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The Last Man
So ... SGA fandom. Honestly, I've hit that point where I've started to waver on it; I'm still writing fic (I've still got my entries for the ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
ronon_love ficathon and sga_genficathon due, as well as sg_rarepairings prompt battle, though I'm leaning more towards SG-1 and crossover prompts on that one), and I'll continue to watch, but my enthusiasm is winding down now that that first flush of new fandom love is gone. Which is fine; I have plenty of fandoms to keep me occupied, and it's not like I ever really leave a fandom, anyway.
Let's cue obligatory thoughts about The Last Man. Pretty much every reaction post I've read has either been "hated it" or "loved it." And I liked it. There were bits that I loved, because I'm easy that way, and bits that I chose to gloss over so I could get back to my general enjoyment. But there's one thing that really started to bug me once I had time to sit down and think about it, and that's Teyla.
At first, I was happy. It was imperative that John go back in time, because Teyla died. And I had quite a few minutes to consider just how awesome that was. Then it became all-too-apparent (and was something I knew anyway, but was happy for it to remain implicit) that Teyla's death was not the problem; it was merely the first of many problems, and the real reason it was a problem at all wasn't because of Teyla herself, or because of what she meant to the expedition, but because of what her baby meant to Michael. So, really, it's the baby that needs to be rescued, and it'd be nice if we saved Teyla, too.
Those thoughts are not quite as nice as the ones I originally had in my head, but I could deal. It's the Everyone Dies episode; her death was not (and could not be) any more important than the death of anyone else. I'm totally on board with that, really. And I didn't start getting weird about the episode until, when reading others' reaction posts, my mind flashed on the utterly disposable (and off-camera) nature of her death.
Because, on first viewing, there's nothing inherently wrong with it. Okay, yes, she's Teyla, and she's a member of the team, and her death (even a fake-out death) should actually be dramatic and a thing of consequence, but okay, it was a fake-out death, and at this point, we're still seeing everything from the POV of Rodney and the expedition. For them, it did happen off-screen, and it probably came across as cruel and pointless and arbitrary to them as it did to the audience. And that's okay; it's a choice I can get behind. Except, then, here's the thing: the episode is not, in fact, told from Rodney's (or anyone's) POV. We get to see the final moments of Sam and Ronon's deaths, which were lovely, and I can readily accept that, in those moments, we are no longer within the narrative that Rodney is relating to John, but are able to see outside that, to give those deaths the sense of poignancy and fatalism they rightly deserved. And it was only when I noticed others pointing out the slight weirdness of that, and completed my own rationalisation, that I could see what was wrong here: if Sam and Ronon get their heroic last moments, if we get to see the way that Sam is practically radiant (admittedly, from the proximity of soon-to-be fatal explosions) and Ronon's frankly awesome expression as he pushes the button, where was Teyla's? If we get to experience these moments, despite them being clearly outside any scope of the supposed narrator's possible knowledge, if we aren't restricted to an objective, single third party POV, where the fuck was Teyla's death scene? If we can see through characters' eyes other than Rodney's, if we get to see their dying breaths and why they happened and what they meant - why was Teyla's death (which, considering that the thing they need to do is save Teyla and stop her child from falling into Michael's hands, may just have been the most important death of anyone's) relegated to finding her corpse on the floor of an empty factory? Give me one reason why we couldn't have seen that death, other than the fact that Teyla is approximately a million months pregnant and therefore apparently a delicate flower, and they just couldn't come up with anything remotely cool for her to do, and I really could have ended this season (reasonably) happy.
On the brighter side, I'm currently watching The West Wing from the beginning, which I haven't done since it was, like, on TV (and still haven't seen at least the last half of the series), and it's making me ridiculously happy. Like, I love these people. I love this show! And it's just ... yes. And JOSH/DONNA!!!, because I shipped them way before I knew what the hell shipping was, or that you were allowed to do it to characters who weren't (obviously) going to end up together, and way before I encountered this great huge thing called fandom, and now that I'm in fandom, and watching this show, I just ... can't articulate. Fittingly, or not. So very, very happy.
ronon_love ficathon and sga_genficathon due, as well as sg_rarepairings prompt battle, though I'm leaning more towards SG-1 and crossover prompts on that one), and I'll continue to watch, but my enthusiasm is winding down now that that first flush of new fandom love is gone. Which is fine; I have plenty of fandoms to keep me occupied, and it's not like I ever really leave a fandom, anyway.Let's cue obligatory thoughts about The Last Man. Pretty much every reaction post I've read has either been "hated it" or "loved it." And I liked it. There were bits that I loved, because I'm easy that way, and bits that I chose to gloss over so I could get back to my general enjoyment. But there's one thing that really started to bug me once I had time to sit down and think about it, and that's Teyla.
At first, I was happy. It was imperative that John go back in time, because Teyla died. And I had quite a few minutes to consider just how awesome that was. Then it became all-too-apparent (and was something I knew anyway, but was happy for it to remain implicit) that Teyla's death was not the problem; it was merely the first of many problems, and the real reason it was a problem at all wasn't because of Teyla herself, or because of what she meant to the expedition, but because of what her baby meant to Michael. So, really, it's the baby that needs to be rescued, and it'd be nice if we saved Teyla, too.
Those thoughts are not quite as nice as the ones I originally had in my head, but I could deal. It's the Everyone Dies episode; her death was not (and could not be) any more important than the death of anyone else. I'm totally on board with that, really. And I didn't start getting weird about the episode until, when reading others' reaction posts, my mind flashed on the utterly disposable (and off-camera) nature of her death.
Because, on first viewing, there's nothing inherently wrong with it. Okay, yes, she's Teyla, and she's a member of the team, and her death (even a fake-out death) should actually be dramatic and a thing of consequence, but okay, it was a fake-out death, and at this point, we're still seeing everything from the POV of Rodney and the expedition. For them, it did happen off-screen, and it probably came across as cruel and pointless and arbitrary to them as it did to the audience. And that's okay; it's a choice I can get behind. Except, then, here's the thing: the episode is not, in fact, told from Rodney's (or anyone's) POV. We get to see the final moments of Sam and Ronon's deaths, which were lovely, and I can readily accept that, in those moments, we are no longer within the narrative that Rodney is relating to John, but are able to see outside that, to give those deaths the sense of poignancy and fatalism they rightly deserved. And it was only when I noticed others pointing out the slight weirdness of that, and completed my own rationalisation, that I could see what was wrong here: if Sam and Ronon get their heroic last moments, if we get to see the way that Sam is practically radiant (admittedly, from the proximity of soon-to-be fatal explosions) and Ronon's frankly awesome expression as he pushes the button, where was Teyla's? If we get to experience these moments, despite them being clearly outside any scope of the supposed narrator's possible knowledge, if we aren't restricted to an objective, single third party POV, where the fuck was Teyla's death scene? If we can see through characters' eyes other than Rodney's, if we get to see their dying breaths and why they happened and what they meant - why was Teyla's death (which, considering that the thing they need to do is save Teyla and stop her child from falling into Michael's hands, may just have been the most important death of anyone's) relegated to finding her corpse on the floor of an empty factory? Give me one reason why we couldn't have seen that death, other than the fact that Teyla is approximately a million months pregnant and therefore apparently a delicate flower, and they just couldn't come up with anything remotely cool for her to do, and I really could have ended this season (reasonably) happy.
On the brighter side, I'm currently watching The West Wing from the beginning, which I haven't done since it was, like, on TV (and still haven't seen at least the last half of the series), and it's making me ridiculously happy. Like, I love these people. I love this show! And it's just ... yes. And JOSH/DONNA!!!, because I shipped them way before I knew what the hell shipping was, or that you were allowed to do it to characters who weren't (obviously) going to end up together, and way before I encountered this great huge thing called fandom, and now that I'm in fandom, and watching this show, I just ... can't articulate. Fittingly, or not. So very, very happy.