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accidentalrabbit · 2 years

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UTSUKUSHII KARE

(series + bonus content)

Japan 2021

RANK: A

A-pairing: Hira x Kiyoi

Other character(s) i enjoyed: Koyama

Overall review:

Utsukushii Kare plays at the ethical boundaries of unhealthy relationship dynamics, but reports of its gritty realism and dark tone have been greatly exaggerated. Let's take a look at how the story breaks down tropes to communicate its themes.

The story happens in two parts, the first of which takes place when Hira is in high school, and a new student, Kiyoi, joins his class. Hira is a wallflower with a stutter exacerbated by his social anxiety, and when Kiyoi's presence distracts the class from his embarrassing introduction, Hira imprints on him like a duckling. (There's a rubber duck in the show, it's on my mind.) Hira then begins to follow Kiyoi around, taking pictures of him (because taking pictures of beautiful things is the primary way he interacts with the world). Kiyoi's good looks and cool demeanor make him super popular at school, but after he loses an idol competition, everybody but Hira turns on him. Their dynamic here is one marked by adolescent immaturity taken to its extreme. Hira is willing to do literally anything if it pleases Kiyoi, and Kiyoi is more than willing to take advantage of his loyalty. It's an uneasy relationship brimming with homoerotic potential, and it boils over when Kiyoi works up the courage to kiss him on the last day of school, before abruptly shoving him away, with hardly so much as a "See you later."

There's a three year timeskip (and it works here for reasons we'll get into), during which time Hira goes to college, joins a photography club, and meets Koyama, who is one of the first peers in Hira's life to treat him like a full human being. They have a much more relaxed and easygoing dynamic, and they really seem to enjoy each other's company. This flips on a dime when Koyama takes him out to dinner and a show, and the lead actor of the performance is none other than Kiyoi himself. Presented with such an unexpected shock to the system, Hira's stutter returns full force as the full weight of his past catches up to him all at once.

Eventually, we piece together the following: Kiyoi, a dumb teenager, genuinely wanted to keep in touch with Hira after graduation, but he was devastated when Hira never returned his calls. Kiyoi actually broke Hira's phone during the kiss incident, and Hira assumed he didn't need to keep his number because nobody liked him anyway. Hira assumed the kiss was just Kiyoi taking pity on him before leaving his life forever, and he took it in stride, all things considered, but he never forgot about him. These missed communications lead to an incredible tsunami of angst over the last couple episodes, during which time there is a very charged scene wherein Hira sucks bood from Kiyoi's injured finger, and the plot culminates in a raucous rendezvous at their old high school, where they finally manage to see each other as equals for the first time and realize how…amorous they've been for each other, without the pretense of treating one another as masters or slaves, and they try to make up for the years they wasted not being in love.

Before talking at length about the themes, i want to defend the timeskip here. All else being equal, i'm wary of the ways timeskips are used to completely reset a story, or to shock the audience with a sudden change without regard to theme, or to elide details of the narrative that writers simply haven't found a better way to address, but there are times when they are useful. I think the writers of Utsukushii Kare ended the first half of the show in a place that maximized the uncertainty of the lead couple's relationship, to the point where neither the audience nor Hira knew whether Kiyoi wanted it to continue, and the timeskip therefore covers a period of radio silence that is pretty uneventful for both of them in terms of where the story is headed. Just enough is implied about the ways that their characters have grown (or not) in the interim that it feels natural, and it works narratively to support the themes the series is trying to get across. Speaking of…

One theme emphasized by Utsukushii Kare is that cruelty is not romance. Cruelty precludes the possibility of love. This is present in the difference we see between Hira and Kiyoi's initial relationship and how that affects them, versus the relationship that develops between Hira and Koyama. Hira as a teenager feels that, because of his particular disability, all he can expect is scorn and derision. Kiyoi 'saves' him from the unwanted attention of his peers, but their dynamic initially recreates many of the cruelties they have subjected him to, including insults and threats of violence, which only further exacerbates the distance in Hira's mind between himself and Kiyoi. Even when they are at their most relaxed, there is no possibility of healthy romantic love between them with this as the foundation. But when he meets Koyama in college, Hira is meeting someone who understands his speech impediment as a disability in a completely neutral way, and certainly not as an invitation to cruelty. By establishing this simple fact when they first meet, Koyama levels the playing field. This attacks the root of one of those unfortunate romance tropes that has made it to real life, that bullying should be understood as an attempt at romantic connection. Utsukushii Kare here says that even if that is true, it fundamentally cannot work. We can only accept the love we think we deserve. You cannot love someone who makes you lesser.

A second theme is a corollary to the first, and it really only starts to get unpacked as we hear more of Kiyoi's perspective on their relationship: Love is not worship. Treating a human being like a god is still a kind of dehumanization. Damaged and insecure as he is, Kiyoi is willing to accept Hira's unconditional adulation as a substitute for real connection when both of them are teenagers. But as an adult, and i think seeing the way Hira and Koyama treat each other as equals in particular, Kiyoi understands a base unfairness is plaguing his dynamic with Hira, and all these years later Hira still hasn't been able let it go. Only once Kiyoi is able to articulate the depth of the anguish it has caused him—and is currently causing him!—to be unable to connect with Hira as a fellow human being, with flaws and fears and all—only then is Hira shaken out of his idolatry. In a way, i think this shift in their relationship is metaphorically removing Hira's camera from between himself and Kiyoi. There is no room in love for the distance that a camera puts between subject and object. To remove Kiyoi from a pedestal is fundamentally to remove that distance Hira has built in his mind between them. This notion again attacks another very common romance trope, that of utter devotion and abnegation being the height of love. Utsukushii Kare instead asks us to consider this trope from the perspective of the beloved, whose lover is so in awe of them that they fail to see how they might actually be causing them pain.

As for the technical side of things, it's a well-produced show, and there are a few truly sumptuous moments of cinematography. The very small core cast works well with the short number of episodes, and no one's acting is lacking.

Finally, there are a couple of bonus scenes that add a little zhuzh to the viewing experience. Mellow Kiyoi is a whole vibe, and it's nice to see Hira doting on Koyama, even though they flop in the end.

I had a good time, but:

The daydream of Hira committing a mass shooting is a bit much. Like, i get what it's doing, his dedication to Kiyoi is strong, irrational, violently adolescent, but also…goddamn. Is he okay?

I could have done with just a taste more of Hira and Kiyoi being happy and intimate, but that's just me being a gay sap.

As for the alleged love triangle: I don't need it. I understand why it's here, and it works, but i don't need it. That's all.

Character(s) entitled to financial compensation: Koyama, who is completely unaware of the approaching love triangle until it's far too late. RIP Koyama's chances, gone too soon.

Conclusion: Utsukushii Kare is a show that is more prickly than gritty, and more hyperreal than real. When its characters behave in edgy ways, they are doing more than contributing to an aesthetic for aesthetic's sake. The series is trying to tell us something about how we engage with fiction—and with each other on this side of the fourth wall, too. The tropes are fun to watch, but they are not above critique. There is no room for pedestals and sacrificial altars in love, and until we understand this, we won't recognize the possibility of true, egalitarian love even as it kisses us in the face.

Coming soon, we have the Teh x Oh-aew triple feature of chaos: I Told Sunset About You + Last Twilight in Phuket + I Promised You the Moon (2020-21). Steel yourselves.

#utsukushii kare #A tier #japanese drama #mine #reviews #my beautiful man #hira x kiyoi #i just. i'm so tired of people who kept gushing about the aesthetic #but then didnt say anything else about the show #i almost didnt watch it bc everywhere i looked people were talking about how dark it got #and real tea is that it's not even that dark! it's just got Things to Say #kiyoi is just a cruel child subjected to cruelty who doesnt mature quite fast enough to fix their relationship #and hira is also a child who doesnt know we only accept the love we think we deserve #and they need to grow a little to figure out how to articulate what they want #if that's dark i'd hate to see what they have to say about itsay

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furiosaofscythia · 4 years

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I am technically on vacation. This means that my blog post for Tuesday is a day late and I’m writing less-regularly than normal. Apologies for the delay. I am also in a mood, and that’s probably not a good thing to be in when trying to write a blog post, but I’m going to post this anyway, because it’s that kind of mood. You have been warned. My son and I went to see Captain America about two weeks back, and it was as enjoyable and delightful a trip to the movies as I can remember in years. My days as a bitchy critic of cinema are long past, mind you, and I’m not interested in posting a review. I could do that. I once did do that. I stopped doing that 20 years ago. The proliferation of people who mistake their opinion for criticism made me stop. We enjoyed it tremendously, and that’s enough. Given the current state of cinema, it may be more than enough. Rick and I did an interview on Monday for The Long and Shortbox of It with Jon Gorga and Josh Kopin, and over the course of the conversation, we ended up discussing the continued slavish devotion to that which is labeled “dark” and “gritty” in super-hero comics. You’ll get an earful on this when you listen to the podcast, but it’s something I’ve been thinking about off and on for a while now, and this seems as good a time as any to get something off my virtual chest, so to speak. When I was working on 52, I half-jokingly asked Geoff Johns what it was with him and decapitations. If you’ve read his work, you’ll know what I’m talking about. Black Adam, in particular, had a penchant for removing the top, so to speak. His response was that he’d grown up playing Mortal Kombat. Fatalities were common, as he put it; a decapitation was de rigueur. Me, I was in college whenNarc came out. Late formative years, and I still remember being taken aback the first time I watched the animated pitbulls tearing me apart on the screen. Rick and I want Lady Sabre to be fun. Stealing a page from the Clevinger-Wegener manifesto, if it’s not fun, it’s not worth doing. If it’s not fun, we’re doing something wrong. Captain America was fun. It was pure, and it was sincere, and it never once apologized for being either of those things, and in fact, that was why Steve Rogers was chosen to become the First Super Soldier. I credit an enormous amount of its success to these factors. Here’s the thing: I am sick and tired of super-heroes who aren’t super and aren’t heroes, but more, I’m sick and tired of Hollywood blaming us for their failures. I am sick and tired of hearing various Hollywood studio execs who are as disconnected from the reality of middle-American taste as Rick Perry is from Christianity excusing the poor performance of their ill-executed product by tacitly blaming you, me, and everyone else of us who didn’t pay to see their garbage. Catwoman fails? Instead of, perhaps, just perhaps, acknowledging that the movie is a piece of excrement unworthy of use as fertilizer, they conclude instead that a female lead can’t open a movie unless her name is Jolie. So now we’re not only guilty of not being willing to pay for 90 minutes of intellectual abuse, we’re all apparently sexist jerks, as well. The problem with Green Lantern’s performance at the box office is that it’s not “gritty” enough? I don’t think so. Art – and even if that art is commercial art, produced for entertainment – feeds and is fed by the society that consumes it. So I ask you, right now, looking around you, what flavor of escapism will go down best with you? In an era of terror alerts and bipartisan dysfunction, of rising hate and blossoming intolerance, of bank failure and wide-spread, global unemployment and recession, is grittyreally what we need? Look, I like gritty. I write gritty. There is a time and a place for gritty. I’ll take my Batman gritty, thank you, and I will acknowledge that such a portrayal means that my 11 year old has to wait before he sees The Dark Knight. But if Hollywood turns out a Superman movie that I can’t take him to? They’ve done something wrong. Superman is many, many things. Gritty he is not, something that Richard Donner certainly understood. (Pet peeve time: for the contingent out there who sneer at heroes like Superman and Wonder Woman and Captain America, those icons who still, at their core, represent selfless sacrifice for the greater good, and who justify their contempt by saying, oh, it’s so unrealistic, no one would ever be so noble… grow up. Seriously. Cynicism is not maturity, do not mistake the one for the other. If you truly cannot accept a story where someone does the right thing because it’s the right thing to do, that says far more about who you are than these characters.) This is not an argument of era or audience sophistication. Sophistication does not negate sincerity, nor does it even deny it, as the Captain America movie proves. Sophistication demands better storytelling, clearer motivation, purer intention. “Gritty” is an apologist word in this sense, used in the place of “realism.” We don’t go to the movies for “realism.” This is why documentaries aren’t the major product in the theaters. Sophistication does not demand realism; it demands smart. I can think of no other industry where the consumer is made to bear the blame for the product’s failure as much as Hollywood. Seriously, let’s think that one through. The movie didn’t perform, therefore it’s our fault? You got food poisoning eating the fish they served and you paid for, it’s your fault? The brakes on your new car crapped out and you wrapped it around a tree, it’s your fault? Here’s a crazy thought. Maybe you made a bad movie. Hold fast. Greg

Greg Rucka - "Light In The Dark" 2012

#greg rucka #the old guard #captain america #wonder woman #dc #comics #marvel #superman #steve rogers #film #optimism #superheroes #quote #2012

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tabby-shieldmaiden · 3 years

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I’ve consumed quite a number of sff fictional works in my lifetime, but for some reason I have a tendency to write either:

Real world aus of those things

Urban fantasy type stories which still take place in our world

Fantasy/sci-fi stuff where the plot is less focused on the usual fantasy/sci-fi tropes (big battles, dramatic romances, talking with monarchs and the leaders of kingdoms, that type of thing) and more on like, the things regular people do (like how fantasy cultures celebrate birthdays, how robot adoption works, I once wrote a story about an aspiring witch trying to sneak into the adult reference section of her local library to get a book she wanted.)

And I think it’s because there’s a part of me who finds the stuff that went on and is going on in our real world just as interesting - maybe even a little bit more so - as a lot of sff fiction out there. Which is not to say I don’t find sff interesting. I do. It’s lots of fun and I do enjoy it. But there’s something about how real, everyday people live their lives which I’m just fascinated by. There’s therefore a part of me who likes when realism meets these things (and I don’t mean realism in the sense that I just make them dark and gritty. Though yes, if a story reflects reality sometimes dark subject matters will be touched upon.)

Like, people preparing to hide their jewellery in safe places because winter is coming up and they know their pet dragons are going to begin hoarding. In-laws trying to learn an alien language to better communicate with their new child-in-law. Superheroes being active in activism work and also deliberately vandalising their friends Wikipedia pages to troll each other. I just... really like when these things happen. I know I’m not alone there, I know I have an audience. And someday, I really hope I get known for writing things like this.

#tabby says something #random thoughts #writing #sff #I know my tastes are kind of boring #but there isn’t anything wrong with having boring tastes!#ain’t a moral failure!

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jadedselfconclusion · 5 years

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Normies, Horrible movies and The Joker.

Okay first I want to state the obvious, I am a comic book fan. Some have gone as far to say I'm a purist. That being said here are my PERSONAL thoughts and OPINIONS.

So apparently people are uppset about the new Joker movie. Saying its too dark/ graphic/ will make white men murder...yada yada yada. Now some these SJW cunts and cucks are hypocrites. Why? Because they were perefectly fine with the Dark Knight Joker...

Portrayed by the late great Heath Ledger, this joker had no back story or Origin story and was pure chaos and fire. Killed multiple people, started fires...Joker shit. Yet he was praised for his "Realistic and Dark" portrayal of the infamous Joker.

Confused? Lets jump back to 1989, 30 years ago when Tim Burton directed the cult classic Batman.

This is Jack Nicholson, who played Joker in the film mentioned aboved. The late 80's portrayal of joker was just as "Dark" but more comic book ( Not a bad thing in this case). Nicholson dig deep and gave a award-winning performance. With wit, style and murder. Many who claim to be SJW's loved this Joker.

Yet here they are trying to ban the ingenious and well crafted film that is the Joker, a one off stand alone Origin story.

There is no definitive Joker Origin story with in DC nor should there be. I personally love the Killing Joke Joker ( the graphic novel not the trash woke animation) but this movie deserves its place. It was like watching a DC graphic novel of the Joker.

This is Joaquin Phoenix, who played this "problematic" ( God I fucking hate that word) Joker. This origin story went deep into mental illness and the dark path Arthur ( the joker's name in this version) is pushed down and his transformation into the Joker. With an unsettling but wonderful gritty realism. It's rated R ( which honestly anything that includes a proper Joker should be rated)

Now the SJW's have their panties in a bunch but yet no out cry of the senseless violence shown in the upcoming Harley Quinn movie. It's titled Birds of prey but ...let's be honest its HQ show. Not even a true portrayal of The red and black PhD wise craking, fun loving harley from the days of the Batman the Animated Series or even from Gotham City Sirens ( which Birds of prey was suppose to be named, but due to the fact Catwoman and Ivy might over shadow thier cash cow and the fact DC has a bunch of eggs in other baskets it was changed.)

https://youtu.be/XDlZ1eJOUKc

We can all agree suicide squad was TRASH. Not only did it not pull enough from its graphic novel counterpart or multiple sources and storylines with in the comic book world. It's casting, writing and production left everyone wondering ( everyone except the Normies) what the fuck is this shit?

Well to capitalize on wokeness and forced female leads they pull out birds of prey. Race bending black canary and other issues. Like the fact that harley isn't in Birds of prey and it focus is mainly on Huntress, Black canary and sometimes batgirl/ batwoman ( not the lesbian one but Barbra Gordon as shown below)

Normies are those who do not read the comics, or just know the mainstream characters. ( nothing wrong with being a Normie) unless you are dictating what should and should not be in a live action film based off the comics. Then we have a problem. Because of this awful woke culture some of my favorite characters have ruined, race bent, gender-bent or just emasculated for the sole purpose of pleasing SJW normies.

https://youtu.be/Yg1uqV2E4aE

This is a problem because not only is it disrespectful to the character, the source material and those who've bought/ related to these characters and storylines but to those who created these characters and stories.

My point is this, stop compromising great writing and storytelling to please people who do not really give two shits about it. These people are hypocrites and have never understood the source material. The dumb bitch who wants to change the name of the Xmen because she thinks its sexist? Does she even know why Xavier named them this? No, she doesn't if she did she wouldn't have opened her goddamn mouth.

Xavier sought out Summers and enlisted him as the first of his X-Men, Cyclops. Xavier called the team "X-Men" because each one had an "extra" power that normal people lacked. (Not so coincidentally, of course, "X" was also the first letter of Xavier's last name, and he himself took the code name "Professor X.")-

furthermore to prove my point -

From a social policy and philosophical perspective, Xavier deeply resents the violent methods of those like his former close friend and occasional enemy, the supervillain Magneto. Instead, he has presented his platform of uncompromising pacifism to see his dream to fruition – one that seeks to live harmoniously alongside humanity, just the same as it desires full-fledged civil rights and equality for all mutants. Xavier's actions and goals in life have therefore often been compared to those of Martin Luther King Jr. for his involvement with the American civil rights struggle, whereas Magneto is often compared with the more militant civil rights activist Malcolm X.

The character's creation and development occurred simultaneously with the civil rights struggle, taking place in the 1960s, while Xavier's first appearance dates to 1963. The fictionalized plight in the comics of mutantkind faced with exceptional intolerance and prejudice was done in large part to better illustrate to audiences of the day what was transpiring across the United States, just the same as it also served to further promote ideals of tolerance and equality for all.

Did you catch that? Equality for All! Well I'll be damned X-men isn't sexiest after all. This is the glaring problem for me at least.

So lets go back the Joker and his source material shall we?

In his comic book appearances, the Joker is portrayed as a criminal mastermind. Introduced as a psychopath with a warped, sadistic sense of humor, the character became a goofy prankster in the late 1950s in response to regulation by the Comics Code Authority, before returning to his darker roots during the early 1970s. As Batman's nemesis, the Joker has been part of the superhero's defining stories, including the murder of Jason Todd—the second Robin and Batman's ward—and the paralysis of one of Batman's allies, Barbara Gordon. The Joker has had various possible origin stories during his decades of appearances. The most common story involves him falling into a tank of chemical waste that bleaches his skin white and turns his hair green and lips bright red; the resulting disfigurement drives him insane.

Now just sit with that a bit.

#Fuck SJW #My personal thoughts on Joker #Dc and Rated R content #Fuck SJWs

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synchronysymphony · 5 years

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Hi anon!! ☀️ it’s so nice to hear from you!! And how flattering that you came to me to vent 😊

I know how you feel, because Enjolras is my very favorite character ever, and I absolutely love him with all my heart. Once, I was feeling sick at a gig, and I pulled up a drawing of him to look at, and I actually immediately felt better 😂 So it makes me so sad when people are mean to him! I get that he’s a fictional character, and people can write whatever they want— that’s totally fair. I would never speak to anyone about this or tell them to stop, because they have the right to do what they want! Fiction is for fun (among other things), and if someone wants to thoroughly misrepresent this good, loving character? They can be my guest! But I’m still going to be umami about it.

I agree that it’s sad when people represent him so poorly. I made a post about him awhile ago detailing some of the things he does that I love, and I could honestly go on for ages about why he represents hope just as much as Cosette does, and why all the light imagery is so fitting because he’s a light in the world, and blah blah blah. He’s incredibly wonderful, and he’s soft and loving and good just as much as he’s fierce and terrifying. He makes me happy even on my very saddest and darkest days, and because of his message of radical goodness, I’ve become a better person (I know it sounds corny, but I really do think that’s the case).

Now, I know that a lot of people who write these fics may find Grantaire to be relatable. That’s fair! I do too! But you hit the nail right on the head: in order to make him be sympathetic, they have to make his foil be even more of a dick than he is, which means he has to be, as you said, a borderline abusive monster. Because the thing is, Grantaire is a dick! He’s such an asshole, my gosh. And in this strange new push for moral purity, people don’t want to relate to a character whom they deem Bad, so they have to defang him in order to make him palatable. They victimize him so that none of his bad behavior is his fault, and he can be absolved of blame. Then, he’s just a poor little sad shy baby who suffers from so many problems, not the least of them being an uptight, self-righteous, awful boyfriend who says mean things for no reason and has really bad takes on literally everything because he’s so naive.

I think, too, that people who write these fics suffer from what I call the DC-Comic Syndrome. That is, everything has to be dark and cynical and chock-full of gritty realism (though really, DC is getting a lot better about that now, so I may have to rename that). Problem is, they don’t really think it through, so their arguments do come down to criticizing Enjolras for having hope. It’s cool to be cynical and jaded, because it’s more intellectual, and smarter, and wanting to change the world is silly and childish, and Grantaire is obviously therefore the epitome of cool. He’s smart and cultured and well-read, yes. But that doesn’t mean that he’s anything more than the 19th century equivalent of that annoying guy in your philosophy class who “just wants to play devil’s advocate” every time someone opens their mouth.

Then, too, there’s the poor characterization. I’ve seen people say things like “oh Grantaire is better than Enjolras because he actually cares about people” like wow, did we read the same book? Grantaire is awful to people, including his friends, may I add! They tolerate him because of his good humor-- I don’t have my book on me, so I don’t have a page number, but it’s in there-- not because he has anything salient to say, or even because he’s particularly nice to be around. When Bossuet mentions that he’s drinking an awful lot, he immediately shoots back by criticizing the hole in his clothing. Sure, it’s funny, but it’s not very good proof that he’s a warm and cuddly friend. Enjolras, on the other hand, canonically stands around thinking about how great his friends are. He gives Grantaire a chance, even though they both know that he doesn’t believe in the cause, and when Grantaire flubs it, he still happily shares a death with him, he’s ready to exchange Javert for Jehan, and he feels such empathy for the artillery sergeant that he claims him as his brother, and cries when shooting him. He’s a very loving person! I think a big problem is that he isn’t so nice to Grantaire, and this makes people think of him in a poor light. But we have to remember how much Grantaire antagonizes, and yes, endangers him. If we look at the facts, we see that Enjolras is very tolerant of him, all things considered. I think one of his blind spots is his love for his friends, putting that even above the cause, and that extends to Grantaire as well.

I’ve also seen so many fics wherein les amis threaten to abandon Enjolras, or threaten him with harm, or don’t listen to his side of the story, or yes, physically assault him, and it’s framed as good. It drives me up the wall! Les amis love Enjolras just as much as he loves them! They mess with him, sure, but they obviously love him a lot, and they would never treat him that way. If he was actually cruel or abusive, yes, I could see them being harsher with him, but that’s a moot point, because he would never. In the original French, he shows his anger with Javert by switching from “vous” to “tu.” He cries, he sits around quietly and listens to his friends talk, he even goes so far as to give the title of leader to Marius. He’s an angel, that’s what he is, and he would never act in the ways that these fics portray. And his friends know that, and it’s obvious that they do, because they feel comfortable following him even to the death. He’s not the conditional member; Grantaire is. Grantaire is the one whose beliefs don’t mesh with theirs; whose ideology can be summarized as “belligerently contrarian”; whose very personality is abrasive and crude. He’s the one who’s only tolerated because of his good humor; Enjolras is there because they adore him, and share the same beliefs that he does. I think it’s a disservice to les amis to see them as any less passionate and earnest as Enjolras, and to portray them as anything less than loving towards one of their dear friends. Think of the controversy if they all were written to turn on Jehan or Joly. There would be a public outcry! The fic writer would be anathematized! So it doesn’t make any more sense for them to turn on Enjolras like that.

Am I saying that everything has to be a fluffy, happy coffeeshop AU? No, definitely not. I think that mode of thinking is very disturbing, actually. Conflict is good, and characters should do problematic and downright shitty things. But when those shitty things are framed by the narrative as good, then it becomes a lot more suspicious. It’s bad writing, is what it is, and I know that I, who am also a bad writer, have no point from which to speak, but I can recognize poor characterization, at least, and this fandom is full of it.

Anyway, I’m sorry that I went on so long! I got a little heated. You put it much better than I did, but in short, I agree with you, and I don’t read a lot of fic these days either, unless it’s by a Trusted Source, or by me. Thank you for sending me this! I’m always down to talk about Les Mis or Enjolras or anything at all, really! I hope you have a fantastic day!!!

p.s. I think you might be interested in this fic by (my girlfriend!!) @amiedelabaisse 😊

#ask #anon #les mis #enjolras #sunshine angel #my love my baby my delight #I could talk about him all day

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neverreallythoughtaboutthefuture · 7 years

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I have a (slightly) bad feeling about this...

Alright, after watching the teaser and the first trailer for “Pacific Rim: Uprising”, I have to admit that I’m still very confused regarding how I feel about the upcoming sequel… Or how I’m “supposed to feel” regarding its current marketing strategy... First, I know that, within 10 years, there probably would have been some significant technological advances in the world since the war, and it’s likely normal that the new Jaegers would look the way they do – i.e. all shiny, sleek and new, and more or less built from the same overall platform. Still, those Jaegers (and the pilots inside) are moving so fluidly and effortlessly that it’s difficult for me to believe that they are huge, heavy pieces of complex machinery piloted by two tiny human beings. Some of the buildings surrounding the Jaegers also look a bit like what you’d expect to see in a videogame… I’m not sure if that’s because they wanted to give the new post-war world a more futuristic look, or because they spent a little less time on animation and special effects than they did with the original movie (especially that scene here from 1:50 to 2:15 approx.).

And you can pilot a Jaeger with just some kind of backpack suit and gloves now? Once again, alright, I know, new technology, but still!

(Okay, I get that this character is a hacker (I think), and probably a genius, and she seems to have more or less built that Jaeger herself (or with some help) from scrap parts or something, because it appears to be much smaller and have a more rugged look with her feet stuck in some types of boots (as opposed to newer models), etc. But even that idea seems the tiniest bit too much for me...).

I did expect the Jaegers themselves to be different, and able to do some new stuff (like yes, flying, and perhaps joining together to create a larger robot, etc.), but I think I was still expecting the pilots themselves to require to be a little more solidly strapped in, and still move like their bodies are the size of a skyscraper! Here, they just seem to be able to jump around in the Conn-pod and do acrobatics, and their Jaegers just… copy them? I dunno… Perhaps it will make more sense and look better in the actual movie when we get to see more than just quick bits and pieces of some scattered scenes, but I’m having a slightly hard time understanding how you can keep your balance in there doing a round kick with seemingly nothing attached to your feet or even the rest of your body!

Where’s the Conn-pod situated? In the chest? The head? If you’re round kicking and the Jaeger is round kicking with you as well... Assuming you’re in the head of the robot, wouldn’t the platform you’re standing on be sharply shoved to the side while you’re trying to perform that move?

There was already a pretty huge level of suspension of disbelief required in “Pacific Rim” when it came to how well the pilots were able to sustain being thrown around in such large robots… All you have to do is watch the scene in the beginning where Gipsy Danger collapses on the beach, and imagine that there’s a tiny human being in that head when it hits the ground from such height to know what I mean. Actually, the laws of physics didn’t quite seem to apply to the first movie in general, but the way it was filmed still made it feel so tangible that I was perfectly fine with stopping asking questions, and just going with it! Here, I’m not so sure… Unless they’ve somehow completely altered the gravity inside the Conn-pods? Otherwise how are you two jumping like this with the lashes and staying suspended mid-jump in the air? What’s going on? How are you connected to the Jaeger’s body and sharing a common “nervous system” with it?

Or perhaps they are held in place by some sort of rig in their backs that is also allowing them to pivot? I’m trying to be open to these changes, I really am... But one of the things I really loved about Guillermo Del Toro’s approach was how he was able to make fantasy look like it was firmly grounded in reality by giving us a solid sense of size and scale, and the illusion that it took a great amount of both physical and inner strength to pilot a Jaeger. Here, it somehow looks like you could easily put the two pilots in a Conn-pod that’s situated outside of the Jaeger to control it remotely, and it would basically do the same thing. I’d have an easier time believing that they’re inside their Jaeger if the Conn-pod was pivoting with them, at the very least... Perhaps that’s what’s not visually working for me. From the looks of it, the floor of the Conn-pod is still perfectly aligned with the ground, and the ceiling with the sky.... But isn’t the big robot doing the same move as the pilots? So why is the Conn-pod still perfectly leveled if it’s inside a Jaeger that no longer is? Does that mean the the Conn-pod itself is pivoting inside the Jaeger to compensate for the Jaeger’s movements at all times; therefore ensuring that the two pilots are in an environment where the floor they are standing on remains perfectly leveled, no matter what the Jaeger surrounding them does? Hopefully, the movie will expand more on this... Also, how old are those pilots? I feel like I’m going to be watching “Ender’s Game” meet “Pacific Rim”. Then again, with the previous generation of pilots now either dead, retired, or I suppose assuming positions of command, like Mako Mori, it makes sense that the new recruits could be pretty young… Chuck Hansen did start piloting a Jaeger when he was 16, so it seems that the PPDC does accept candidates that are younger than 17. I guess that, with pilots in the first movie aged 21 to 44, and the relationships between them being diverse (ex: father and son), I just didn’t expect this to be an all teenagers / very young adults (I doubt any of them are older than 25) team of pilots this time around. Actually, everything from the younger main cast to the music choice in the trailer (and the teaser) seems to be geared towards attracting a younger audience. I’m not sure if that’s because they believe that most people who fell in love with the first movie were teenagers, or because they are hoping to make “Pacific Rim” more appealing to them by having new pilots that are easier for kids to relate to. Even the fact that the only movie novelization I’ve seen so far is called “Pacific Rim Uprising: The Junior Novel”, with the products details listed on Amazon as:

Age Range: 8 - 12 years

Grade Level: 3 - 7

Paperback: 160 pages

Publisher: Insight Kids (March 27, 2018)

Language: English

has me greatly concerned that the targeted audience of the sequel is indeed going pre-teens to teenagers, with very little thought given to more mature audiences. It also makes me question if they are going to be willing to take as many risks as they did in the first by sacrificing so many pilots to the war this time around... I mean yes, “Pacific Rim” was an homage to anime and kaiju-era movies... But it was a very dark and gritty homage with the perfect balance between drama, humor, tragedy and hope... People call it “silly” and a movie about “big robots punching monsters in the face!”, but you are given a 15 minutes opening that features two tightly bonded young pilot brothers that deeply kicks you in the guts! Then, the first time you see Cherno Alpha, Crimson Typhoon, and Striker Eureka all get together on a mission out there, two of those teams gets dispatched right away! I remember sitting in the theater looking at the screen in shock and disbelief while asking my friend “Wait. Did that just happen? Did they just kill those 2 teams after having barely introduced them - just like that?” And my friend, equally stunned, just going “Yes. Yes they did.” That’s when shit for me got 100% real for me, and I knew that the movie wouldn’t fuck around. Yancy had just been the beginning, and no one in this universe was safe. The stakes got crazy high! So, I can’t believe I’m saying this, but as much as part of me hated the “there are no heroes in a world where heroes can’t die” mentally, it still profoundly resonated with me and gave the movie some weight. Because back then, I happened to be in a situation where I was very sick and disabled, and had to learn a very important lesson in order to be able to cope with and accept my condition - life isn’t fair, anyone can fall. Bad things happen to good people, and sometimes nothing can be done about it no matter how hard you try to prevent it. (For everything else, there is fanfiction! Lol! And thank the PTB for that!) But yes, it broke my heart into a thousand tiny pieces to watch Chuck Hansen die before he was ever given a chance to finally figure out who he was, among others... But all those things also had a profound psychological and emotional impact, and it did add to that sense of realism in an otherwise very unrealistic universe and movie. Guillermo Del Toro made me believe in the unbelievable. He made me forget that it was a movie about giant robots punching giant monsters in the face, and experience that movie first and foremost through my heart. I am also heavily crediting Travis Beacham for the screenplay, the actors for having brought those characters to life, and everyone else that took such great care in building that universe (set designs, costumes, etc.)... But I think that GDT is hugely responsible for giving the movie its soul in the way he directed the actors, and seemingly got involved in every little detail of the movie’s production, including the 3D conversion. This was a work of pure love, and it showed. And even today, the movie is still helping me cope with a certain level of survivor’s guilt, given that I now have access to proper medical cares and treatments; including monthly injections that have gotten rid of about 70% of my symptoms, and allowed me to start living again. . Meanwhile, I still have friends, that are as ill as I was a year and a half ago, that are still looking for a diagnosis, are left without resources, or then again, share the same diagnosis but don’t respond well to the same treatment I’m taking, etc. It wasn’t fair that I was unable to leave my room most of the time for 7 years, and depended on others to prepare my meals and care for me... And yet, it’s no more fair that I’m getting better now, when so many of those that are in similar situation aren’t getting better, or can’t... Anyone can fall... Meaning all I can do is continue to care about those people, and help where I can. Otherwise, I have to accept that sometimes, things are the way they are. Life is not about what you deserve, or being fairly rewarded for your efforts; but simply about your ability to live with and take advantage of the resource you do have, while ideally finding ways to share those resources with others, when and if you can. Raleigh’s journey in “Pacific Rim”, to me, heavily reflected that. Actually, pretty much every character shared a similar journey where they had to learn to trust in others, and let go of the things beyond control. Beyond the Jaegers and the Kaiju themselves, one of the key elements of “Pacific Rim” was that it was, in Del Toro’s words, a movie about “the world saving the world”: “I just wanted to show small stories of people trying to come together to survive, because I didn’t want to make a war movie. I wanted to make an adventure movie about people who come from all over the world. We have an African American leader, we have a Japanese girl, we have Korean-Chinese guy, we have an Australian team. I wanted to show all the world coming together. It’s not just two characters; among them all they don’t understand each other. All of them have great differences. And the thing is as the movie resolves you see these characters be above all those differences. I wanted that. I didn’t want to make it just, “Oh if these two guys only got along.” Everybody, everybody, which is like a movie set. On a movie set if you don’t come together, we are all very different, but it works. I really love the idea of coming together without a certain jingoist or, you know, this or this side saved the work. Everybody did.” That’s why I find many debates regarding who’s the protagonist of the original movie sort of silly, and, like I’ve expressed before, I see Raleigh Becket as being more or less a leading character in a supportive role. i.e. The story is no more about him than it is about any other character. Once again, anyone can fall, and anyone in life will do what they can with the internal and external resources they have. Sometimes, someone just happens to be at the right place at the right time with the right resources, and they wind up getting the credit for something that was built through the efforts of countless others before and/or with them. Though history and society will generally tend to remember the leaders, and/or those that used what was done before them to innovate and come up with something groundbreakingly new, we are all connected. Raleigh basically just happens to be the character introducing us to the world of “Pacific Rim”, and whose story arc we are invited to follow first. But every character in the movie has their own stories, doubts, and issues to come to terms with before they can all save the world together. And that’s why I’ve connected with this movie so strongly, and why I love it so much. So, regarding the teaser that was first presented to us, for me, in terms of marketing strategy, it heavily missed the mark of what the first movie had been all about. I’m wondering if that was meant to show that, while the Kaiju were gone, world leaders have all been essentially patting themselves on the back on a job well done and taking credit for it. Were they trying to convey that humanity, once again, has learned very little from history, and its ego has inflated to the point where suddenly Jaegers became all about “Look how awesome we are, and always have been!”, and “Why pilot a Jaeger? Because YOU’re worth it!” Were they trying to convey that, in the future, humanity has gone back to the mentality of the “glory days” where Jaeger pilots used to be rock stars, and people thought Kaiju no longer posed any significant threat? Was that teaser meant to be an actual recruiting video that would fit within the mindset of that universe, 10 years in the future (which could make sense, and would therefore sort of make up for how weirdly self-centered it was)? Or was it simply how the marketing team in charge of “Pacific Rim: Uprising” chose to promote the movie, thinking that this is what audiences, nowadays, would get massively excited about? Because, yes, I do love Jaegers. And, of course, John Boyega is a wonderful actor and a pure treasure that can totally rock that drivesuit! But where is the sense that Jaegers are only as good as their pilots (plural), and the stronger the bond between them, the better they fight? Why having made the choice to show a single Ranger alone (unless that teaser was made very quickly to present fans with some form of publicity, and he was the only actor available to shoot it)? And quite frankly, I don’t personally give a single damn about Jaegers being “me” times a thousand! What is a Jaeger? A Jaeger is the very embodiment of the deep trust and empathy shared by two (or more) people who genuinely love each other regardless of the type of relationship they share. A Jaeger is that love and that bond times a thousand – two (or more) beating hearts made one that burn as bright as the sun, and have the power to move mountains! You become the most heroic version of yourself through your connection with others – through learning to balance your own needs with theirs, and using the potential you have been gifted with to serve the common good. This is what “Pacific Rim” was all about to me, and this is the message that the teaser, as far as I’m concerned, has sadly failed to convey. And while the actual trailer does show pilots fighting together, and present them all working together as a team and joining forces to survive, once again there’s something slightly off about the vibe I’m getting from it. Like it’s a movie that is a lot more about new cool Jaegers, and how they and the Kaiju have evolved, rather than the complex human connections that are required to power up those Jaegers. I know I’m probably overthinking this, and most people are likely just going “Whoohoohoo! NEW ROBOTS, WEAPONS AND KAIJU! COOL FIGHTS! AWESOME DUDE!” And, like my partner told me, “No matter what they do, given everything the original represents for you and why it means so much, I’m not sure anything else they could ever come up with will ever measure up.” And maybe he’s right. But still, instead of getting me all excited for the sequel, what the teaser and the trailer have managed to do is confuse the Anterverse out of me! Now, I’m sort of scared that they essentially took shortcuts with this movie by using elements of what they thought made the first one so popular with the (apparently young) public, but without understanding the deeper message behind the story, and/or Guillermo Del Toro’s vision of that universe. Every little detail in “Pacific Rim”, from the set pieces to the colors that were used, were filled with tons of symbolism and meaning. 4 years later, I still continue to discover and notice new little things every time I watch it. I’m not expecting the new director to copy Guillermo Del Toro’s style or use the same symbolism, but I’m hoping he’ll find ways to put nearly as much love and thought into every scene, and that the sequel will hopefully have as much depth and soul to it, too. Offer us beautiful robots, monsters, and actions scene, yes; but don’t forget what the movie was about first and foremost – the power, beauty and complexity of human connection. Another thing that sort of completely turned me off about the teaser is the choice of music. The Pacific Rim’s main theme is one of the most addictive and distinctive movie themes I’ve ever heard. The first few notes start to play, and that’s it! I’m back in that world!

Even the movie trailers of the first installment chose a soundtrack that had strong elements of pure epicness to it.

For example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5guMumPFBag , and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XUR1IoPdBg8 Everything felt like it was larger than life and imposing. While that “I’m a Beast” song, combined with the would-be flattering message “a Jaeger is YOU times a thousand and tall as a mountain”, seems to have been put out there to appeal to self-centered and easily influenced kids in search of thrills who are supposed to go “Oh yeah man! I’m a Jaeger, I’m a beast, I’m so cool, dude!” Maybe I’m getting too old for this (I was born barely 6 months after Herc Hansen, after all). But, to me, it basically looked like the teaser was meant to be the equivalent of a sports car line publicity, with Jaegers replacing the cars! I just… I don’t get it. Yeah, this worked for the PPDC’s glory days, I suppose; and if the world has reverted back to that mentality, then please, by all means! But still, I’m hoping it’s just a phase, and they’ll move out of it soon. And, while the music in the trailer itself takes back some elements of the original soundtrack, it’s weirdly mixed with a rap song, and combined with videogame looking CGI. Somehow, this makes me feel like I’ve just stepped into a completely different world that has very little to do with the massive scope and depth of the original. Don’t get me wrong, I can appreciate a good rap song remixed with a movie theme every now and then... But here, I find it to be heavily distracting, and it makes me disconnect from that sense of awe I get every time I watch those huge robot titans appear on screen in the trailers the original “Pacific Rim”. It works for movies like “The Fast and the Furious”, but here it messes with the overall tone, and gives me the impression that the robots are once again an oversized version of a sports car and next thing you know we’ll be watching them racing each other for thrills! If they keep at it, I’ll start nicknaming that sequel “Pacific Rim: Tokyo Drift”. That being said, there are a few things I’m excited about. Like the return of Mako Mori, Newton Geiszler, Hermann Gottlieb, and the fact that Gipsy Avenger looks like the child Gipsy Danger and Striker Eureka would have had together if Jaegers could make little Jaegers. Although I am slightly concerned about how they will be using those beloved characters in the new installment. I’m also glad that John Boyega seems like such a huge fan of the first movie, and therefore hoping that’s a good sign, and the storyline will remain true to the first movie, and the extended universe that we’ve gotten thus far. I’m also curious regarding how they will be explaining Jake’s Pentecost backstory, and why Stacker and Mako have never mentioned him in the original movie. Was Stacker even told he had a son (otherwise, I would have expected him to have some parting words for him as well, regardless of whether Jake was there or not, considering that the missions are usually recorded and/or Mako, Herc, or anyone else who would hopefully survive the mission could have relayed his father’s words to him), and how old was he when his father died? And looking at Stacker’s own backstory, i.e. his father having been killed in a fight with a club owner (where his mother was performing) when he was only 10, and little 10-year-old Stacker burning that club down and attacking the club owner in response… Well… It seems that little Pentecost babies tend to take losing their fathers very seriously, and will come after whatever is responsible for their death with everything they’ve got, apparently. Which I do find rather interesting. Otherwise, I’m also a little concerned regarding how they will handle Raleigh, Herc, and even Tendo’s absence from the movie… Basically, I still plan on going to see it, but I’m having huge mixed feelings about it, and trying to keep my expectations as low as humanly possible (going down to the breach deep under the Pacific ocean to be sure...). That being said, please don’t let my own doubts, concerns, and personal preferences keep you from being all psyched about the new sequel, and loving the teaser and trailer to death! Truth is, if the original had never existed, and that trailer had been my very first introduction to anything “Pacific Rim”, there’s a possibility I would have been jumping up and down, cheering, and unable to wait to see that movie! I do love “Transformers” (in general), used to be a huge fan of “Power Rangers”, and my favorite TV show as a small child growing up was “Goldorak” (in English “UFO Robot Grendizer”). But “Pacific Rim” had a very different and unique feel to it that felt inspired by those series, without exactly becoming them. “Go Go PPDC Rangers!” doesn’t sound quite right in my mind... Except here. Probably the only place where I want to see those two related. Lol!

#Pacific Rim #Pacific Rim Uprising #Pacific Rim: Uprising #Pacific Rim 2 #Still trying to make up my mind about this...#My thoughts #My Posts

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notourhomeland · 7 years

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About Gratitude, Love, and Life’s “Collateral Beauty”

Dear Mr Gansa,

I was very hesitant to participate in this letter campaign for many reasons. For one, I would never want to pressure anyone into doing anything he or she didn’t want to do, or overly influence someone to achieve a goal, however valid it may be. If this letter campaign had taken place straight after the finale of 6.12, I might have acted more impulsively and emotionally and jumped right in without thinking through the impact my actions could have on another person, as you are a fellow human being after all. Nonetheless, I do remember how strongly I felt four months ago, how devastated I was and my state of painful disbelief. At the time I felt so passionately about what happened that I did write something which I had worded quite strongly, angrily and desperately even. But that was then. My feelings have since changed. I’m not angry anymore, though still conflicted and confused. And sad and strange as it may sound, there is a part of me which feels gratitude towards you. Not that it matters because it’s not likely you will read my letter, not only because it is going to be one of many, but because I’m sure you have people employed to deal with letters like mine before they even get to you. In my head, I have this picture that my letter will end up in a shredder or a bin somewhere, and maybe that is where it belongs. I’m not a writer. I don’t understand anything about television shows, story arcs, character development, what you do and what your job entails, and what you consider to be important. I just remember falling in love with a character on your show for a very particular reason - a personal reason. I lost someone many years ago, also named Peter. He was a soldier who was killed doing his job “protecting people”. Ours was a beautiful, honest, and gritty love story which was sadly cut all too short. Even though many years have passed, his loss cuts deep and not a day goes by that I don’t miss him. My story is a very personal one, and so my love for him and my grief I usually prefer to keep very private. Still, I’m going to tell you a little bit about him, about my Peter, and about others too.

But first I will tell you how I started watching Homeland. I heard about the show through tv ads and a colleague and I was intrigued. I liked the idea of a female protagonist who had to face the challenges of being bipolar because I know people who face similar mental health challenges. It is a subject matter which interests me and I wanted to learn about it, and it was the first thing that drew me to Homeland. I tend to get captivated by stories and characters who have some kind of link to my reality, to real-life experiences, to the stories of people I know. It helps me process and find new and better ways of looking at something or someone, and sometimes it helps me resolve what’s unresolved. Unfortunately, no matter how much I loved the character of Carrie, I lost the connection to her as a character as her relationship with Brody progressed. I stopped watching; it wasn’t a deliberate decision but rather less conscious. Things just started to come in-between somehow, daily life things.

Years passed, and I was up late one night. I was sewing, not with a machine but stitching by hand. I felt tired and was nodding off, so to keep myself awake I switched on the television and coincidentally I stumbled upon a repeat episode of Homeland. It was during the scene when Quinn was sitting beside the pool getting hammered. When he finished, he threw the empty bottle into the water, and at that moment the landlady arrived and reprimanded him in a friendly, forgiving sort of a way. He in turn shrugged dorkily and tried to get up from the lounger, but he was so drunk that he fell back. It was that very scene that pulled me back into the world of Homeland- that short, small scene is the one that did it for me. It was so powerful that I pricked my finger, because what I saw onscreen felt so familiar. Quinn felt so familiar, because he reminded me of my Peter. He also used to self-medicate when something was really bothering him at work or after he had experienced something traumatic. Similar to the landlady, I couldn’t be mad at him because my Peter, like Quinn, had an unusual, unconventional charm; he too was mesmerising on so many levels; he was drawn to the darkness but was made of light; he struggled with the moral implications of his job; he blamed himself for the death of a child; he suffered an injury, but was lucky enough to make a full recovery; he had self-esteem issues; he too was a turtle- tough on the outside, resilient but vulnerable on the inside, and capable of deep, deep love; he too was very good at his job, had nerves of steel, was a protector by nature; he also struggled with depression and PTSD and, as we later learned about Quinn, was a survivor of sexual abuse. And I could go on with the list of uncanny and extraordinary similarities which drew me to your Quinn in Homeland.

I also share some similarities and real-life parallels with your Quinn. I am a survivor of child sexual trauma and was physically and psychologically abused, and I am familiar with depression and PTSD. I was a street-kid like Quinn at one time and struggled against a failing foster care system, falling through that proverbial net. I was groomed and manipulated and controlled by Dar-like figures, and like Quinn came close to killing my abusers. The scenes at the Lakehouse in season six felt as if they were taken out of difficult chapters from my own life.

All these parallels felt extremely validating. It was as if someone had done their research to bring such realism to the many difficult issues raised by Quinn in Homeland. I felt like someone had taken meticulous care in telling such tough, controversial, complex, and painful stories like the one my soldier partner and I had lived through, and which had left us with many scars and a closet full of demons. Therefore, to me the story you were telling and how you were telling it made complete and utter sense. Where others saw plot holes or retcons, inconsistencies or implausibilities, I saw realism, consistency, truth, and accuracy, and it turned me into a fan. I admired your courage in wanting to highlight these difficult issues, to shed light on them. I interpreted it as proof of your real commitment to giving people like my Peter and me a face and a voice, and I was grateful to you, very, very grateful!

Looking at it from an entirely sober and rational perspective, I probably don’t belong to the category of people you want to target in terms of marketing. Yes, I am interested in politics and I follow current events, but I’m not usually someone who gets captivated by spy plots, political thrillers, or semi-current affair shows which mirror or try to predict what goes on in the world or behind closed curtains, all elements which are very important to you if past interviews are correct. I’m probably your polar opposite; I’m someone who is more interested in matters of the heart, in humanity and what makes us who we are. I’m interested in the human experience, what shapes us and how we deal with reality, relationships, difficult past experiences, moral questions… the emotional and psychological journeys and challenges humans face in their lives and in their jobs, including the military, and how global affairs and politics impact us in human terms. That is why I love following the journey of characters on-screen, especially when I can connect with them for personal reasons.

However, I have never connected as deeply with a fictional tv-character as I have with Quinn, and I am convinced it will never happen again. It was a once in a life-time experience for me.

Peter Quinn was a tv character who stood out for me. He was a beautiful man and I could relate to him on so many levels, and that relatability allowed me to connect to and appreciate the spy plot and the political and prescient elements of your story-telling. And through him, I also gained access once again to Carrie and her journey. In other words, Quinn was my key to the overall Homeland experience. He made me appreciate other characters and the story-line as a whole, the totality of the Homeland universe you have created. But while for Carrie I cared, it was Quinn that I loved. I loved him because of what he represented and who he represented, “real-life” people. And, yes, one of them was my own Peter, a soldier who wanted to take a similar career path to Quinn. But he didn’t make it. He came under intense machine gun fire and died during one of his overseas deployments. Quinn allowed me to connect to my own Peter in a positive way, and allowed me to understand him and his struggles better, his demons and his job and its psychological implication.

And then something happened on Homeland, an unexpected shift: Quinn suffered a stroke, which further drew me to the character. Now he not only mirrored my own Peter in complex ways, but also people I have the privilege to work with in a rehab and care-providing setting, people who face all types of challenges- physical, personal, cognitive, emotional, relational, societal. People I have huge respect for, people I assist and facilitate and support on their road to recovery and in making positive adjustments to achieve the maximum amount of independence, people with whom I enjoy connecting and who motivate me. I especially enjoy working with people like Quinn who are in danger of falling through the cracks of the system, or who are in danger for their very own personal reasons and the nature of their demons, or because they simply lack family support structure. I enjoy it because I can relate, in the same way I could relate to Quinn.

Another very important reason why I love Quinn is because he reminds me of my own husband. I was lucky to have found love twice in my life, and my husband is just as special and amazing as my Peter was. He is an exceptional guy and is also like Quinn, but in a different way. He lives with a physical and cognitive disability, though the expression “differing” ability or “different” ability better describes the truth as he and we live it. And even though my husband doesn’t resemble Quinn in looks, he wears Quinn’s face in the shape of his courage, agency, resolve, and capacity to love unconditionally.

Quinn was the face of so many of us. He stood for so many of us, and us for him. That is why I loved him, because he gave us a voice, a face, words. We saw people we loved in him, people we cared for, ourselves even. But he did more than that… He brought us into the living room and thoughts and minds of others who may not have shared our experiences, people who wore a different face, lived different lives, had different pasts, loved differently, thought differently. And, yes, they too loved Quinn. Quinn’s popularity and importance to the story felt like a beautiful validation. It bestowed worth upon all of us whose face he wore. And we felt a sense of worth through him and through the love others felt for the character, because if the wider audience loved and accepted and rooted for Quinn, then perhaps the wider society had the capacity to accept and root and even love people like “us”. Perhaps we were deserving of acceptance and love. And it was not only because others loved and accepted Quinn but also because someone important like you who could reach many felt it was important to tell Quinn’s story, our story. And you managed to find an incredibly talented and believable actor who breathed life and realism into your creation in such a sensitive way that he touched every strand and fibre of our emotions. He made us love him, forgive him, understand him, admire him, feel with him, empathise with him, grieve with him, love with him, suffer with him, walk with him…. An actor who made Quinn complex, mesmerizing to watch, and beautifully relatable.

Quinn touched me in the same way my husband, the people I work with, and my own Peter touched me. There is much I would love to tell you about the people I deeply care about and love, the many faces of Quinn. And when I think about that, I wonder if it is all just an amazing coincidence, or did you and your team deliberately write Quinn and his story in such a way that it allowed for a multitude of personal projections. Was it solely down to the direction? Or maybe it was all in the acting and talent? Maybe it was a combination, I have no idea. I just know that on that day when I was stitching and Quinn appeared I became hooked on the show, really hooked.

I remember how intensely I was looking forward to season six. I had read your interviews before the season aired and discovered that you wanted to tell the story of a wounded veteran. My own Peter suffered a blast injury from an IED. Thankfully he recovered and returned to duty, but it triggered all sorts of struggles in him, and his recovery was not an easy one. Therefore, I loved the idea of your commitment to telling the story of a struggling veteran. After 5.12, I believed Quinn was “safe” and his place in Homeland secure. To me, 5.12 had centered around Quinn’s death, and so I believed Quinn’s story in season six was going to be a tough story towards recovery and life. I absolutely wanted you to touch on gritty reality, on tough subjects veterans are facing in every country, what it might be like to be affected by traumatic injury, stroke, PTSD and other mental health issues like depression, to touch on the challenges of adjusting to and coping with “disabilities” and finding alternatives to old ways of doing things. I wanted you to raise the issue of the many shortcomings in the provision and accessibility of good care, rehab programs and home supports, of people facing isolation, and the struggle with reintegration and the difficulties soldiers and veterans can face when transitioning into civilian life. I also wanted you to show how some people might struggle to engage with Quinn and how he might struggle to engage with others. I wanted you to show how some carers find it difficult to relate to someone like him, and how some carers can fall into the trap of infantilizing or dismissing the person in need of support. I wanted you to highlight the pressure that acquired “disabilities” and mental health issues can place on relationships, and how the interactions between couples can become strained. I wanted you to show how professional carers can be unprofessional and compromised. I wanted you to show the reality of depression, the dark side, the self-doubt, and I wanted you to touch on suicide and anger management issues. I wanted you to go deep on all fronts, to go dark and touch on all the taboo subjects. I wanted it and was prepared for it, and you took us there and even deeper, and I was grateful to you.

Before season six I was not part of the fandom, had never heard of the term. But because of the many complex issues raised by Quinn, all issues which are close to my heart and in which I’m personally and professionally invested, I started to engage in some online and offline discussions. I was grateful for these discussions because we were discussing and demystifying misconceptions and taboos, perceptions which needed clarification and reevaluation, and we did it together and with respect. It made people ask questions about themselves and others and about society as a whole. It led me to challenge my preconceptions and look at and question my own. It felt healthy and like a positive sign of the times, and it gave me hope that perceptions can change through raising awareness and through honest, respectful dialogue. It also made me believe in the power of love, that love is the most potent ingredient to affecting and bringing about change in society, and that even the love for a fictional character can unite people and move and shift things internally. Quinn was the common ground we could all relate to, and he was the catalyst for these discussions.

Quinn was almost universally loved and was such a strong character that he could carry that torch and be that beacon. He could take people by the hand and show us the difficult side of life, the struggles some of us face, the harshness of reality, the ugly and uncomfortable and unpalatable experiences some of us have to face, the damage and scars of trauma and abuse, the draw to darkness. Quinn could do this because he somehow coupled it with light and a touching vulnerability. Someone somewhere in the fandom eloquently and poignantly stated that Quinn showed us all of this without our ever losing the love we had for him. He mistook a friendly hug for a sexual one, did drugs and drank and smelled and yelled. He sucker punched Astrid, and even brutally killed. And still we loved him. He showed us his pain, his darkness, and his struggles so viscerally that we felt it too, we ached for him. And even when it was difficult we stayed and didn’t turn away because we loved him. That in my view is an incredible achievement on your part, the writers’ part, and the actor’s part!!!!!

We all saw the worth in Quinn, and because of the way you were telling his story and the way you expressed that sentiment in your interviews, I believed that you did too. I believed you understood and valued Quinn and enjoyed telling his story, and that you wanted to continue to write and explore it in future seasons, seasons I was looking forward to because I wanted to know more.

And that is why I never saw his death in 6.12 coming. A few hours prior to watching the finale I had come across spoilers of his death, but my brain didn’t fully process it. It made no sense. It was late at night because of the time difference, but because it was the finale I wanted to stay up. My husband was too tired and had fallen asleep, which meant I was alone. I was drawn into the story playing out on the screen immediately, to the point that I became part of it. I walked alongside Quinn and Carrie and followed Quinn into the underground parking lot. I stood beside them when Quinn told Carrie to do as she was told, and watched as she got in and shielded the president-elect with her body. I got into the car, but I was not afraid because I trusted you. I closed the door and clicked the buckle of my seat-belt. I felt the car move as Quinn drove us out of the garage and watched as he made his split second decision. I felt like someone who was about to embark on a roller coaster ride. I felt the adrenaline and the suspense. Yes, I did feel fear, but still I trusted you like one trusts the engineers who build a real-life roller coaster. I trusted that you had built the story in such a way that you wanted to challenge us, thrill us, frighten us, shake us, shock us even, but I didn’t think, not for one second, that you actually wanted to kill us. Because that is how it felt when suddenly it all changed, when the bolts that held the roller coaster started popping, the bullets started flying, the windscreen started cracking, when it all started to fall apart around and underneath me, when I was sent into a terrifying free-fall towards an emotional death of sorts. Because like Carrie, I could not lose another one… Not Quinn, not a character who embodied so many of us, became the face of us, and who wore the face of my beloved Peter, the brave soldier who came under heavy machine gun fire and died protecting other people. And as time slowed so did my heart and my breath, because it was as if I was sitting in the front seat beside Quinn. I let you take me there because I had trusted you. But in that moment, as I became witness to Quinn’s death, I was hurled violently into the moment of the death of my own Peter. And the pain I felt in that moment was unbearable, because the bullets did not hit my flesh, they hit my soul. And it was sheer and blinding agony. I could feel myself choking, I had the taste of blood in my mouth, I felt the life drain from me and the world fade around me. And I died. I died with my Peter. I died with Quinn. My heart and soul bled out, and I died. And so I became a writer’s unwitting collateral damage, your collateral damage.

The next day my husband watched 6.12 and cried as I had never seen him cry before. You know when a man cries first in stillness, when he presses all the air out of his lungs and loses his breath completely, and still he tries to resist taking in air. But then he just has to breathe, and when he does he makes an indescribably painful and agonizing sound. That was the sound of my husband when he watched Quinn die, because he too did not see Quinn’s death coming, even though I had tried to prepare him. He too believed you wanted to tell a different story which focused on Quinn’s capabilities and abilities in future seasons. Because Quinn’s face was also my husband’s face, my husband who lives with the challenges of his differing abilities and who has learnt to rise above it all and plough on through the obstacles in his way. And he was so proud of Quinn, proud of the story he believed you were telling, proud to a see an unconventional and complex hero on our television screen who functions differently just like he does, a man of agency and worth. But as Quinn died onscreen and the “burp” of an alt-right radio personality marked the end of his existence, a little bit of my husband died too in that moment, because it raised questions about his own worth as nothing had ever done before. He started asking himself questions he had never asked himself nor had reason to. He asked himself whether he was “too damaged” as a person, whether he could only have worth if he sacrificed himself, if his worth was tied to death. He asked himself if there was room in society for him, if he was a burden to me. And so he too became collateral damage, a writer’s unwitting collateral damage. Your collateral damage.

Recently I met a US veteran and his wife who were fans of Homeland, and they too were a writer’s unwitting collateral damage. Your collateral damage. And so was a young man who like my husband has differing abilities. I spoke to his mother who found a farewell note in his room. He was a fan of Quinn and felt that if Quinn could succeed, so could he. Following Quinn’s journey and his resilience allowed the young man to tap into his own strengths, and through Quinn he found the feeling of acceptance. But when Quinn died, he read some critical reviews which described Quinn as too damaged to have a place as a character in future seasons and that therefore his death was a logical and fitting conclusion. And that’s when the young man started to write his farewell note. Thankfully, his mother found it before he could take his own life. Still, he too had become collateral damage, the writer’s unwitting collateral damage. Your collateral damage.

And there are many more stories like that, more collateral damage.

You could easily think this is not your problem, that we are not your responsibility. And if you do think this, I would agree with you. My emotions, my mental health, my past experiences, how I connected with your Quinn, my personal projections and those of others are not your responsibility. And how could they be? You can’t know all the viewers and their own personal stories. You don’t know my Peter, my husband, my patients. I understand that you don’t know us. We are formless and faceless, a small part of the wider viewership, a small statistical number, a footnote. And there are a lot of people out there who are perfectly okay with Quinn’s death. But still, we do exist. We are the collateral damage.

I can’t imagine you wanted to send such a soul-destroying message or cause such pain, I really don’t. Instead, I want to believe that by telling the story the way you did that you wanted to effect positive change in society. Maybe you wanted to get people to confront themselves and their negative views by showing everyone the reality of the social and emotional seclusion that veterans can face, or that people with differing abilities or mental health issues face. Or the struggles of active service men and women and the difficulties they encounter when trying to re-enter civilian life, or the challenges and strengths of people who have been sexually abused. Maybe you wanted to encourage us to measure or define people not in terms of “damage” but in terms of ability, potential, and possibility. Maybe you wanted to encourage us to focus on what we find attractive in another human being, rather than the aspects which do not fit into our “ideals”. Maybe you wanted to encourage us to think outside the box. That is what I hoped you were advocating for, that it was your dream to open eyes and not to shut them, that you wanted to foster growth of soul and heart and not pull the rug from under people.

And I wanted to believe that by not showing a memorial for Quinn, by answering his death with a burp, by applying restraint to Carrie’s emotional responses and having her use a bin liner to gather Quinn’s few belongings, you wanted to achieve the opposite- to emphasize and magnify the void Quinn has left in the hearts of so many and in the story itself. That by not talking about Quinn publicly until now, you were indeed letting the silence speak louder than words.

I’m sure you have your reasons and I do believe you when you say that you too are grieving and that there are no fitting words. You too are made of flesh and blood and have feelings and the capacity to empathize. I’d like to believe that, like us, you connected with Quinn on a deep level. There has to be a part of you in him. And because I’d like to believe that, I would love to know why. Why did you kill him? Maybe your reasons are too personal or painful to share with strangers. Maybe that is the reason you did not publicly acknowledge and draw clear lines around the sexual abuse angle you introduced through Dar, why you didn’t publicly “have Quinn’s back”. Just maybe you experienced what my Peter has, what I did, and maybe nobody had your back. Perhaps you didn’t know and still can’t process that what was done to you was wrong because you feel guilt or shame, maybe you felt you deserved it or were asking for it. Or possibly acts of abuse were sold to you and disguised as love, and so the lines became blurred and the emotions confusing. Maybe you felt your abuser somehow saved you from an even worse fate and that you owed the abuser something. Abuse is complex, and that is why clear lines and clear statements are so important and valuable, statements like the ones Rupert Friend made on the issue- clear, unambiguous statements. Maybe you couldn’t do the same because it is hard for you, because it is a subject you struggle with like my Peter did, like I did and still do. Or maybe it wasn’t you personally who was affected by the issue… Perhaps it was someone you deeply care about, or someone on your team whom you are trying to protect somehow. Maybe someone on your team was a victim of a sexual predator when they were a child, teenager or young adult. Or perhaps you left the lines so blurred because the person who inspired you to integrate the abuse angle between Quinn and Dar was not the victim, but the perpetrator. There are so many possible reasons for your ambiguity on that matter and for your silence in general because you are a human being, because you are made of flesh and blood. And that is why maybe you too understand what it is like to become collateral damage, because you have witnessed or experienced it through your own eyes or through the eyes of someone you love and care about.

This is what I would like to think and need to believe. I’d also like to believe that behind the sparsity of your words hides an altruistic wish - the wish to trigger people into wanting to take note of people like Quinn. Maybe you want to propel us into meaningful action so that we contribute to a charity for those who have been affected by the issues raised. Maybe you want us to get in touch with a veterans organisation to see if there is something we can do, to take the time to write or adopt a soldier who is deployed overseas and who might not have a family. Perhaps instead of passing a homeless person and feeling uneasy or uncomfortable, you want us to stop and sit down and have a chat and ask real questions. Maybe you want us to sit down with a veteran and hear his/her story, for us to see a person who has experienced sexual abuse not as someone to pity or fear, who has become tainted or tarnished, but as one who has been tested and tested again and is resilient, robust and made of tough stuff. Maybe you want us to go and watch a basketball team that is being played by people who skillfully maneuver their wheelchair, or watch athletes with prosthetic limbs who can run faster than gazelles. Perhaps you yourself have tried to open a bottle or tie your shoelaces with just one hand, and maybe you too have become more aware of how ingenious people who live with some form of paralysis have to be, how they are constantly learning and discovering new ways of doing things. Maybe you don’t want us to just stare or feel frightened when someone in a shop has an epileptic fit, when the person’s bladder opens and he or she starts to vomit. Rather you want us to know first aid procedures, what to watch out for, and how to safely support and be there for that person, to treat him or her with dignity. Maybe you want us to really listen when we meet someone who has a different speech pattern, whose speech is perhaps slurred or affected by aphasia after a stroke. Maybe you want to encourage us to give that person the time and space to answer, and for us to be interested in what he or she has to say and not feel “embarrassed” for the person or get nervous ourselves. Perhaps you want us to appreciate the musicality, the beat, the pauses, the acceleration, the slowing down, the movement, the symphony of different speech patterns and hear not the “damage” but the “beauty” and “music”. Maybe if we meet someone who lives in a world where someone’s reality has a dreaminess to it, where someone’s cognitive processes work differently, or he or she misjudges a situation on account of brain damage, you want us to see things from the other person’s view and ask if there is something we can do to best support that person. Perhaps you want us to see each other more clearly and empathically and for us to appreciate our differences.

This is what I want to believe is the reason why you say so little. I choose to believe that you want to give people space and time to find their own path and to develop their own response, rather than trying to influence us. Because I cannot imagine nor want to imagine anything else. Any other explanation just feels empty and cold. And because I choose to believe that you are not cold, I am not going to criticise or clamor for change or a different ending, or ask you to give us more in terms of an explanation, I don’t need that, not anymore.

The reason why I am participating in the letter campaign is for a very different reason: I’m writing to you because I want to thank you. Thank you for the creation of Quinn, for giving all of us a face and a voice, even if I feel Quinn’s story ended abruptly and feels incomplete. Thank you for telling aspects of the complicated struggles my own Peter had to face and also for reflecting on his character, his morality, his beauty, his heart. And thank you for challenging us and for uniting so many of us through the love we felt and still feel for this particular and very unique character named Peter Quinn.

This is not meant sarcastically; my thanks comes sincerely from the heart. And as strange as it may sound, I also want to thank you for opening my pandora’s box of intense pain and grief which allowed me to set hope free, for making me confront my worst nightmares and demons. Thank you for making me remember my own beautiful Peter, for triggering memories I had locked away for too long. And thank you for reading my words, or to whoever took the time to plough through these many pages and this maze of feelings and thoughts of a stranger. And if nobody reads this, then I want to thank the universe or the shredder or the bin where my letter ends up, because I’m glad for the opportunity to have written it, for the opportunity to remember.

With deepest gratitude to you, Mr Gansa, for creating Quinn. Thank you to Rupert Friend for breathing heart and soul into the character. Thank you to my own Peter, for the years we shared, for giving your love and for accepting mine. You were my soul-mate, and I will love you always. And of course a big and heartfelt thank you to my brave husband and life-partner who also understands the meaning of loss, for putting up with me all these years, and for your acceptance and love. And thank you to my patients, to soldiers and veterans, to all the other Quinns of this world, and the special friend who helped me water my flowers.

Thank you.

Yours sincerely,

One of your many European viewers…

#letter #submission #not our homeland #letters to gansa

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sometimesrosy · 7 years

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The 100 Positivity: My Statement of Purpose

I’m sick of the antis. On both sides of the fandom. In society in general. I hate the way people tear things down, point out all the awfulness, just to make themselves look and feel superior.

So I come here, to tumblr and The 100 fandom, to enjoy a show that I think is great. It’s dark and it’s gritty, with great characters and engaging stories and it talks about some of the issues that are most important in my life.

I AM A FAN OF THE 100.

When I analyze it, I’m not coming at it to pick it apart, look for the flaws, point my finger at how it is “problematic” and therefore unworthy. What I am doing is trying to understand what is on the screen. I want to know how it fits together. I want to figure out why the characters made their choices, and what the writers are trying to say.

This doesn’t mean I ignore its flaws. But when I see something that is a flaw, I don’t wave it away as “bad writing,” I still try to figure out how it fits in to the story, or if it doesn’t at all. When it fits, then I have to say that it was intentional, even if I didn’t like it. When it doesn’t, I either let it go with suspension of disbelief, since nothing is perfect, or I let it sit and wait and see how they handle the rest of the show. As of yet, the sitting flaws have not damaged the long term story. It was close with 3A, but the writers, because they are actually good writers, pulled it out.

I’m not going brush off my confusion at the plot by saying it’s the writer’s fault, bad writing, racist, OOC, or discount everything that doesn’t fit my reading. I’m going to look at different possibilities, different interpretations, and different ideas to see if any of them make sense. Whenever something DOESN’T make sense, I pay it more attention. I have to work to figure out HOW it makes sense. While doing this, there are a few things that I have discovered about the long term narrative structure and large themes of The 100.

The 100 uses multiple literary, cinematic, mythological, psychological and social references. These can help us understand the story better. Dante’s Divine Comedyl. The Illiad and The Odyssey. Shakespeare. The Matrix. Lord of The Flies. Greek Myths. PTSD. If they mention a book or story, whether visually, in dialogue, or in the titles, I pay attention. If they mention it MORE than once (like Dante) then I am damn well going to start interpreting the story through that lens. And guess what? All of a sudden a lot of those plot holes and OOC characters are no longer plot holes or ooc and MAKE EVEN DEEPER SENSE.

The 100 has as one of it’s main themes that hate, xenophobia, and tribalism is what doomed humanity, and working together is what will save it. (This is why we see so many xenophobes, bigots, colonialists, white saviors, wars, genocides etc) I do NOT think The 100 is racist. I think it is talking about racism in its “post racial” fantasy world.

The 100 is creating characters based on psychological realism. This world is traumatized. Everyone is suffering from this trauma and their actions are based on real world mental struggles. This means that the characters do ugly things. Things that “a hero” wouldn’t do. But The 100 is also about fighting THROUGH the trauma to become stronger, and this is what a hero WOULD do. In fact, it’s what makes them heroes. So a lot of characters are going through these dark struggles in order to get to the other side and become the heroes we need them to be.

The 100 absolutely writes about dark stories. Dark love. Obsession. Power. Abuse. Megalomania. Free will. Failure. Destruction. To consider the stories in The 100 to be dark in nature is not at all inconsistent with the show. To consider good characters to be struggling with darkness is not unfair. To consider that a character might fall to their darkness or rise from it is consistent. There are no cupcakes. This is explicit. “Maybe there are no good guys.” All the characters MUST struggle against their monster and be responsible for it when they let it out. When your favorite character does something wrong, look at how they handle it. This is the true test of character. Not that they did the bad thing, but how they change from it. Much change and growth? Heroic character. Pretend they did nothing wrong at all? Uh oh. Keep an eye on it. They do however allow the dark characters to be redeemed. That is why I don’t write any characters off until I see what they do with their bad choices.

The science is crap. Do not poke the science. It won’t make sense. Let it go. It’s not actually a show about science. TV science fiction rarely is.

A lot of the criticism I see about The 100 is actually a misunderstanding of genre. And I get that it’s a crossover, and people who are not familiar with science fiction or post apocalyptic fiction are watching it, and they don’t get the rules that the genre follows, but much of what people are complaining about, (what was the recent accusation I heard? That it was torture porn?) is a failure to understand the type of story. Or the complaints about characters dying or suffering. It is built into the genre that this is going to happen. You don’t get to keep your representation safe from suffering or death, no one does. Also, the way the grounders are developed. There’s a bit of handwaving there, just like there is with the science. But again, it’s based on some accepted tropes of the genre. The loss of civilization, the return to tribalism and war, the mixture of cultures, the scavenging, even the wardrobe. It’s a pretty standard post apocalyptic setting. It’s like complaining because the heroine in a mass market romance is immediately drawn to hero. This is the genre.

THIS IS MY BIAS. I love this show. I do not think it’s badly written. I don’t think the heroes are villains. I don’t think anyone is out of character (except for Finn, I just can’t see around that.) I don’t think it’s racist. I would not watch it if I did. And I know what racist shows look like. I am simply not going to write anyone or anything off as “BAD” because they’re not perfect. I’m going to look at their flaws and see how it affects the story. I’m going to look at the darkness and see how it affects the meaning. If I come to the conclusion that one character is “good” and one character is “bad,” that is an interpretation. I did not start out that way and refuse to look at any complexity.

There is no such thing as unproblematic. There is no such thing as perfect. There is no way to please everyone.

I just want to enjoy this good show. And it is a good show. I am critical to understand, not to hate. I like the gray morality. I like the complexity. I like the characters. I even like the antagonists, and I’m gonna talk about them. If you’d like to do the same thing, then come along for the ride.

#the 100 #in defense of the 100 #in defense of me #rosymamacita #the 100 positivity

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lanasitra · 7 years

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Honeymoon Notes | What’s It Like?

Composed in the summer of 2013

I wrote “What’s It Like?” when I was going through both the “I’m not happy with myself” phase and the “I think I’m going to die any day now” phase. In tandem with these two trains of thought, something that would become a recurring practice for me toward the end of my first year of university was the gross over-analysis of my contemporary situation, as well as those of my potential futures. At one point, I had a breakdown because I felt that, once I had found “the one” and settled down, there would come a day where nothing excited me anymore; I felt I would just be bored, scrolling through YouTube videos until I died. Another side of me thought these feelings may be symptomatic of the relationship I was in; maybe I wasn’t feeling stimulated because the relationship wasn’t good enough to stimulate me. Yet another part of me thought every single relationship would turn out this way (which is a problem in itself, because it indicates I put “finding a partner” on a pedestal and was neglecting the health of my internal world). These fears are significant factors in “What’s It Like?” The impetus to write began with me scrolling through Facebook, looking at photos of couples on their various summer trips, ostensibly happier than I had been in a long time. I wanted to ask these people, “what’s your secret?” or, “what’s it like to be that happy all the time?” And so it began.

Despite what an inattentive audience might initially think (this piece has been called “depressing” – even labeled “dark pop” – by some of my peers), “What’s It Like?” is actually built on a theme of hopeful defiance. Despite my emotionally heavy questions that will never be answered in a satisfactory manner, “I am quite alright… One day, I’ll get it right, / But, for now, I’ll hold on tight.” “What’s It Like?” is about acceptance of the lows and faith in oneself that you’ll come out on top eventually. In the final chorus, I make the realization that the perfection I see in other people is just smoke and mirrors: “Everyone, hold on tight. / It’s all going to be alright. / I promise it’ll be alright.” We are all in the same boat and need reciprocal love and support.

The album recording of “What’s It Like?” is built on a single, simultaneous take of both guitar and vocals, recorded backstage in the Roy Barnett Recital Hall of UBC in 2015. Because there is clear bleed in both the vocal track and guitar track, it was incredibly difficult to do much meaningful editing on either source without introducing notable artifacts. Though I added a number of vocal overdubs and the underlying pad, the main vocal and guitar remain relatively untouched, which ultimately led to what could be considered “squandered potential” on both fronts.

BUT TUHSWUHTUHMUS! WHY WOULDN’T YOU JUST RECORD THEM SEPARATELY?! Back in 2014 and early 2015, I had incredible difficulty recording these particular vocals separately from the guitar and actually have it sound good. I feel part of the reason is that there is an intensity in my voice when I sing and play simultaneously that just isn’t there when I sing separate takes. Secondly, my vocal intonation straight up sucked (more than usual) against a recording of just the guitar. After months of trying, I decided to just say, “f*** it, this is literally the only way I can get a passable recording of this piece.” I felt an enormous pressure to get “What’s It Like?” on Honeymoon because it was – and still is – obvious to me that, to an audience, it is one of the most “poppy,” accessible and engaging pieces in my oeuvre. I was therefore going to jump through any hoops necessary to release the piece.

I don’t remember exactly when I decided to include the foley-pad in “What’s It Like,” but I recall 2014 and 2015 being a time period in which I became privy to a handful of techniques used to make a chorus jump out at a listener. Based on my experiences and opinions, the best choruses tend to be held up by pads prolonging the tonic or a progression of the most harmonically relevant notes. The pads don’t need to be in the listener’s face, but they’re usually there to fill the space. Again, it was clear to me and to others that “What’s It Like” had incredible potential, so I wanted to try anything to make it hit hard.

The spring of 2015 saw me give a presentation to my “History of Music Since 1900” class about the work of my close friend Kjel Sidloski. His album, Ad viger, had fascinated me due to its ability to move in and out of a multitude of styles without ever feeling incoherent (an impressive balancing act at a time when some people still put pieces and artists in little boxes and create personal expectations based on those boxes). Part of my presentation’s thesis was that Kjel is able to create cohesion across Ad viger by making the album gapless and using foley as a bridging mechanism between each piece. Ad viger presents a world to its audience; a world I dive deeply into with every listen. This immersive quality is an aspect I desired for Honeymoon, so I began collecting my own field recordings to act as gaps and help coalesce the project.

Some time down the road, I managed to get an audio recording of my friends Ava, Taylor and Laura conversing in a taxi following a particularly heavy night out. While the content of this conversation will remain confidential, I found it intense enough to find a place at the back end of Honeymoon – but not, as we can hear, as a gap. While tinkering with the audio file, I created a pad by applying a mixture of reverbs, EQ and auto-tune. “What’s It Like?” has been taken to the next level by this pad, and I’m fairly proud of the fact that it’s not some b***s*** midi string section or synth; the pad is unique to “What’s It Like” (and “Sunrise,” for that matter), as well as to me as an artist.

The addition of the floor tom only made sense; it compliments the growing intensity of the piece and highlights the rhythmic syncopation of the harmonic progression. I feel as though the idea was in my head from the get-go, but my desire to add percussion was clear by September of 2014.

(Regarding the Remaster) I did try to retake the vocals for “What’s It Like?” prior to releasing the Honeymoon remaster on iTunes. However, while my pitch accuracy was notably better in some spots, my delivery was sterile. In all honesty, I just don’t sing “What’s It Like?” quite the same way anymore, even with a guitar; my performance no longer has such gritty, pleading intensity. Once in a blue moon, I can recapture that grit and retain good intonation, but, for now, a consistent balance eludes me.

I was tearing myself up about these vocals until I read a Facebook status posted by my friend Heather Gunn. In this status, she says:

“Because of how rooted our culture is in capitalism and consumerism, people think they can't make music if the music they make wouldn't be ‘worth buying’… if there's one other thing I can say for sure, it's that making music makes people happy… since I'm someone who ‘does music’, I hold myself to pretty ridiculous standards - I can't let anyone hear me if I'm less than perfect, I can't make any music if it's not ‘worth buying’. Anyway. I want to change that way of thinking” (15 March 2016)

Funnily enough, I had this very same struggle with “What’s It Like?” upon Honeymoon’s initial release eight months earlier. It took hearing the perspective of others to sit back and say, “no, this is the most honest version of the piece. I am willing to accept an imperfection or two if it means retaining emotional integrity.” Here I am again – same song, same struggle. However, Heather’s status came at the perfect time. Once again, I was able to say, “no, this is the song’s pure essence, and this is what I need it to be.” I am a perfectionist elsewhere on Honeymoon, but I savor the fact that I am mentally and emotionally capable of letting go for a few moments here and there. I feel this approach gives the Honeymoon recordings realism and personality, thereby setting them apart – even in the tiniest capacity – from their pop contemporaries. Furthermore, I just remain a little saner, as opposed to obsessing over cent deviations in pitch and rubati that shift the rhythm by less than an eighth of a second.

Don’t mistake what I’m saying here for the same complacency that led to me sucking as a songwriter in mid-2014 (see “Honeymoon Notes | Canadian Summer”). I still hold myself to a high standard, much like Heather. However, as with Heather, I am beginning to see where to draw the line between just enough and too much.

Namaste

- t s w t m s

#tswtms #The Sunlit Woods the Moonlit Sea #Honeymoon #What's It Like?

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meetmeinmysocalledlife-blog · 7 years

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About Gratitude, Love, and Life’s “Collateral Beauty”

Dear Mr Gansa, I was very hesitant to participate in this letter campaign for many reasons. For one, I would never want to pressure anyone into doing anything he or she didn’t want to do, or overly influence someone to achieve a goal, however valid it may be. If this letter campaign had taken place straight after the finale of 6.12, I might have acted more impulsively and emotionally and jumped right in without thinking through the impact my actions could have on another person, as you are a fellow human being after all. Nonetheless, I do remember how strongly I felt four months ago, how devastated I was and my state of painful disbelief. At the time I felt so passionately about what happened that I did write something which I had worded quite strongly, angrily and desperately even. But that was then. My feelings have since changed. I’m not angry anymore, though still conflicted and confused. And sad and strange as it may sound, there is a part of me which feels gratitude towards you. Not that it matters because it’s not likely you will read my letter, not only because it is going to be one of many, but because I’m sure you have people employed to deal with letters like mine before they even get to you. In my head, I have this picture that my letter will end up in a shredder or a bin somewhere, and maybe that is where it belongs. I’m not a writer. I don't understand anything about television shows, story arcs, character development, what you do and what your job entails, and what you consider to be important. I just remember falling in love with a character on your show for a very particular reason - a personal reason. I lost someone many years ago, also named Peter. He was a soldier who was killed doing his job "protecting people". Ours was a beautiful, honest, and gritty love story which was sadly cut all too short. Even though many years have passed, his loss cuts deep and not a day goes by that I don’t miss him. My story is a very personal one, and so my love for him and my grief I usually prefer to keep private. Still, I’m going to tell you a little bit about him, about my Peter, and about others too. But first I will tell you how I started watching Homeland. I heard about the show through tv ads and a colleague and I was intrigued. I liked the idea of a female protagonist who had to face the challenges of being bipolar because I know people who face similar mental health challenges. It is a subject matter which interests me and I wanted to learn about it, and it was the first thing that drew me to Homeland. I tend to get captivated by stories and characters who have some kind of link to my reality, to real-life experiences, to the stories of people I know. It helps me process and find new and better ways of looking at something or someone, and sometimes it helps me resolve what’s unresolved. Unfortunately, no matter how much I loved the character of Carrie, I lost the connection to her as a character as her relationship with Brody progressed. I stopped watching; it wasn’t a deliberate decision but rather less conscious. Things just started to come in-between somehow, daily life things. Years passed, and I was up late one night. I was sewing, not with a machine but stitching by hand. I felt tired and was nodding off, so to keep myself awake I switched on the television, and coincidentally I stumbled upon a repeat episode of Homeland. It was during the scene when Quinn was sitting beside the pool getting hammered. When he finished, he threw the empty bottle into the water, and at that moment the landlady arrived and reprimanded him in a friendly, forgiving sort of a way. He in turn shrugged dorkily and tried to get up from the lounger, but he was so drunk that he fell back. It was that very scene that pulled me back into the world of Homeland- that short, small scene is the one that did it for me. It was so powerful that I pricked my finger, because what I saw onscreen felt so familiar. Quinn felt so familiar, because he reminded me of my Peter. He also used to self-medicate when something was really bothering him at work or after he had experienced something traumatic. Similar to the landlady, I couldn’t be mad at him because my Peter, like Quinn, had an unusual, unconventional charm; he too was mesmerising on so many levels; he was drawn to the darkness but was made of light; he struggled with the moral implications of his job; he blamed himself for the death of a child; he had self-esteem issues; he too was a turtle- tough on the outside, resilient but vulnerable on the inside, and capable of deep, deep love; he too was very good at his job, had nerves of steel, was a protector by nature; he also struggled with depression and PTSD and, as we later learned about Quinn, was a survivor of sexual abuse. And I could go on with the list of uncanny and extraordinary similarities which drew me to your Quinn in Homeland. I also share some similarities and real-life parallels with your Quinn. I am a survivor of child sexual trauma and was physically and psychologically abused, and I am familiar with depression and PTSD. I was a street-kid like Quinn at one time and struggled against a failing foster care system, falling through that proverbial net. I was groomed and manipulated and controlled by Dar-like figures, and like Quinn came close to killing my abusers. The scenes at the Lakehouse in season six felt as if they were taken out of difficult chapters from my own life. All these parallels felt extremely validating. It was as if someone had done their research to bring such realism to the many difficult issues raised by Quinn in Homeland. I felt like someone had taken meticulous care in telling such tough, controversial, complex, and painful stories like the one my soldier partner and I had lived through, and which had left us with many scars and a closet full of demons. Therefore, to me the story you were telling and how you were telling it made complete and utter sense. Where others saw plot holes or retcons, inconsistencies or implausibilities, I saw realism, consistency, truth, and accuracy, and it turned me into a fan. I admired your courage in wanting to highlight these difficult issues, to shed light on them. I interpreted it as proof of your real commitment to giving people like my Peter and me a face and a voice, and I was grateful to you, very, very grateful! Looking at it from an entirely sober and rational perspective, I probably don’t belong to the category of people you want to target in terms of marketing. Yes, I am interested in politics and I follow current events, but I’m not usually someone who gets captivated by spy plots, political thrillers, or semi-current affair shows which mirror or try to predict what goes on in the world or behind closed curtains, all elements which are very important to you if past interviews are correct. I’m probably your polar opposite; I’m someone who is more interested in matters of the heart, in humanity and what makes us who we are. I’m interested in the human experience, what shapes us and how we deal with reality, relationships, difficult past experiences, moral questions... the emotional and psychological journeys and challenges humans face in their lives and in their jobs, including the military, and how global affairs and politics impact us in human terms. That is why I love following the journey of characters on-screen, especially when I can connect with them for personal reasons. However, I have never connected as deeply with a fictional tv-character as I have with Quinn, and I am convinced it will never happen again. It was a once in a life-time experience for me. Peter Quinn was a tv character who stood out for me. He was a beautiful man and I could relate to him on so many levels, and that relatability allowed me to connect to and appreciate the spy plot and the political and prescient elements of your story-telling. And through him, I also gained access once again to Carrie and her journey. In other words, Quinn was my key to the overall Homeland experience. He made me appreciate other characters and the story-line as a whole, the totality of the Homeland universe you have created. But while for Carrie I cared, it was Quinn that I loved. I loved him because of what he represented and who he represented, “real-life” people. And, yes, one of them was my own Peter, a soldier who wanted to take a similar career path to Quinn. But he didn’t make it. He came under intense machine gun fire and died during one of his overseas deployments. Quinn allowed me to connect to my own Peter in a positive way, and allowed me to understand him and his struggles better, his demons and his job and its psychological implication. And then something happened on Homeland, an unexpected shift: Quinn suffered a stroke, which further drew me to the character. Now he not only mirrored my own Peter in complex ways, but also people I have the privilege to work with in a rehab and care-providing setting, people who face all types of challenges- physical, personal, cognitive, emotional, relational, societal. People I have huge respect for, people I assist and facilitate and support on their road to recovery and in making positive adjustments to achieve the maximum amount of independence, people with whom I enjoy connecting and who motivate me. I especially enjoy working with people like Quinn who are in danger of falling through the cracks of the system, or who are in danger for their very own personal reasons and the nature of their demons, or because they simply lack family support structure. I enjoy it because I can relate, in the same way I could relate to Quinn. Another very important reason why I love Quinn is because he reminds me of my own husband. I was lucky to have found love twice in my life, and my husband is just as special and amazing as my Peter was. He is an exceptional guy and is also like Quinn, but in a different way. He lives with a physical and cognitive disability, though the expression “differing” ability or “different” ability better describes the truth as he and we live it. And even though my husband doesn’t resemble Quinn in looks, he wears Quinn's face in the shape of his courage, agency, resolve, and capacity to love unconditionally. Quinn was the face of so many of us. He stood for so many of us, and us for him. That is why I loved him, because he gave us a voice, a face, words. We saw people we loved in him, people we cared for, ourselves even. But he did more than that... He brought us into the living room and thoughts and minds of others who may not have shared our experiences, people who wore a different face, lived different lives, had different pasts, loved differently, thought differently. And, yes, they too loved Quinn. Quinn’s popularity and importance to the story felt like a beautiful validation. It bestowed worth upon all of us whose face he wore. And we felt a sense of worth through him and through the love others felt for the character, because if the wider audience loved and accepted and rooted for Quinn, then perhaps the wider society had the capacity to accept and root and even love people like “us”. Perhaps we were deserving of acceptance and love. And it was not only because others loved and accepted Quinn but also because someone important like you who could reach many felt it was important to tell Quinn’s story, our story. And you managed to find an incredibly talented and believable actor who breathed life and realism into your creation in such a sensitive way that he touched every strand and fibre of our emotions. He made us love him, forgive him, understand him, admire him, feel with him, empathise with him, grieve with him, love with him, suffer with him, walk with him.... An actor who made Quinn complex, mesmerizing to watch, and beautifully relatable. Quinn touched me in the same way my husband, the people I work with, and my own Peter touched me. There is much I would love to tell you about the people I deeply care about and love, the many faces of Quinn. And when I think about that, I wonder if it is all just an amazing coincidence, or did you and your team deliberately write Quinn and his story in such a way that it allowed for a multitude of personal projections. Was it solely down to the direction? Or maybe it was all in the acting and talent? Maybe it was a combination, I have no idea. I just know that on that day when I was stitching and Quinn appeared I became hooked on the show, really hooked. I remember how intensely I was looking forward to season six. I had read your interviews before the season aired and discovered that you wanted to tell the story of a wounded veteran. My own Peter suffered a blast injury from an IED. Thankfully he recovered and returned to duty, but it triggered all sorts of struggles in him, and his recovery was not an easy one. Therefore, I loved the idea of your commitment to telling the story of a struggling veteran. After 5.12, I believed Quinn was “safe” and his place in Homeland secure. To me, 5.12 had centered around Quinn’s death, and so I believed Quinn’s story in season six was going to be a tough story towards recovery and life. I absolutely wanted you to touch on gritty reality, on tough subjects veterans are facing in every country, what it might be like to be affected by traumatic injury, stroke, PTSD and other mental health issues like depression, to touch on the challenges of adjusting to and coping with “disabilities” and finding alternatives to old ways of doing things. I wanted you to raise the issue of the many shortcomings in the provision and accessibility of good care, rehab programs and home supports, of people facing isolation, and the struggle with reintegration and the difficulties soldiers and veterans can face when transitioning into civilian life. I also wanted you to show how some people might struggle to engage with Quinn and how he might struggle to engage with others. I wanted you to show how some carers find it difficult to relate to someone like him, and how some carers can fall into the trap of infantilizing or dismissing the person in need of support. I wanted you to highlight the pressure that acquired "disabilities" and mental health issues can place on relationships, and how the interactions between couples can become strained. I wanted you to show how professional carers can be unprofessional and compromised. I wanted you to show the reality of depression, the dark side, the self-doubt, and I wanted you to touch on suicide and anger management issues. I wanted you to go deep on all fronts, to go dark and touch on all the taboo subjects. I wanted it and was prepared for it, and you took us there and even deeper, and I was grateful to you. Before season six I was not part of the fandom, had never heard of the term. But because of the many complex issues raised by Quinn, all issues which are close to my heart and in which I’m personally and professionally invested, I started to engage in some online and offline discussions. I was grateful for these discussions because we were discussing and demystifying misconceptions and taboos, perceptions which needed clarification and reevaluation, and we did it together and with respect. It made people ask questions about themselves and others and about society as a whole. It led me to challenge my preconceptions and look at and question my own. It felt healthy and like a positive sign of the times, and it gave me hope that perceptions can change through raising awareness and through honest, respectful dialogue. It also made me believe in the power of love, that love is the most potent ingredient to affecting and bringing about change in society, and that even the love for a fictional character can unite people and move and shift things internally. Quinn was the common ground we could all relate to, and he was the catalyst for these discussions. Quinn was almost universally loved and was such a strong character that he could carry that torch and be that beacon. He could take people by the hand and show us the difficult side of life, the struggles some of us face, the harshness of reality, the ugly and uncomfortable and unpalatable experiences some of us have to face, the damage and scars of trauma and abuse, the draw to darkness. Quinn could do this because he somehow coupled it with light and a touching vulnerability. Someone somewhere in the fandom eloquently and poignantly stated that Quinn showed us all of this without our ever losing the love we had for him. He mistook a friendly hug for a sexual one, did drugs and drank and smelled and yelled. He sucker punched Astrid, and even brutally killed. And still we loved him. He showed us his pain, his darkness, and his struggles so viscerally that we felt it too, we ached for him. And even when it was difficult we stayed and didn’t turn away because we loved him. That in my view is an incredible achievement on your part, the writers' part, and the actor’s part!!!!! We all saw the worth in Quinn, and because of the way you were telling his story and the way you expressed that sentiment in your interviews, I believed that you did too. I believed you understood and valued Quinn and enjoyed telling his story, and that you wanted to continue to write and explore it in future seasons, seasons I was looking forward to because I wanted to know more. And that is why I never saw his death in 6.12 coming. A few hours prior to watching the finale I had come across spoilers of his death, but my brain didn’t fully process it. It made no sense. It was late at night because of the time difference, but because it was the finale I wanted to stay up. My husband was too tired and had fallen asleep, which meant I was alone. I was drawn into the story playing out on the screen immediately, to the point that I became part of it. I walked alongside Quinn and Carrie and followed Quinn into the underground parking lot. I stood beside them when Quinn told Carrie to do as she was told, and watched as she got in and shielded the president-elect with her body. I got into the car, but I was not afraid because I trusted you. I closed the door and clicked the buckle of my seat-belt. I felt the car move as Quinn drove us out of the garage and watched as he made his split second decision. I felt like someone who was about to embark on a roller coaster ride. I felt the adrenaline and the suspense. Yes, I did feel fear, but still I trusted you like one trusts the engineers who build a real-life roller coaster. I trusted that you had built the story in such a way that you wanted to challenge us, thrill us, frighten us, shake us, shock us even, but I didn’t think, not for one second, that you actually wanted to kill us. Because that is how it felt when suddenly it all changed, when the bolts that held the roller coaster started popping, the bullets started flying, the windscreen started cracking, when it all started to fall apart around and underneath me, when I was sent into a terrifying free-fall towards an emotional death of sorts. Because like Carrie, I could not lose another one… Not Quinn, not a character who embodied so many of us, became the face of us, and who wore the face of my beloved Peter, the brave soldier who came under heavy machine gun fire and died protecting other people. And as time slowed so did my heart and my breath, because it was as if I was sitting in the front seat beside Quinn. I let you take me there because I had trusted you. But in that moment, as I became witness to Quinn’s death, I was hurled violently into the moment of the death of my own Peter. And the pain I felt in that moment was unbearable, because the bullets did not hit my flesh, they hit my soul. And it was sheer and blinding agony. I could feel myself choking, I had the taste of blood in my mouth, I felt the life drain from me and the world fade around me. And I died. I died with my Peter. I died with Quinn. My heart and soul bled out, and I died. And so I became a writer’s unwitting collateral damage, your collateral damage. The next day my husband watched 6.12 and cried as I had never seen him cry before. You know when a man cries first in stillness, when he presses all the air out of his lungs and loses his breath completely, and still he tries to resist taking in air. But then he just has to breathe, and when he does he makes an indescribably painful and agonizing sound. That was the sound of my husband when he watched Quinn die, because he too did not see Quinn’s death coming, even though I had tried to prepare him. He too believed you wanted to tell a different story which focused on Quinn’s capabilities and abilities in future seasons. Because Quinn’s face was also my husband’s face, my husband who lives with the challenges of his differing abilities and who has learnt to rise above it all and plough on through the obstacles in his way. And he was so proud of Quinn, proud of the story he believed you were telling, proud to a see an unconventional and complex hero on our television screen who functions differently just like he does, a man of agency and worth. But as Quinn died onscreen and the "burp" of an alt-right radio personality marked the end of his existence, a little bit of my husband died too in that moment, because it raised questions about his own worth as nothing had ever done before. He started asking himself questions he had never asked himself nor had reason to. He asked himself whether he was "too damaged" as a person, whether he could only have worth if he sacrificed himself, if his worth was tied to death. He asked himself if there was room in society for him, if he was a burden to me. And so he too became collateral damage, a writer’s unwitting collateral damage. Your collateral damage. Recently I met a US veteran and his wife who were fans of Homeland, and they too were a writer’s unwitting collateral damage. Your collateral damage. And so was a young man who like my husband has differing abilities. I spoke to his mother who found a farewell note in his room. He was a fan of Quinn and felt that if Quinn could succeed, so could he. Following Quinn’s journey and his resilience allowed the young man to tap into his own strengths, and through Quinn he found the feeling of acceptance. But when Quinn died, he read some critical reviews which described Quinn as too damaged to have a place as a character in future seasons and that therefore his death was a logical and fitting conclusion. And that's when the young man started to write his farewell note. Thankfully, his mother found it before he could take his own life. Still, he too had become collateral damage, the writer’s unwitting collateral damage. Your collateral damage. And there are many more stories like that, more collateral damage. You could easily think this is not your problem, that we are not your responsibility. And if you do think this, I would agree with you. My emotions, my mental health, my past experiences, how I connected with your Quinn, my personal projections and those of others are not your responsibility. And how could they be? You can't know all the viewers and their own personal stories. You don’t know my Peter, my husband, my patients. I understand that you don’t know us. We are formless and faceless, a small part of the wider viewership, a small statistical number, a footnote. And there are a lot of people out there who are perfectly okay with Quinn’s death. But still, we do exist. We are the collateral damage. I can’t imagine you wanted to send such a soul-destroying message or cause such pain, I really don’t. Instead, I want to believe that by telling the story the way you did that you wanted to effect positive change in society. Maybe you wanted to get people to confront themselves and their negative views by showing everyone the reality of the social and emotional seclusion that veterans can face, or that people with differing abilities or mental health issues face. Or the struggles of active service men and women and the difficulties they encounter when trying to re-enter civilian life, or the challenges and strengths of people who have been sexually abused. Maybe you wanted to encourage us to measure or define people not in terms of “damage” but in terms of ability, potential, and possibility. Maybe you wanted to encourage us to focus on what we find attractive in another human being, rather than the aspects which do not fit into our "ideals". Maybe you wanted to encourage us to think outside the box. That is what I hoped you were advocating for, that it was your dream to open eyes and not to shut them, that you wanted to foster growth of soul and heart and not pull the rug from under people. And I wanted to believe that by not showing a memorial for Quinn, by answering his death with a burp, by applying restraint to Carrie’s emotional responses and having her use a bin liner to gather Quinn’s few belongings, you wanted to achieve the opposite- to emphasize and magnify the void Quinn has left in the hearts of so many and in the story itself. That by not talking about Quinn publicly until now, you were indeed letting the silence speak louder than words. I’m sure you have your reasons and I do believe you when you say that you too are grieving and that there are no fitting words. You too are made of flesh and blood and have feelings and the capacity to empathize. I’d like to believe that, like us, you connected with Quinn on a deep level. There has to be a part of you in him. And because I’d like to believe that, I would love to know why. Why did you kill him? Maybe your reasons are too personal or painful to share with strangers. Maybe that is the reason you did not publicly acknowledge and draw clear lines around the sexual abuse angle you introduced through Dar, why you didn’t publicly "have Quinn’s back". Just maybe you experienced what my Peter has, what I did, and maybe nobody had your back. Perhaps you didn’t know and still can’t process that what was done to you was wrong because you feel guilt or shame, maybe you felt you deserved it or were asking for it. Or possibly acts of abuse were sold to you and disguised as love, and so the lines became blurred and the emotions confusing. Maybe you felt your abuser somehow saved you from an even worse fate and that you owed the abuser something. Abuse is complex, and that is why clear lines and clear statements are so important and valuable, statements like the ones Rupert Friend made on the issue- clear, unambiguous statements. Maybe you couldn’t do the same because it is hard for you, because it is a subject you struggle with like my Peter did, like I did and still do. Or maybe it wasn’t you personally who was affected by the issue... Perhaps it was someone you deeply care about, or someone on your team whom you are trying to protect somehow. Maybe someone on your team was a victim of a sexual predator when they were a child, teenager or young adult. Or perhaps you left the lines so blurred because the person who inspired you to integrate the abuse angle between Quinn and Dar was not the victim, but the perpetrator. There are so many possible reasons for your ambiguity on that matter and for your silence in general because you are a human being, because you are made of flesh and blood. And that is why maybe you too understand what it is like to become collateral damage, because you have witnessed or experienced it through your own eyes or through the eyes of someone you love and care about. This is what I would like to think and need to believe. I’d also like to believe that behind the sparsity of your words hides an altruistic wish - the wish to trigger people into wanting to take note of people like Quinn. Maybe you want to propel us into meaningful action so that we contribute to a charity for those who have been affected by the issues raised. Maybe you want us to get in touch with a veterans organisation to see if there is something we can do, to take the time to write or adopt a soldier who is deployed overseas and who might not have a family. Perhaps instead of passing a homeless person and feeling uneasy or uncomfortable, you want us to stop and sit down and have a chat and ask real questions. Maybe you want us to sit down with a veteran and hear his/her story, for us to see a person who has experienced sexual abuse not as someone to pity or fear, who has become tainted or tarnished, but as one who has been tested and tested again and is resilient, robust and made of tough stuff. Maybe you want us to go and watch a basketball team that is being played by people who skillfully maneuver their wheelchair, or watch athletes with prosthetic limbs who can run faster than gazelles. Perhaps you yourself have tried to open a bottle or tie your shoelaces with just one hand, and maybe you too have become more aware of how ingenious people who live with some form of paralysis have to be, how they are constantly learning and discovering new ways of doing things. Maybe you don’t want us to just stare or feel frightened when someone in a shop has an epileptic fit, when the person’s bladder opens and he or she starts to vomit. Rather you want us to know first aid procedures, what to watch out for, and how to safely support and be there for that person, to treat him or her with dignity. Maybe you want us to really listen when we meet someone who has a different speech pattern, whose speech is perhaps slurred or affected by aphasia after a stroke. Maybe you want to encourage us to give that person the time and space to answer, and for us to be interested in what he or she has to say and not feel “embarrassed” for the person or get nervous ourselves. Perhaps you want us to appreciate the musicality, the beat, the pauses, the acceleration, the slowing down, the movement, the symphony of different speech patterns and hear not the “damage” but the “beauty” and “music”. Maybe if we meet someone who lives in a world where someone’s reality has a dreaminess to it, where someone’s cognitive processes work differently, or he or she misjudges a situation on account of brain damage, you want us to see things from the other person’s view and ask if there is something we can do to best support that person. Perhaps you want us to see each other more clearly and empathically and for us to appreciate our differences. This is what I want to believe is the reason why you say so little. I choose to believe that you want to give people space and time to find their own path and to develop their own response, rather than trying to influence us. Because I cannot imagine nor want to imagine anything else. Any other explanation just feels empty and cold. And because I choose to believe that you are not cold, I am not going to criticise or clamor for change or a different ending, or ask you to give us more in terms of an explanation, I don’t need that, not anymore. The reason why I am participating in the letter campaign is for a very different reason: I’m writing to you because I want to thank you. Thank you for the creation of Quinn, for giving all of us a face and a voice, even if I feel Quinn’s story ended abruptly and feels incomplete. Thank you for telling aspects of the complicated struggles my own Peter had to face and also for reflecting on his character, his morality, his beauty, his heart. And thank you for challenging us and for uniting so many of us through the love we felt and still feel for this particular and very unique character named Peter Quinn. This is not meant sarcastically; my thanks comes sincerely from the heart. And as strange as it may sound, I also want to thank you for opening my pandora's box of intense pain and grief which allowed me to set hope free, for making me confront my worst nightmares and demons. Thank you for making me remember my own beautiful Peter, for triggering memories I had locked away for too long. And thank you for reading my words, or to whoever took the time to plough through these many pages and this maze of feelings and thoughts of a stranger. And if nobody reads this, then I want to thank the universe or the shredder or the bin where my letter ends up, because I’m glad for the opportunity to have written it, for the opportunity to remember. With deepest gratitude to you, Mr Gansa, for creating Quinn. Thank you to Rupert Friend for breathing heart and soul into the character. Thank you to my own Peter, for the years we shared, for giving your love and for accepting mine. You were my soul-mate, and I will love you always. And of course a big and heartfelt thank you to my brave husband and life-partner who also understands the meaning of loss, for putting up with me all these years, and for your acceptance and love. And thank you to my patients, to soldiers and veterans, to all the other Quinns of this world, and the special friend who helped me water my flowers. Thank you. Yours sincerely, One of your many European viewers…

#not our homeland #letters to gansa #posting for a friend

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