![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Stargate clicks (and Farscape didn't)
Jun. 25th, 2004 06:06 amI was trying to figure out why Farscape didn't work for me. I mean, I'd watch the show if you put it in front of me. I like it, but... fuck, I spent $100 on Stargate within weeks of having seen my first episode.
But I adored Stargate on first glance. And I adore Firefly (which I pre-ordered on amazon before it came out). I do embrace the space quirk, people.
What I don't embrace, apparently, is the romance. Farscape is so... J/A. The show 'ships John and Aeryn.
John and Aeryn excite me as much as the idea of eating spam every day for the rest of my life.
I watch them on the screen together and I like them both quite a lot, really. Just... not on the screen together. And Farscape is a romance. It's build around the J/A romance. People involved with the show have confirmed as much and it drips from the screen. It's a love story, but it's not one that I enjoy and that taints the parts of the show that I do enjoy (like Chiana, who I do utterly adore and who apparently gets utterly screwed over in the last season).
Stargate isn't a love story. It's mostly about four separate journeys that wind together in brilliant and beautiful patterns. That kid whose name I couldn't spell but he's Sha're's son, you know the one, (and Oma) set out one of the things that rings true to me so far in my Stargate viewage -- each man must walk his chosen path alone... I would kill to be able to watch the entire series -- this will probably be the only time you'll seen me mourn the fact that the show is still going, as it means I can't make definite statements of meaning. There is so much to explore in what Oma says -- as Daniel says, to decide if she's worth listening to.
The ending of a story is what ultimately determines its meaning. Until you see the last scene, you can't place the rest into context. A Buffy that ended at The Gift would have contained a far different meaning than the Buffy that ended at Chosen. The last sentence is what makes the rest of the story exist as a story. It is the ending that makes the tale what it is, because nothing ends and each ending is only a new beginning. Skip to the very end of an episode, and you'll see what the emotional heart of it was. That's almost always true in my viewing (I honestly can't think of any exceptions, but the possibility exists).
Tangent -- it's a culture-bred girl thing, to be so afraid of confrontation (as exemplified by fanfic_hate). Catty high-school behavior, because that's where it's taught and reinforced. Slink around and say bad things behind someone's back because you wouldn't want to be seen as a 'bitch'.
I definitely respect people who stand up and say what they think (I have several very out-spoken people on my flist that I admire very much, though you probably wouldn't know it, since I do, in fact, suck at commenting). Mostly, I'm sure, because I don't have that kind of strength when it comes to negative things. Even positive sometimes. I love something, someone else hates it, and there's always that flickering doubt -- "What am I seeing wrong?" My first impulse is always to doubt my own feelings and instincts, despite how very much I believe that one can't and shouldn't be thought badly of for them. My open-mindedness usually fades when it comes to myself.
Which a rather roundabout way to get back on-topic by saying that I felt hella guilty writing that Farscape didn't effect me like Stargate does. I mean, it's a personal viewing preference and our culture (my family, my upbringing, my personality) has me feeling guilty about it! It's horrifying, when you think about it.
But I adored Stargate on first glance. And I adore Firefly (which I pre-ordered on amazon before it came out). I do embrace the space quirk, people.
What I don't embrace, apparently, is the romance. Farscape is so... J/A. The show 'ships John and Aeryn.
John and Aeryn excite me as much as the idea of eating spam every day for the rest of my life.
I watch them on the screen together and I like them both quite a lot, really. Just... not on the screen together. And Farscape is a romance. It's build around the J/A romance. People involved with the show have confirmed as much and it drips from the screen. It's a love story, but it's not one that I enjoy and that taints the parts of the show that I do enjoy (like Chiana, who I do utterly adore and who apparently gets utterly screwed over in the last season).
Stargate isn't a love story. It's mostly about four separate journeys that wind together in brilliant and beautiful patterns. That kid whose name I couldn't spell but he's Sha're's son, you know the one, (and Oma) set out one of the things that rings true to me so far in my Stargate viewage -- each man must walk his chosen path alone... I would kill to be able to watch the entire series -- this will probably be the only time you'll seen me mourn the fact that the show is still going, as it means I can't make definite statements of meaning. There is so much to explore in what Oma says -- as Daniel says, to decide if she's worth listening to.
The ending of a story is what ultimately determines its meaning. Until you see the last scene, you can't place the rest into context. A Buffy that ended at The Gift would have contained a far different meaning than the Buffy that ended at Chosen. The last sentence is what makes the rest of the story exist as a story. It is the ending that makes the tale what it is, because nothing ends and each ending is only a new beginning. Skip to the very end of an episode, and you'll see what the emotional heart of it was. That's almost always true in my viewing (I honestly can't think of any exceptions, but the possibility exists).
Tangent -- it's a culture-bred girl thing, to be so afraid of confrontation (as exemplified by fanfic_hate). Catty high-school behavior, because that's where it's taught and reinforced. Slink around and say bad things behind someone's back because you wouldn't want to be seen as a 'bitch'.
I definitely respect people who stand up and say what they think (I have several very out-spoken people on my flist that I admire very much, though you probably wouldn't know it, since I do, in fact, suck at commenting). Mostly, I'm sure, because I don't have that kind of strength when it comes to negative things. Even positive sometimes. I love something, someone else hates it, and there's always that flickering doubt -- "What am I seeing wrong?" My first impulse is always to doubt my own feelings and instincts, despite how very much I believe that one can't and shouldn't be thought badly of for them. My open-mindedness usually fades when it comes to myself.
Which a rather roundabout way to get back on-topic by saying that I felt hella guilty writing that Farscape didn't effect me like Stargate does. I mean, it's a personal viewing preference and our culture (my family, my upbringing, my personality) has me feeling guilty about it! It's horrifying, when you think about it.