. All different, but all with a few things in common. Superman. Clark Kent. Lois Lane. A little later, Lex Luthor.
Clark and Lois, though, first and always.
Also, I seem to feel the same protectiveness towards Lois that I feel towards Buffy and Rose. That is, I feel that they're strong female characters that I would feel honored to be anything like, so I have a shockingly limited amount of patience for dismissiveness towards them. Not criticism in general, just that particular brand of condescending criticism where I'm told that what I see as strength is really the cold-hearted, smug bitchiness of women who are getting 'above their places' (Want to make my blood boil in ten seconds or less? Mention that someone, particularly a female someone, needs to be 'put in her place'.). When Rose is dismissed as a stupid shopgirl or Buffy is called a heartless bitch or people call SV's Lois various hideously sexist terms and make everything all about her body (And her *omg* huge breasts, which just comes across as hypocritical when they're cooing over "Chloevage" every other post. I guess breasts are only okay if they're Chloe's.), I feel true feminist rage.
Which baffles me. Did this theory exist back in season three (which is the last time that I visited the Smallville boards)? I don't remember it, though the Chloe-worship is... familiar.
Apparently, there is a group of people who think that Chloe is going to change her name to Lois, dye her hair, change her personality, pretend not to know Clark, and then become the love of Clark's life (because he's not going to notice that Lois has gotten a lot shorter... because he's a "Big Dumb Alien" who isn't worthy of her Radiant Goddess Glow and... why do they want her with him again?).
Or I guess they think that Chloe is already like Lois Lane which... baffles me more. Chloe is soppy. Lois Lane is not soppy. Lois Lane is the opposite of soppy. I mean... I don't have anything against Chloe, I've always mostly liked her (she was my favorite female on the show in seasons 1-3, before Lois showed up and stole my heart (as she does)), but how is she anything like Lois Lane? Chloe is an underdog. She has, like, eighty-gazillion fans (note: number may or may not be exaggerated) because she's an underdog.
Lois Lane isn't an underdog.
I can't ever imagine Chloe staring down her boss and saying that she didn't write a mood piece because she "wasn't in the mood" (I can imagine SV's Lois saying that, though -- only the news that she's interested in, thank you). Lois is confrontational, pushy, and (gasp!) kinda bitchy. She steamrolls over people when she's figuring out what to do and then is annoyed at them for not being fast enough to move out of the way.
Not everyone likes Lois Lane. That's always been true. It amuses me how many people on the "Chlois" thread bash Lois and Clark's Lois, who strikes me as a classic Lois in the tradition of the better comics and the first two movies. Dude, y'all don't even like Lois. Why do you want your favorite character to turn into her? Is the love of Clark that wonderful and amazing?
I love Smallville's Lois Lane. Like the other classic comic characters (Clark and Lex), they took the basic character profile and twisted it so that Lois was actively fighting against her future.
But all three of them have the essence of what will one day make them their Iconic character (It took me forever to figure out that ILL stood for "Iconic Lois Lane", btw.). Lex has the will to power, Clark has that need to help, and Lois has the guts to stand up to both of them. All three of them are coming by those essences differently than the various other versions of themselves, but that's all right. That's comics. There are many worlds, many versions. They don't cancel each other out, nor do they necessarily lead into each other.
The comics are not the movies are not Lois and Clark is not Smallville. There's pre-Crisis and post-Crisis. Silver and Gold Age. Superman Returns and The Adventures of Superman. All different, but all with a few things in common. Superman. Clark Kent. Lois Lane. A little later, Lex Luthor.
Clark and Lois, though, first and always.
Also, I seem to feel the same protectiveness towards Lois that I feel towards Buffy and Rose. That is, I feel that they're strong female characters that I would feel honored to be anything like, so I have a shockingly limited amount of patience for dismissiveness towards them. Not criticism in general, just that particular brand of condescending criticism where I'm told that what I see as strength is really the cold-hearted, smug bitchiness of women who are getting 'above their places' (Want to make my blood boil in ten seconds or less? Mention that someone, particularly a female someone, needs to be 'put in her place'.). When Rose is dismissed as a stupid shopgirl or Buffy is called a heartless bitch or people call SV's Lois various hideously sexist terms and make everything all about her body (And her *omg* huge breasts, which just comes across as hypocritical when they're cooing over "Chloevage" every other post. I guess breasts are only okay if they're Chloe's.), I feel true feminist rage.
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(no subject)
Date: 2006-10-08 03:38 am (UTC)I had to change it very fast. The accent I grew up with told people that I was a redneck, and most people where I come from are. It's a stereotype based on a level of truth I can't deny.
Where I come from, there is no hope, and I have nothing but contempt for the old school mates who didn't try to escape.
Pride in ignorance. I don't understand that, but people have it, and there is weird bizarre pride in being a bogan (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bogan) in my country, when it's just plain pathetic, like people can't do better. *sigh*