#because we just got done watching a series with really questionable treatment of its female characters and im just soooo sick and tired of—

[relaxxattack]

i really liked these additional comments and thought they deserved to be in the post

every time i post about male favoritism in the fandom i feel like i need to wear a shirt that says "i am not trying to tell you that it is wrong to like davekat i literally also like davekat if you come away with the assumption that my message is to stop liking the boy ships in homestuck you are missing the overall point which is arguably more detrimental than never having interacted with what i was trying to say in the first place" flashback to that person in my inbox like "just admit that you don't like davekat it's pretty obvious based on your posts that you have a problem with it" do i need to draw them holding hands or something to get you guys to trust me and engage with what i'm saying. would it help if i also threw in a subway surfers clip

[bonni]

idk how this media hyperfixation ask game works, like do you answer to all questions or just the i choose? anyways for one piece: 💢 🏳‍🌈✨🎥💕

💢 what do you NOT like about your hyperfixation? is there something you would want to change about it?

oh fuck, where do i begin? i guess the most obvious is oda’s treatment of women. i don’t think it’s as terrible as people who haven’t read the series thing that it is, but it’s still not great. and actually, the art style isn’t really the part that bothers me, it’s more about misogynistic stereotypes (girls don’t fight, if they do they fight other girls/it’s not melee, girls are the babysitters/serious ones while guys are the fun ones, stuff like that), and the pervert/nosebleed jokes. the first complaint is actually one of the main reasons i love carrot so much, because she shows that oda is able to write female characters who are scrappy and tough and like to have fun, and i hope he continues to do so. i also get really happy when characters like nami and robin are allowed to be kind of dorky and fun, like nami wanting to be a ninja and robin having a ridiculously dark sense of humor. tl;dr, i have hope that oda is getting better when it comes to female characters, but up until now he definitely hasn’t handled them so well.

i also have problems with some of the story arcs, like i think wano has been really boring so far because it feels like the strawhats have been completely sidelined, and i had similar issues back in dressrosa. some arcs definitely have more problems than others, and imo skypeia through marineford is still the most engaging chunk of the series (maybe with thriller bark cut out, because i didn’t like that one too much, lol.)

🏳‍🌈 do you have any headcanons (lgbt, race, neuro, etc) that are important to you?

i’m one of the few fans who doesn’t really like any inner-crew pairings (i don’t mind all of them, but i think it’s really cool that oda wants to keep romance out of the series and i think the crew is just better as a family), so even though i do have lgbt headcanons none of them are really for the sake of shipping. but anyways, lesbian nami is so fucking important. usopp and zoro are also gay, robin and franky are bi, and aside from that i… really don’t care. i also think that most of the strawhats have ptsd, nami has ocd, luffy has adhd, and robin has bpd.

✨ what draws you towards your hyperfixation? what is interesting about it?

i’ve been reading one piece since early middle school and what’s always stood out to me about it is its ability to remain interesting and maintain a sense of direction despite its length. with series like naruto and inuyasha, it began to feel like a chore to keep reading, because the authors were so clearly just stretching out the story. one piece is long as shit, but it’s incredibly purposeful; oda is so thoughtful and it’s really evident that he’s been planning this story long-term. i’ve also always loved character driven stories, and “a group of traumatized misfits find family in each other” is like my favorite trope ever, so i love the straw hats. plus i love the fantastical settings like skypeia and whole cake island.

🎥 do you have any favorite scenes from your hyperfixation?

off the top of my head... luffy ringing the golden bell after defeating enel, usopp shooting down the world govt flag, hiriluk’s cherry blossoms, corazon telling law he loves him..... oh, the iconic vivi sendoff with The Pose (TM), and uhh... carrot drawing the strawhats as a shoujo, lmao. also i don’t watch the anime anymore but my favorite animated scene is luffy punching charlos, it’s even done by one of my favorite animators.

💕 tell us about one of your favorite characters and why you like them!

CARROT!! i fucking love carrot so much and i want her to become a straw hat so badly...... i liked her right away because uh. she’s cute. but then she quickly became my favorite character because she’s so different from all the other female characters in the series. like i said before, i love that carrot is super strong, i love that she’s a melee fighter, i love that she’s adventurous and irresponsible and a little dumb. she actually reminds me a lot of luffy, who is also one of my favorite characters. plus she gets a totally metal super saiyan form and i really hope we get to see her fight more!

[onceland]

Fairy tale ending: Inside the magical Once Upon a Time series finale

To read more scoop on this year’s season finales, pick up the new issue of Entertainment Weekly on stands Friday, or buy it here now. Don’t forget to subscribe for more exclusive interviews and photos, only in EW.

“Oh, man, I’m fired. Guys, I think this might be my last day!” Once Upon a Time is in its final days of production, and Ginnifer Goodwin is feeling particularly punchy after flubbing a line during a pivotal scene. Her Snow White stands before our beloved heroes at a massive war-room table, giving a rousing speech about hope as it seems all but lost. A great evil threatens to steal their happy endings once and for all — if it sounds like a moment from the pilot, there’s a reason for that. As actress Jennifer Morrison puts it, “The heartbeat of the show has always been hope.”

Despite being the brainchild of Lost writers Adam Horowitz and Edward Kitsis, Once’s premise — Snow White and Prince Charming’s (Josh Dallas) daughter Emma Swan (Morrison) returns after 28 years to rescue a variety of legendary literary characters, like Jiminy Cricket (Raphael Sbarge) and Little Red Riding Hood (Meghan Ory), from the Evil Queen’s (Lana Parrilla) dark curse — seemed a lot to swallow when the series launched in 2011, and many critics expected the fairy-tale mash-up to fail.

Instead, OUAT went on to become one of ABC’s top performers, bewitching audiences with emotionally grounded and relatable stories that resonated with adults and children alike for seven seasons. “Even though it’s about fairy-tale characters, the writers have written [the show] in such a way that really goes to the heart of everybody,” says Colin O’Donoghue, who joined the show in season 2 as Captain Hook. “That’s hopefully where it will endure.”

Part of the show’s initial appeal was the OUAT bosses immediately bucking age-old expectations, setting a game-changing tone of female empowerment with a very simple, if not monumental moment in the pilot: sticking a sword in the hand of Disney princess Snow White. “When we wrote it, we didn’t realize,” Kitsis says. “We wanted her to pull a sword and not be a damsel in distress, and that is what people respect about Snow White — she’s a fearless warrior for good.”

“At the time that we made the pilot, no one was doing anything like this,” says Goodwin. “Honestly, these guys wrote a truly female-driven show. It was instrumental then in my choosing to take the part.” Goodwin notes OUAT’s female-forward approach was also used behind the scenes — she was No. 1 on the call sheet for years until Parrilla took the top spot in season 7. “I hope that Once is remembered as being groundbreaking, that it’s remembered as being representative of the strongest kinds of complex and beautiful women.”

That was never more apparent than with the character of Regina Mills. She started out as the show’s ultimate villain, unleashing a curse that trapped everyone in a land without magic, where Regina could live out her own personal happy ending. But it was one that turned out to be anything but happy, evolving into a Groundhog Day-like prison of her own making until she adopted Henry (Jared Gilrmore), eventually leading to the arrival of Emma Swan, who went on to wake the cursed characters.

Slowly, but surely, Regina conquered her own demons, becoming not just an ally to the Charmings, but family. “Regina is a very hopeful character because she’s so flawed and complex,” says Parrilla. “Following Regina’s journey over the years, we’ve seen that she’s made some mistakes, but she picks herself back up. I think she’s an inspiration to many, including myself; I’ve learned so much from her.”

Aside from its compelling leads, the show’s fortitude also stemmed from its ability to reinvent itself from season to season, sometimes multiple times within. The Onceuniverse expanded into a playground sandbox where characters like Aladdin (Deniz Akdeniz) and Belle (Emilie de Ravin) could cross paths with Tinker Bell (Rose McIver), the Wicked Witch (Rebecca Mader) or Dr. Frankenstein (David Anders). The show even birthed a short-lived Wonderland-set spin-off.

The biggest reboot came last year when — after the exits of six major cast members — Parilla, O’Donoghue, and Robert Carlyle (as Rumplestiltskin) were left to take center stage alongside Andrew J. West as an older version of Henry (Jared Gilmore), Dania Ramirez as a new iteration of Cinderella, and Rose Reynolds as Wish Realm Hook’s daughter Alice. But audiences waned without the original cast, seemingly losing hope at the worst possible time. “It makes me sad that something so positive on television is being taken off the air when we need it most,” says Parrilla. “It breaks my heart.”

Even the characters of Once may come to lose hope as the series heads into its final episodes. Despite developments in Hyperion Heights that could signal a brighter tomorrow, an unleashed villain intends to follow through with a dangerous plan, the painful effects of which would be felt by our cherished characters for eternity. “I would definitely say the last episode is as epic as probably any episode that Once Upon a Time has ever done,” O’Donoghue teases. “It’s like taking the best of all seasons and jamming it into one — literally.” West concurs: “The finale is maybe the single most massive episode that the show has ever done. And I mean that in all sincerity.”

Though their future may look bleak, Snow White would (and does) tell our heroes to keep hope alive, a notion Morrison attributes to why the show “had such a strong connection with the audience.” It didn’t hurt that the show launched in a time when social media allowed fans to share in the characters’ experience, cheer their triumphs, and criticize their missteps in real time, creating a community of fans who have cemented a strong bond over the years. “It’s brought a lot of people together that maybe never felt seen,” says Mader, who joined the show’s ranks in season 3. “These people will now be friends forever, because of a TV show that we made — that’s really special.”

For some, it’s much more than that; the mark that OUAT has left is indelible. “There’s been a couple of times where people have said that they were so desperately alone that they’ve considered taking their own lives,” O’Donoghue says. “Through the show, they’ve met other people who felt the same way and realized they’re not alone. That blows me away.”

Sometimes, even the OUAT actors can forget how much the show has affected fans, something season 7 addition Reynolds learned while filming the final episodes. “It didn’t really hit me, the impact of this show, until I went to Steveston,” says Reynolds of the real-life Storybrooke set that the show will return to before series end. “We had people coming out to see it, and even just being on the street I saw in the pilot, that is when it really hit home for me that this is a big deal and this show is epic. Working with [returning stars] Ginny and Josh as well has hammered that home even more.”

Though the Once bosses depicted their originally planned ending in the season 6 finale, they have cooked up a particularly magical final chapter that brings the show back to the beginning in a number of ways — keep your eyes peeled, as there are Easter eggs galore. “The pitch for the whole show was ‘What would a world look like in which the Evil Queen got her happy ending?’ I feel that we’ve finally figured out what that would look like,” says Goodwin, just one of the season 6 departures who returns for the finale. (Read who else is returning here.) “We saved Regina’s happy ending for the end,” says Kitsis. “Her journey has really been watching somebody confront the demons within and emerge on the other side a better person.”

“I know everyone’s been waiting for Regina’s happy ending and no one really could define what that is, and no one really knew what it was going to look like, and nor did I,” Parrilla says. “Once Robin died, it was really hard to foresee another love in her life. But I’m happy with where her happy ending is at.” Parrilla remains coy about the specifics of Regina’s happily-ever-after, only teasing that it takes place “in the same location” as the opening of the pilot.

O’Donoghue, meanwhile, offers that Hook’s fate is intrinsically tied to Rumple’s. “I remember thinking [the ending] was just such an amazing way for this relationship that Bobby and I have invested in over six seasons,” O’Donoghue says. “It’s been so integral to both of our characters, so I thought it was a really beautiful moment and very, very important to me for that to be the happy ending for Hook.”

The notion of happy endings has been vital to the success of the show, particularly Once’s central message that no matter who you are as a person, good or evil, everyone deserves a happy ending — all three of this year’s legacy characters initially entered the show as villains. “It’s so important to send that message,” says Dallas, “particularly in this day and age, when we have so much negative in the world, and to know that you do have a second chance, that you can have redemption, is super-powerful.”

But the question remains whether Once will get a second chance in the future, someday joining the pantheon of shows getting the reboot or revival treatment. “Look, you never say never, but for now this is our ending and the end of this show for us,” says Horowitz. “But if in the future something else happens with the show, we’ll be excited to see what that is.”

Once Upon a Time’s series finale will air over two weeks, starting Friday, May 11, and concluding Friday, May 18, at 8 p.m. ET on ABC.

x

[efnewsservice]

May 4, 2018

“Oh, man, I’m fired. Guys, I think this might be my last day!” Once Upon a Time is in its final days of production, and Ginnifer Goodwin is feeling particularly punchy after flubbing a line during a pivotal scene. Her Snow White stands before our beloved heroes at a massive war-room table, giving a rousing speech about hope as it seems all but lost. A great evil threatens to steal their happy endings once and for all — if it sounds like a moment from the pilot, there’s a reason for that. As actress Jennifer Morrison puts it, “The heartbeat of the show has always been hope.”

Despite being the brainchild of Lost writers Adam Horowitz and Edward Kitsis, Once’s premise — Snow White and Prince Charming’s (Josh Dallas) daughter Emma Swan (Morrison) returns after 28 years to rescue a variety of legendary literary characters, like Jiminy Cricket (Raphael Sbarge) and Little Red Riding Hood (Meghan Ory), from the Evil Queen’s (Lana Parrilla) dark curse — seemed a lot to swallow when the series launched in 2011, and many critics expected the fairy-tale mash-up to fail.

Instead, OUAT went on to become one of ABC’s top performers, bewitching audiences with emotionally grounded and relatable stories that resonated with adults and children alike for seven seasons. “Even though it’s about fairy-tale characters, the writers have written [the show] in such a way that really goes to the heart of everybody,” says Colin O’Donoghue, who joined the show in season 2 as Captain Hook. “That’s hopefully where it will endure.”

Part of the show’s initial appeal was the OUAT bosses immediately bucking age-old expectations, setting a game-changing tone of female empowerment with a very simple, if not monumental moment in the pilot: sticking a sword in the hand of Disney princess Snow White. “When we wrote it, we didn’t realize,” Kitsis says. “We wanted her to pull a sword and not be a damsel in distress, and that is what people respect about Snow White — she’s a fearless warrior for good.”

“At the time that we made the pilot, no one was doing anything like this,” says Goodwin. “Honestly, these guys wrote a truly female-driven show. It was instrumental then in my choosing to take the part.” Goodwin notes OUAT’s female-forward approach was also used behind the scenes — she was No. 1 on the call sheet for years until Parrilla took the top spot in season 7. “I hope that Once is remembered as being groundbreaking, that it’s remembered as being representative of the strongest kinds of complex and beautiful women.”

That was never more apparent than with the character of Regina Mills. She started out as the show’s ultimate villain, unleashing a curse that trapped everyone in a land without magic, where Regina could live out her own personal happy ending. But it was one that turned out to be anything but happy, evolving into a Groundhog Day-like prison of her own making until she adopted Henry (Jared Gilrmore), eventually leading to the arrival of Emma Swan, who went on to wake the cursed characters.

Slowly, but surely, Regina conquered her own demons, becoming not just an ally to the Charmings, but family. “Regina is a very hopeful character because she’s so flawed and complex,” says Parrilla. “Following Regina’s journey over the years, we’ve seen that she’s made some mistakes, but she picks herself back up. I think she’s an inspiration to many, including myself; I’ve learned so much from her.”

Aside from its compelling leads, the show’s fortitude also stemmed from its ability to reinvent itself from season to season, sometimes multiple times within. The Once universe expanded into a playground sandbox where characters like Aladdin (Deniz Akdeniz) and Belle (Emilie de Ravin) could cross paths with Tinker Bell (Rose McIver), the Wicked Witch (Rebecca Mader) or Dr. Frankenstein (David Anders). The show even birthed a short-lived Wonderland-set spin-off.

The biggest reboot came last year when — after the exits of six major cast members — Parilla, O’Donoghue, and Robert Carlyle (as Rumplestiltskin) were left to take center stage alongside Andrew J. West as an older version of Henry (Jared Gilmore), Dania Ramirez as a new iteration of Cinderella, and Rose Reynolds as Wish Realm Hook’s daughter Alice. But audiences waned without the original cast, seemingly losing hope at the worst possible time. “It makes me sad that something so positive on television is being taken off the air when we need it most,” says Parrilla. “It breaks my heart.”

Even the characters of Once may come to lose hope as the series heads into its final episodes. Despite developments in Hyperion Heights that could signal a brighter tomorrow, an unleashed villain intends to follow through with a dangerous plan, the painful effects of which would be felt by our cherished characters for eternity. “I would definitely say the last episode is as epic as probably any episode that Once Upon a Time has ever done,” O’Donoghue teases. “It’s like taking the best of all seasons and jamming it into one — literally.” West concurs: “The finale is maybe the single most massive episode that the show has ever done. And I mean that in all sincerity.”

Though their future may look bleak, Snow White would (and does) tell our heroes to keep hope alive, a notion Morrison attributes to why the show “had such a strong connection with the audience.” It didn’t hurt that the show launched in a time when social media allowed fans to share in the characters’ experience, cheer their triumphs, and criticize their missteps in real time, creating a community of fans who have cemented a strong bond over the years. “It’s brought a lot of people together that maybe never felt seen,” says Mader, who joined the show’s ranks in season 3. “These people will now be friends forever, because of a TV show that we made — that’s really special.”

For some, it’s much more than that; the mark that OUAT has left is indelible. “There’s been a couple of times where people have said that they were so desperately alone that they’ve considered taking their own lives,” O’Donoghue says. “Through the show, they’ve met other people who felt the same way and realized they’re not alone. That blows me away.”

Sometimes, even the OUAT actors can forget how much the show has affected fans, something season 7 addition Reynolds learned while filming the final episodes. “It didn’t really hit me, the impact of this show, until I went to Steveston,” says Reynolds of the real-life Storybrooke set that the show will return to before series end. “We had people coming out to see it, and even just being on the street I saw in the pilot, that is when it really hit home for me that this is a big deal and this show is epic. Working with [returning stars] Ginny and Josh as well has hammered that home even more.”

Though the Once bosses depicted their originally planned ending in the season 6 finale, they have cooked up a particularly magical final chapter that brings the show back to the beginning in a number of ways — keep your eyes peeled, as there are Easter eggs galore. “The pitch for the whole show was ‘What would a world look like in which the Evil Queen got her happy ending?’ I feel that we’ve finally figured out what that would look like,” says Goodwin, just one of the season 6 departures who returns for the finale. (Read who else is returning here.) “We saved Regina’s happy ending for the end,” says Kitsis. “Her journey has really been watching somebody confront the demons within and emerge on the other side a better person.”

“I know everyone’s been waiting for Regina’s happy ending and no one really could define what that is, and no one really knew what it was going to look like, and nor did I,” Parrilla says. “Once Robin died, it was really hard to foresee another love in her life. But I’m happy with where her happy ending is at.” Parrilla remains coy about the specifics of Regina’s happily-ever-after, only teasing that it takes place “in the same location” as the opening of the pilot.

O’Donoghue, meanwhile, offers that Hook’s fate is intrinsically tied to Rumple’s. “I remember thinking [the ending] was just such an amazing way for this relationship that Bobby and I have invested in over six seasons,” O’Donoghue says. “It’s been so integral to both of our characters, so I thought it was a really beautiful moment and very, very important to me for that to be the happy ending for Hook.”

The notion of happy endings has been vital to the success of the show, particularly Once’s central message that no matter who you are as a person, good or evil, everyone deserves a happy ending — all three of this year’s legacy characters initially entered the show as villains. “It’s so important to send that message,” says Dallas, “particularly in this day and age, when we have so much negative in the world, and to know that you do have a second chance, that you can have redemption, is super-powerful.”

But the question remains whether Once will get a second chance in the future, someday joining the pantheon of shows getting the reboot or revival treatment. “Look, you never say never, but for now this is our ending and the end of this show for us,” says Horowitz. “But if in the future something else happens with the show, we’ll be excited to see what that is.”

[scope-dogg]

Cross Ange: Skeev Score Roundup and Final Thoughts

Before I go in to the verdict, let’s finish up the tally of this show’s fanservice. This series is notorious for this so I set out to try and catalogue it with some kind of objective scale. As a reminder, every time there was a boob shot, butt shot or otherwise fan-servicey camera angle, I gave the episode 1 point. Note that this was specifically for shots where the character’s anatomy is the focal point of the shot, or shots with more than the average amount of nudity (If I counted every shot with a character wearing skimpy clothes and you can see their boobs or butt then each episode would likely earn hundreds of points more than I gave it) When a scenario arose with obvious sexual connotations I gave it 1-10 points, with a more overtly sexual or degrading incident earning more points. For instance, two characters kissing is usually 1-3 points, whereas a sexual assault is 10 points. With that in mind, the Skeev score for each episode is as follows, below the break:

E01 - 27 E02 - 42 E03 - 15 E04 - 28 E05 - 47 E06 - 12 E07 - 19 E08 - 18 E09 - 1 E10 - 23 E11 - 28 E12 - 11 E13 - 5 E14 - 13 E15 - 27 E16 - 26 E17 - 25 E18 - 11 E19 - 32 E20 - 43 E21 - 8 E22 - 18 E23 - 21 E24 - 11 E25 - 40

Add those scores altogether and divide by 25 episodes and we get our average:

Cross Ange Skeev Index Average Score: 22.4

Before I go on, let’s just address this. The amount of fanservice I thought, overall, on average, wasn’t that excessive, probably in line with various other fanservicey anime. The next most fanservicey mecha series I’ve seen was probably Shinkon Gattai Godannar, and that’s honestly not too far behind this. However, the sexual content in this spikes up and down a lot, where sometimes it feels like they’re trying to tone it down and then other times it’s like they can’t help themselves. The worst scenes are absolutely awful, for some I wish I could give more than ten points, and a couple of these scenes come really early on. A lot of people trying this out are going to see them and instantly recoil from this series, and I honestly can’t say I can blame them. I feel like that’s also the primary source of this series’ notoriety. I’m split between feeling that it’s deserved and that it’s a shame, because I actually found quite a lot to like about this series, but everything I liked comes with caveats. Female main characters in mecha are quite rare - the gold standards are probably the main characters of Gunbuster and Diebuster as well as Patlabor and Escaflowne, but other than that there’s precious little. Enter Ange, who’s cross a lot of the time. I actually thought that she was quite a good, even occasionally great character, who develops a lot over the course of the series and becomes a strong, independent protagonist - so long as the writers and animators aren’t conspiring to put her in some cheap sexual scenario, or worse, in the way of some pretty horrendous sexual abuse. I thought she deserved better treatment than this series’ writers give her, frankly. Her by-and-large female co-cast are also mostly great, as a bunch they’ve got a lot of personality and their conflicts and backgrounds are typically woven quite well into the overarching plot.

That’s probably the next thing to talk about, because it’s another mixed bag. The plot setup is really good: in a world where people can use mana, which is basically magic, the people who can’t are called Norma and are shunned as monsters. Princess Angelise is down with this, until she discovers that she is one. She’s deported to a distant island called Arzenal, where Norma are put to work piloting flying mecha called Para-mail to fight dragons that are invading from another dimension. I think that this setting is great, it’s unique and sets up some interesting questions about the world. The caveat is that when it comes to actually explaining it all, the answers are more convoluted than they need to be. When the series spills the beans it feels like it’s throwing a boulder at your head with the amount of exposition it needs to do, and there’s so much that it kind of pushes it over the barrier from interesting to just overblown and ridiculous. The effect is a series that takes a dip in the second half, and it sometimes gives in to melodrama or nonsensical bullshit - episode 22 is probably my single least favourite episode of any mecha anime ever, as it features a plot asspull that was so bad that calling it an asspull is arguably being too kind to it - that would imply that some kind of effort was made. The second half does have some silver linings though, including a creepy main villain and some plot revelations about familiar characters, but overall it fell short of the promise of the earlier portions.

Probably the one thing I can unequivocally praise is the mechanical designs, which I thought were fantastic. I usually don’t go for mecha with the kind of spindly wing-thrusters on the Vilkiss, which are similar to the Strike Freedom from Gundam Seed, but Vilkiss manages to pull it off, plus it has a sharp yet curvaceous and elegant design that’s almost raptorial in essence - it’s refined and graceful but with more than a hint of viciousness about it, which makes it a perfect fit for its pilot. All the other mecha in the series follow a similar sort of design pattern, which means they’re not as varied as some other series but they’re all still great on their own merits. The one small caveat is that they’re all animated in 3D, which I usually hate, but this is about as well as I’ve seen it done. The fights are all well animated as well, as is the rest of the series for the most part, although there are some obvious cut corners scattered throughout.

Overall, whether to recommend CastlevaniaCross Ange: Rondo of Blood and KnucklesDragons (guest starring DanteKira Yamato from the Devil May CryGundam Seed series!) isn’t as cut and dry as I’d like. For the typical anime viewer, it’d maybe be a hesitant recommendation, so long as this isn’t the first mecha series they’ve seen, because there are plenty out there that are far better. If it’s someone who’s sensitive to the ways women are portrayed in media, then I’d say definitely no - there is some good about this series in that regard, because I feel like Ange is in many ways a strong female lead, but the endless fanservice and sexual content means that the bad strongly outweighs the good. On the other hand, if you’re someone who doesn’t give a fuck, who enjoys their titty anime shamelessly, hell, go right ahead, you sick bastard, you’ll probably like it. On balance I dunno, I feel very neutral on the whole about this series. It wasn’t as bad as I was expecting but at the same time wasn’t as good as I might have hoped. At the very least it kept me watching, I don’t usually get through anime of this length this quickly. I feel like it could have been unambiguously good or even great if they’d changed just a few things, like cutting out some of the most uncomfortable scenes and plotting things out just a little more carefully. At the very least, this wasn’t total trash like Robot Girls Z was.

Hopefully I’ll get something that’s unequivacally good on my next spin of the wheel.

[preserving-ferretbrain]

The Epic Dollhouse Article of Doom: Episodes 1-6

by Dan H

Tuesday, 19 May 2009

Dan Talks About Joss Whedon. And Talks. And Talks.~

So I finally got around to watching Dollhouse. I’m writing this article as I go, episode by episode, so you can expect it to get a bit incoherent and a bit rambling.

Obviously I went into the show with a fair few preconceptions about what it was going to be like, and it would be remiss of me not to admit that this coloured my experience of it.

I should also say that I am in no way disputing the fact that Joss Whedon makes excellent TV. The problem is that he makes excellent TV which sometimes whacks you in the face with a gigantic disembodied penis with the words “look how serious and morally complex I am” tattooed on the side.

Got that image firm in your minds? Good.

Also. Spoilers.

Episode One: Ghost

The first episode opens with a fragment of Echo’s induction into the Dollhouse. Something bad has happened, and the Dollhouse is willing to make it all go away if she’ll sign up for a five year mission to explore strange new … umm … to work for them for five years.

There’s a bit of classic Whedonesque dialogue in this scene which set my teeth on edge. It goes something like this:

“What we’re offering you is a clean slate.” “Have you ever actually tried to clean a slate? You can always see what was on it.”

Two things. No. Three things:

First. Step away from the Themehammer. Okay, we get it, they’re going to erase her personality but because of her Awesome Girlpower they won’t succeed. Fabulous. You don’t need to drive it into my head like a railroad spike.

Second. Okay, Joss, we know you like playing with language, we know you like deconstructing metaphors (he’s like Pratchett in this regard) but really “have you ever tried to clean a slate” what the hell?

Third. Who the fuck has tried to clean a slate? Was Echo some kind of slate-studies graduate? Was she majoring in sedimentary rock formations? About the only people I can think of who would work with slate regularly are art students, and in that case you’d think they’d view a “clean slate” as something like a “clean piece of paper” – something completely new rather than something that has had the old stuff scrubbed off of it. In fact, surely that’s why one needs a “clean slate” – because one’s old slate is dirty from all the stuff that’s been on it.

Sorry, that was a massive digression.

So we go on from Echo being spunkily inducted into the Dollhouse to Echo riding around spunkily on a motorbike, where she flirts spunkily with this rich dude who she appears to have been having an awesome weekend of hot bondagey sex with. Then he goes to get a drink, and she goes spunkily outside and gets into a spunky black van, where she is taken back to the Dollhouse for her “treatment”.

As she goes, the hot billionaire likens her to Cinderella at the ball, getting back into her coach before it turns into a pumpkin.

Back at the Dollhouse, she talks animatedly about how happy she is, and how glad she is that she’s finally found the right guy. Then they wipe her brain. Then there is a metric arseload of exposition.

I’m not going to go too far into the “is it rape or isn’t it” question right now – I’m sure there’ll be time to cover that later. What I am going to mention is the way that this is presented.

Echo's “Engagement” (as the Dollhouse insists on calling it) with Rich Dude is presented in an unremittingly positive light. She's happy, he's happy, it's just All Over Too Soon and she has to go back to the Magic Kingdom to be put into her Enchanted Sleep. The only flaw presented in the scenario is the fact that it is not “real”. The fact that Echo spent three days having sex with this guy because she had been compelled to do so by high-tech mind control is not addressed – not merely addressed ambiguously, or addressed subtly, not addressed at all. Not directly and not indirectly. We are asked to view her time with Mr Millionaire as a brief moment in the sun, and its erasure from her mind as a violation.

More on that later.

Anyway, after that we are presented with the main plot of the episode. A billionaire's daughter is kidnapped, and for spurious reasons he goes to the Dollhouse. For even more spurious reasons, they decide to program Echo with a composite personality made up of hardened hostage negotiators, asthmatics, and an abuse victim who killed herself (don't worry, it was an empowering suicide). They then dress her up as a sexy librarian and send her out to negotiate with the kidnappers. This she does extremely badly. Her first act is to randomly offer them an extra three million dollars (so they will “get used to doing things her way”) and she goes on to blow the entire handoff because – surprise surprise, one of the kidnappers is the guy who abused one of the people who were jammed into her head in a process that somehow makes her an amazing hostage negotiator.

Words cannot describe how much this pissed me off. Mr Paedophile Guy (who apparently kept telling suicide!Echo that “You Can't Fight a Ghost” for no reason other than so it would be ironic when suicide!Echo confronts him about it) is basically one of Whedon's

vast

numbers

of

cardboard

misogynists

, the characters he puts into half his shows whose basic function is to distract you from the fact that a lot of his characters are actually

sexist assholes

. You could construct the argument that we are supposed to compare paedophile guy to Rich Dude, or the other clients of the Dollhouse. That argument would be bollocks. He's an evil man, and Echo takes him down by spuriously convincing his friends to shoot him. This is sort of presented as providing closure for the dead abuse victim whose fragmented personality was stitched into Echo's brain. This is an example of something “good” done by the Dollhouse, which we are regularly told “helps people”.

Two things really stood out for me in the pilot. The first was how consistent Echo's personality is. When you get right down to it, sexy-bike-chick and sexy-hostage-negotiator chick feel more like people Echo is pretending to be than like artificial personalities grafted onto a zombie. Similarly just plain Echo feels a lot less personality-deprived than I would have expected from somebody who had just had every shred of their identity removed by a sinister hyperbrothel. Early in the episode she finds her way into the operating theatre where a new Active is being wiped. In so doing she displays both curiosity and compassion, two traits which remain consistent throughout the episode, regardless of what her “personality” is supposed to be.

The second thing that stands out about the pilot is how little it actually feels like a pilot. There's a lot of exposition but you don't really get a handle on any of the characters. It feels more like the first chapter of a novel than the first episode of a television series. As ever, I'm a bit of a heretic in that I think this is a bad thing, instead of awesomely true to the creator's individual vison.

And for some running tallies:

Percentage of Echo's “Engagements” In Which She Is a Glorified Prostitute: 50

Straw Rapists: 1

Episode Two: The Target

This episode is irredeemably stupid.

Observation the first. So there's this FBI guy who's on the trail of the Dollhouse. He has two colleagues who don't believe the Dollhouse exists. The problem is that they keep making really sensible arguments about why it makes no sense for the Dollhouse to exist.

At the start of the episode, they discover the wreckage of the previous episode which, as you should remember, Echo completely fucked up because it's stupid to expect an organisation whose primary function is providing custom-made fucktoys to rich men to be able to handle hostage negotiations. FBI Guy insists that the Dollhouse is somehow involved, and his colleagues point out that this is a stupid suggestion, because it makes no sense for an organisation whose primary function is providing ... well you get the idea.

There are many ways to deal with inconsistencies in your work. You could just try to avoid having them, or if they are unavoidable you could do your best to distract people from them by including lots of explosions or putting your hot female protagonists in a new wig and short skirt every episode. Alternatively you can find all the most obvious and sensible arguments that people might have for why your work makes no sense and attribute them to stupid people.

Anyway, episode proper.

The second thing that struck me about this episode (in which Echo is hired out to an outdoorsman who tries to hunt her through the woods in order to “prove that she deserves to live” - and that's pretty much all I'm going to say about that) is how consistent Echo's personality is turning out to be. Outdoorswoman!Echo is functionally identical to spunkybiker!Echo from the previous episode. She's still the same feisty, inquisitive, determined compassionate chick that she was in all the flashbacks, and in the previous episode, and in the videos that we are shown of her before the Dollhouse. She has changed only cosmetically.

I'm going to talk more about this, because I find the characterisation of Echo at once deeply fascinating and deeply annoying. There's a very telling sequence in episode two of the Dollhouse in which Hunter Guy teaches Echo to fire a bow. It's worth noting here that Echo has been totally amazing at everything else Hunter Guy has tried to do with her, but for some reason she doesn't know how to shoot a bow. Then, when he gets her to aim at a deer, we see her take aim and loose the arrow, but we don't see it hit or see her reaction to the kill. I don't think this choice was accidental. The writers obviously have a very clear idea about the sort of person they want Echo to be – powerful, compassionate, a little bit damaged, quick thinking and good in a crisis. If she had shown any genuine relish in the act of hunting, that would have given her character an edge of cruelty which the writers didn't want her to have.

I might still be proven wrong on this one, but while the entire premise of the show is that Echo gets her personality rewritten for every new “Engagement” it seems a lot more like she gets the same basic personality, and has a bunch of matrix-esque skill packages “imprinted” into her brain. It's this central inconsistency which seems to be at the heart of a lot of the controversies over the Dollhouse. Put simply, what it's okay to get somebody to do by downloading a bunch of superpowers into them and then asking nicely is very different two what it's okay to get somebody to do by mind control.

Episode two also includes a lot of flashbacks about Alpha. At this point making the “isn't it interesting that Whedon decided to make his terrifying, sinister, extremely powerful extremely mysterious villain a man” point is just kinda cheap.

Running Totals

Percentage of Echo's “Engagements” In Which She Is a Glorified Prostitute: 75

Straw Rapists: 1

Episode Three: Stage Fright

Brief summary of episode three: uppity black woman doesn't know what's good for her, white folks smack her around until she learns her lesson.

There is so much wrong with this episode I don't know where to begin. There's this singer, right, and she has a psycho fan who wants to kill her, and obviously if you want to protect your Beyonce-esque diva from a maniac who wants to murder her your best bet is to hire a brain-wiped prostitute.

So Echo is programmed to be a backing-singer-slash-ninja, as well as being given an instinctive desire to protect the target. It seems that the Dollhouse worked a little reprogramming on the target as well, because she immediately takes Echo into her confidence despite having no particular reason to do so, other than to save the writers the trouble of having the plot of this particular episode evolve naturally.

Long story short, it turns out that the singer feels that she isn't in control of her own life, and that by being murdered by an obsessive fan, she will attain the “freedom” she so desires. The freedom/slavery themes are revisited throughout the episode – her stage show puts her in a cage, when Echo auditions she sings a song about how freedom is all we need.

To put it another way, it seems to be saying a lot about the legacy of slavery on the psyche of Black America which I'm not entirely sure Joss Whedon is qualified to be saying. Particularly when one of those things seems to be “what this woman needs is a good smack in the mouth.”

Sierra also appears in this episode, allegedly as backup but in practice she just gets kidnapped, so what her backup role was supposed to be I have no idea.

I'll also mention that in this episode, Echo once again has effectively the same personality as she did in the previous episode, and the episode before that.

I honestly can't remember what happens with Agent Ballard this episode. He gets closer to the Dollhouse I suppose. Part of the problem with having these two parallel threads in the show is that neither one gets properly developed. The Echo plotline in Episode three basically boils down to “Hi, you're hired, I want to die, you're fired, ow! You've hit me! I don't want to die any more” while the Ballard plotline winds up as “Where's the Dollhouse! There is no Dollhouse! Yes there is! But it's clearly stupid! Nuh uh! Uh huh!”

Running Totals:

Percentage of Echo's “Engagements” in which she is a glorified prostitute: 60

Season Peak: 75

Straw Rapists: 1

Total Number of Dolls Identified: 3

Of Whom Male: 1

Of Whom White: 3

Episode Four: Gray Hour

For no discernible reason, this episode begins with Echo acting as a midwife.

I mean seriously guys, what the fuck. Come on now, all together: why would you hire an international conspiracy of ...

Seriously, what the fuck.

Seriously.

The main plot of the episode starts with Echo playing a spunky safecracker called “Taffy” who talks and acts exactly like every single other persona Echo has had thus far. They're busting into a vault to steal one of the Elgin Marbles (which are, for some reason, in Los Angeles). Things go south first when the resident art critic double crosses them all and secondly when Alpha – by some mysterious remote method – manages to cause Echo to wipe in the middle of the job, rendering her entirely helpless.

I watched episodes four, five, and six in a batch, and so they've sort of blurred together for me, but one of the things that I really started to notice in this episode was how much more interesting the men in this series are than the women. FBI Dude Ballard and Echo's handler Boyd are both serious, competent, highly trained and (particularly in Boyd's case) totally awesome. By comparison the female characters are either two dimensional (De Witt), incidental (the doctor played by Amy Acker, who seems to be in it primarily because Joss loves to reuse the same cast members) or just plain subordinate (there's an Asian girl with a nose stud who appears in either this episode or the next, whose basic function seems to be being Less Good Than Topher). Then of course there's Alpha (incidentally, the Dolls seem to get their names on a rotation, what're the odds that the guy who went evil was the one with the appropriate name – had he been recruited a few months later he might have been called Hotel). Alpha's awesome, Ballard and Boyd are awesome, even Topher is pretty cool. The girls in the show ... well ... even the ones who aren't brainwiped zombies are pretty lacklustre.

To go off on one for a bit, I think this is part of why Firefly was so good. The main character was male, as were most of the supporting cast, and Whedon just plain Does Guys Better. It's why Angel was better than Buffy, it's why Xander was the coolest of the Scoobies.

Sorry, I digress.

Anyway, basically everything goes to hell. Boyd saves the mission (because he's awesome) and echo escapes by authorial fiat, but not before she gets to have a long conversation with the bank robbers about art and the sky and how we all start out whole but end up being broken (Themehammer!).

That's about it for episode four. Sierra is in it again, and is useless again. She does a better job of being convincingly different than Echo does – possibly because the writers are actually treating her the way the Dolls are supposed to be treated: as a disposable body who can fill any role they happen to need, whereas Echo seems to be consciously written as a consistent character.

Numbers again:

Percentage of Engangements in which Echo is a glorified Prostitute: 42 (below fifty percent! Wow!)

Straw Rapists: 1

Number of Dolls Identified: 3

Of Whom Male: 1

Of Whom White: 3

Episode Five: True Believer

I've sung the “so obviously, you go to the international hyperbrothel” song so many times it's getting absurd. This episode, the problem to which the obvious and rational solution is to hire a hot zombie chick is “infiltrating a suspicious cult”.

At least she's still avoiding the hooker work.

For no clear reason, in this episode they have to make Echo blind. This is allegedly so that they can hide tiny cameras in her eyes but seriously, dude, if you've got the technology to stick tiny cameras in somebody's cerebral cortex, you've got the technology to do it and leave the person's damned eyes intact. In fact, isn't there technology that would allow you to do this without sending somebody in at all? In fact, isn't there something with insects and listening devices that has been genuinely tried out by real intelligence agencies? Or failing that, don't they have spy satellites?

Were I feeling cynical, I'd suggest that Eliza Dushku wanted to show that she could play a blind woman.

Anyway, Echo is programmed to be a “true believer” so that the cult will in no way suspect that she might be an infiltrator. This works which, once again, seems to show that the Dollhouse has mind control powers that go well beyond their Actives, and extend to their clients as well.

To give the cult their due, they don't actually trust Echo immediately. They take her away into a dark room and shine light into her eyes in order to check that she's really blind (which will somehow prove that she isn't a spy – perhaps the US government has a really bad record with disability discrimination). It is somewhat less to the credit of the cult leadership that they decide to perform their test in their secret locker full of guns and ammo. This gives the clients (the US government in this case) all the evidence they need to move in.

Taking a step back for a second: how the sweet holy hell was this plan actually supposed to work? Echo was not programmed to investigate the cult, just to join it. She didn't know she was supposed to be looking for anything. If she hadn't been taken directly into the Gun Room, she would never have found it.

Anyway, Echo miraculously recovers her sight, and the FBI raid the compound. The cult leader decides that the only hope they have of survival is to set themselves on fire. Why? Who knows. Fortunately, despite being programmed to be a “true believer” Echo decides that mass suicide is a bad idea (I'll be charitable here, and assume that it's evidence that either the Dolls are programmed with Asimovian survival instincts or that this is supposed to be another “glitch”). She then immediately starts acting, you guessed it, exactly like she does in every other episode (seriously, these brain wipes do not seem that big of a deal) informing people that “God sent me with a message, and that message is move your ass”.

Everybody is evacuated, except the cult leader who faces off against echo before being gunned down by Laurence Dominic – who occupies some kind of security position at the Dollhouse. Dominic, who has decided that Echo is a threat to the Dollhouse, then proceeds to whack her in the face and leave her to burn. But not to shoot her. Because. Umm.

Numbers!

Percentage of Engangements in which Echo is a glorified Prostitute: 38 (falling)

Straw Rapists: 1

Number of Dolls Identified: 3

Of Whom Male: 1

Of Whom White: 3

Episode Six: Man on the Street

This episode is framed by a “vox pop” in which an interviewer asks members of the general public their opinion on the mythical “Dollhouse” - whether it exists and, if it did exist, what they think of it.

This is a thinly veiled excuse for Joss Whedon to tell us exactly what we are supposed to think about the Dollhouse.

Before you all write in, yes I know that there are multiple interpretations of the Dollhouse presented in the interviews: some people think it sounds terrible, some think it sounds romantic, some think it's a stupid idea for a TV sh... I mean “organisation”. This is one of the many cases of Joss having his TV show address the audience directly (see also every speech Buffy makes in season seven, the line in episode four where Echo tells somebody “you can mention this when you blog about it later”).

The interpretations of the Dollhouse which Whedon lays before us are, in order:

It's slavery

Being a Doll sounds great

If they'd had it in my day, I'd have had Betty Grable every night

[incoherent girlish giggling]

“I think it could be maybe beautiful”

It's human trafficking, end of story

If this technology exists then: “it’ll be used. It’ll be abused. It’ll be global. And we will be over. As a species. We will cease to matter. I don’t know, maybe we should”

This pretty much runs the gamut of opinions expressed by fans (except for the last bit, which is just Whedon wanking) and in theory that's fair enough. Whedon is saying that the Dollhouse is open to multiple interpretations, which is great.

Except it isn't great. Giving your audience a shortlist of possible interpretations, is effectively a way of saying “you must interpret this work as being deep and complex, and full of hidden layers and ambiguities, you must be AWED by my GENIUS”. To put it another way, it's a way of passing off incoherence as subtlety.

Something I've been thinking about a lot recently, as a consequence of racefail, dipping into the feminist blogsphere, and getting into arguments on the internet, is the bias inherent in supposed “open mindedness”. If somebody is offended by something, or considers it racist, or sexist, or literally criminal (in the case of the Dollhouse if it actually existed) then saying “I understand that you feel that way but you should accept that is only one of several possible interpretations” is actually just a long winded way of telling somebody to shut up and stop trying to stand up for themselves.

Put simply, if the Dollhouse really is “human trafficking” then it cannot be “beautiful” it cannot be romantic or empowering or cool. It can only be wrong. Unambiguously, entirely, unremittingly wrong, and the people who are involved with it are bad people for being involved with it. Yes that includes Boyd. Yes, that includes Fred from Angel. Yes, that includes the Asian girl with the nose stud. If Joss genuinely thinks that it's possible for “it's human trafficking” and “it's beautiful” to be anything other than mutually exclusive then he either hasn't thought it through at all, or his ideas about human trafficking are deeply fucked up.

There are three main plot threads in this episode. The first involves Agent Ballard drawing ever closer to the Dollhouse, and finally getting together with his neighbour Mellie, who later turns out to be a Doll (bringing the number of recurring female characters in the show who are not Dolls to a mighty two, and one of the two who remain apparently turns out to be a Doll around episode ten). This is tied in closely with the sad story of Joel Mynor, a fat whiny geek who hires a Doll once a year to pretend to be his dead wife, who after struggling to support Joel on her nurse's salary, died in a car accident on the very day he became a millionaire. The final plot thread involves the discovery that Sierra has been raped by somebody in the Dollhouse.

It's the rape plot I want to look into most closely, because it's another excellent example of Whedon paying lip service to complexity while actually living in the same happy magic hooker la-la-land that he's been living in since his wife invented the character of Inara when he was working on his space western.

Long story short: Sierra freaks out when another Doll touches her, which of course means she's been raped because (a) all rape victims freak out when men touch them and (b) the only women who don't like to be touched are rape victims. A implies B, B implies A. The Dollhouse thinks it was Victor (who has been getting supposedly impossible “man reactions” while looking at Sierra in the shower), but it turns out that the perpetrator is her handler Hearn.

Perhaps I wasn’t paying attention, but I spent the first half of the episode thinking it might genuinely have been Victor, which would have raised all kinds of fascinating questions: to what extent could he be held responsible for his actions? How will the Dollhouse deal with the fact that their Actives can pose a threat to each other? Isn't it interesting that attractive, sympathetic characters can still be rapists? By instead passing the blame onto somebody who is clearly Capital-E Evil they manage to avoid all these questions, as well as neatly sidelining the “hang on, isn’t the Dollhouse all fucked up” question.

Specifically, once he’s been caught (by Boyd, again, awesome) Hearn is sat down in front of various members of the Dollhouse staff who tell him that he’s in serious trouble and by the way is also a big sicko. His response is incoherent, arrogant, and includes the following line:

“But if you put her under some fat old Emir, that’s different, because she’ll think she loves him for all of a day? We’re in the business of using people!”

Throughout Man on the Street Whedon puts a variety of responses to the Dollhouse into the mouths of a variety of different characters. The problem is that the nature of these characters cannot help but colour the reaction we have to the attitudes they express. The woman who compares it to slavery is black, so we assume she knows about slavery. The woman who says it sounds beautiful is herself beautiful, which makes the idea attractive. The man who says that the Dollhouse technology makes human race obsolete looks intellectual, so we assume his opinions are weighty and considered. The woman who says she’d like to be a Doll is physically unattractive and sounds uneducated, so we take her statements with a pinch of salt.

The attitude that the “Engagements” of the Dolls is rape – not “like rape” not “similar to rape” but actual rape – is a common one (particularly among people who actually know something about the issues) and to have it used as the self justification of a “real” rapist is extremely distasteful. It’s not only a valid point, it’s an absolutely correct interpretation of what the Dollhouse is and does, but none of the other characters react to it. They all remain on their moral high horses. Supposedly decent Boyd just shrugs it off. Supposedly amoral de Witt dismisses it. Nobody engages with the accusation, and they don’t have to. Hearn is a rapist. He is therefore a bad person. Therefore nothing he says is worth listening to.

This attitude to rape and to rapists is profoundly destructive. It’s destructive because it seems, on the surface, so harmless. After all, they’re saying that raping people is bad, and that rapists are bad people, that’s alright, right?

The problem is that the attitude to rape displayed in Dollhouse is not that rapists are bad people because they commit rape, but that rapists commit rape because they are bad. To put it another way, it’s the attitude that rape is something that happens in the mind of the attacker, not the mind or body of the victim. What Hearn does to Sierra is rape because he explicitly intends to rape her, because he is a bad guy.

There's an episode of The West Wing in which Ainsley Hayes, the resident Republican, calls out the Democrats on their anti-gun politics, telling them that the real reason they're in favour of gun control is that they don't like the sorts of people who like guns. In the same way, Dollhouse judges the morality or immorality of peoples actions not on how those actions affect other people, but on whether that person is – for want of a better word - “nice”.

Echo's “Engagement” in this episode is with internet billionaire Joel Mynor. Mynor hires a doll once a year to play the role of his dead wife Rebecca, who died tragically while she was on the way to the dream home he had bought her as a surprise. Let's make no bones about this: what Joel Mynor does to Echo is no different from what Hearn does to Sierra. He has sex with somebody who is not capable of consenting, because they are under the influence of the technology of the Dollhouse. Hearn gets beaten up, insulted, and eventually killed while Mynor gets Echo coming back at the end of the episode to let him finish his fantasy.

Let's be clear here. There is no difference whatsoever in what happens to either girl, except that Echo presumably gets dinner first. Neither one actually knows what is happening to them, or has any control over it. The only difference between the two “Engagements” is the degree to which the two men's “Fantasies” are accepted by the writers and the audience. Hearn wants to stick his dick in somebody he has total power over, and we don't like that, and we don't like him, so we call him a rapist. Mynor wants to stick his dick in somebody who reminds him of his dead wife, and we find that sweet and affirming, so we don't.

And I know that somebody out there is going to say “But that's the point, it's about making you ask questions!” The thing is, it doesn't make you ask questions. In fact, it stops you asking questions. Put simply, the general public, if asked to compare obvious, explicit rape with – say – date rape or rape by intoxication, will be extremely reluctant to call them the same thing. The public perception of rape is that it's a guy with a knife in a dark alley when the reality is that it's your boyfriend when you're a bit drunk and you can't remember saying “no”. By waving the spectre of the Straw Rapist at us, Whedon does not highlight the inherently abusive nature of the Dollhouse, he distracts from it. By asking people to question whether getting somebody into bed with mind control is rape, he's effectively arguing that it's not.

Aside from the rape, the other thing this episode is about is Fantasy. And by Fantasy, of course, we mean sexual fantasy. Fantasy is, apparently, the business of the Dollhouse (although they apparently have sidelines in hostage negotiation, bodyguarding, midiwifery, safecracking and assassination). One of the other things I found a bit creepy about this episode is precisely how narrow the Dollhouse's idea of “Fantasy” is.

When Ballard is confronting Mynor about his Engangements with the Dollhouse he taunts the guy by asking (sarcastically) whether his wife looked like Caroline (Echo's real name, for those who haven't seen the series). He responds smugly by saying that yes, she was in fact totally beautiful, and she knew it, and she was a nurse and she supported him while he was being a big fat loser. I don't know about you, but it sounds like this guy's whole life was a Dollhouse-supplied wish-fulfilment. Anyway, the fact that the late Mrs Mynor apparently really did look like Eliza Dushku helpfully avoids the all important question of what poor old Joel would have done if she – well – hadn't. What if his wife had been short and kind of fat, and he'd wanted a woman who looked like that? There's no short chubby dolls that I've seen. And perish the thought that the late Rebecca Mynor might have been black.

The Dollhouse is in the business of letting people live out their fantasies. But apparently only those fantasies that involve young, thin, conventionally attractive white people. And you're not allowed to do anything nasty to them, because that would be wrong.

I'm halfway in, and I sort of regret bothering.

One final numbers count.

Percentage of Engagements in which Echo is a Glorified Prostitute: 45 (we're rising again)

Straw Rapists: 2

Number of Dolls Currently Identified: 4

Of Whom Male: 1

Of Whom White: 4Themes:

TV & Movies

,

Sci-fi / Fantasy

,

Whedonverse

,

Minority Warrior

~

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Arthur B

at 10:13 on 2009-05-19You know, it strikes me that the big problem with what Hearn did wasn't so much what he did as the fact that he didn't pay for it. Presumably, if he'd saved his money and then paid the Dollhouse for the use of Sierra everything would have been

perfectly fine

.

So basically, Hearn used Sierra and wrote it off on the expense sheet. And as we all know from recent events, if you fiddle your expenses you're

WORSE THAN HITLER

.

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http://vectoreditors.wordpress.com/

at 10:20 on 2009-05-19It's tricky to respond to this, because we watch the show from such different initial standpoints, but a question: what was your response (emotional and intellectual) to the way in which Hearn was dispatched at the end of "Man on the Street"?

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Rami

at 11:02 on 2009-05-19Sorry to pick up pedantically on an entirely trivial point but I've not seen more than the first episode and figure I should before I comment on anything substantive...

Who the fuck has tried to clean a slate? Was Echo some kind of slate-studies graduate? Was she majoring in sedimentary rock formations? About the only people I can think of who would work with slate regularly are art students

Actually, lots of people still use chalk and 'slate' in schools in the developing world, and it's not unusual for idealistic young Westerners to go volunteer in developing countries (often at schools). So it's by no means impossible that Echo would have experience cleaning slate.

Of course, I agree it's much more likely a clumsy attempt at some "clever" wordplay...

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http://katsullivan.insanejournal.com/

at 11:27 on 2009-05-19

By asking people to question whether getting somebody into bed with mind control is rape, he's effectively arguing that it's not.

I think that summarizes everything that is wrong with Dollhouse. Thanks for nothing, Joss.

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Dan H

at 11:37 on 2009-05-19

It's tricky to respond to this, because we watch the show from such different initial standpoints, but a question: what was your response (emotional and intellectual) to the way in which Hearn was dispatched at the end of "Man on the Street"?

Unfortunately, as you say, we watch the show from such different initial standpoints that my answer to that question probably won't be useful. I already knew that Mellie was a Doll, so I pretty much guessed that Hearn was going to get taken out. My emotional and intellectual reaction, therefore, was essentially "oh for fuck's sake" with a side order of "there is so much that could have gone wrong with that plan".

What was your reaction?

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Dan H

at 11:42 on 2009-05-19

So it's by no means impossible that Echo would have experience cleaning slate.

True, but again I'd think that anybody who had actual experience of "cleaning slate" wouldn't object to the use of the term "clean slate". If she'd volunteered in schools in Africa, she'd presumably have occasionally had to provide people with clean slates.

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Rami

at 11:45 on 2009-05-19

again I'd think that anybody who had actual experience of "cleaning slate" wouldn't object to the use of the term "clean slate"

I think we're getting confused here. Yes, if someone had experience putting the metaphor into practice, then they probably wouldn't object to its use. If someone had experience with the literal reality of scrubbing a stubborn slab of rock, I think the opposite would be true, because they'd know slates are a bugger to wipe clean and the metaphor doesn't work for them.

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Arthur B

at 12:01 on 2009-05-19Unless you take the metaphor as implying tossing away the old, messy slate and getting a brand new one.

At which point it doesn't apply to the situation Whedon was applying it to.

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Dan H

at 12:03 on 2009-05-19I'm rather amused that we're having this much discussion about one bit of cheesy dialogue:

Surely the term "clean slate" does, in fact, come from a time when slates were regularly used in schools. It's not like it was a phrase that was cooked up in 1987 to sound cute.

I could be wrong, but nine times out of ten, people who object to metaphors are people who *don't* understand where they come from. Not people who do. People who object to things like "straight as an arrow" or "black as pitch" tend to be smug gits who have never fired (sorry "shot") an arrow or worked with pitch in their life.

Sorry, metaphor-nazis are even worse than Grammar-nazis in my book.

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http://childofatlantis.livejournal.com/

at 12:16 on 2009-05-19Everything I read about this show makes me more and more determined not to watch it. It sounds like the three dolls should be named Whiskey, Tango, and Foxtrot...

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Rami

at 12:34 on 2009-05-19

Surely the term "clean slate" does, in fact, come from a time when slates were regularly used in schools.

Up till the 50s or 60s (in some bits, even the 70s) in the US, and I would have thought a similar time frame would apply to the UK?

I'm rather amused that we're having this much discussion about one bit of cheesy dialogue:

I'm sorry about that -- as I mentioned, I've not seen them so I don't want to comment on the show without actually having watched more than one episode.

object to things like "straight as an arrow" or "black as pitch" tend to be smug gits

Which is why we have

much better metaphors

these days, right ;-)?

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http://vectoreditors.wordpress.com/

at 13:29 on 2009-05-19Daniel, my reaction was whiplash: that's a typical Joss Whedon moment -- no, wait, that's a *parody* of a typical Joss Whedon moment. Seeing Mellie snap her rapist's spine can clearly be understood as viscerally satisfying ... except you're immediately pulled back by the realization that it wasn't Mellie, that it was a sleeper personality; that *in the moment of her empowerment* she has still been raped -- mentally, not physically, but raped nonetheless.

It's very much a lynchpin scene for my understanding of the show; I find the dollhouse acts as a frame that corrupts everything within it. The fact that the sequence at the start of "Ghost" turns out to be a lie *is itself a critique*, and a sufficient one so far as I'm concerned. It's not "this was a moment in the sun, it's sad that it has gone"; it's "this was not a moment in the sun, after all".

Similarly, no, I don't find Mynor "sweet and affirming", nor do I think the show encourages us to -- not with Echo-as-wife shouting "porn!" when she discovers his plan, not after the conversation with Ballard, not with the oh-so-ironic ending montage. So I don't think there's any question, within the show, that getting somebody into bed using mind control is rape, that Mynor is raping the dolls he hires. It is, and he is, just as the imprinting of dolls is itself a form of rape; that's why, in the same episode, after Hearn has been discovered, when Topher imprints Echo he asks her if she "wants to play" -- surely a deliberate echo of Hearn asking Sierra if she "wants to play the game".

Moreover, what's missing from your analysis of the rape story in "Man on the Street" is Ballard -- first, the degree to which Mynor's critique of Ballard strikes home and is valid (I do not have words to state how strongly I disagree with your assumption that how we take commentary about the dollhouse should be shaped by who says it; Hearn's critique *is* absolutely valid, and just because the characters shrug it off *does not mean we should as well*), and second, that by the logic established in the Mynor and Hearn threads -- that dolls cannot meaningfully consent -- Ballard rapes Mellie. (And, possibly, the dollhouse rapes Ballard via Mellie at the same time.) That, to me, is where the interesting question asked by the episode lies; not "is this rape?" but "how do you avoid being complicit in this system?"

All of which said, I'd agree that the first five episodes are roughly as worthless as you have suggested here; I just think "Man on the Street" is significantly more successful than you're allowing. To take one more example: to take the beautiful talking head's assertion that being a doll could be beautiful as in any sense having equal weight to some of the other opinions on display seems manifestly wrongheaded; the show is heavily tilted away from that idea. On the other hand, the idea that an ugly thing could be *presented* as *superficially* beautiful ... well, that shapes every aspect of the show, I'd say.

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Dan H

at 15:08 on 2009-05-19

I do not have words to state how strongly I disagree with your assumption that how we take commentary about the dollhouse should be shaped by who says it

That's problematic, because I think it's actually quite important. There is a world of difference between an idea being placed in the mouth of a character we admire and respect, and the same idea being placed in the mouth of a character we despise and reject. Ideas expressed by cool, friendly, or attractive people are very much not given equal weight to ideas given by uncool, abrasive, or repulsive people. The only person who compares what happens in the Dollhouse to rape is himself a rapist. I'm not sure how you can deny that this colours the way people will react to the concept.

That, to me, is where the interesting question asked by the episode lies; not "is this rape?" but "how do you avoid being complicit in this system?"

And that is why the attitude to rape in Dollhouse is so fucked up, because that's actually classic rape apologist logic. One of the most important steps to take in dismantling rape culture is to get people to accept the idea that the responsibility for rape prevention falls entirely on the rapist. The moment you start asking questions like "how do you avoid being complicit in this system" you are shifting responsibility back onto the victims.

Ballard clearly can't know that Mellie is a doll. It is literally impossible for him to know it and he therefore bears no moral responsibility for his decision to sleep with her. Moral responsibility in that case lies entirely with de Witt, who sent her there. Mynor and Hearn know exactly what they're doing. Therefore they bear full moral responsibility for it. It's not rocket science.

"How do you avoid being complicit in this system" is the classic straw man argument people put forward when other people suggest that date rape is a real problem. I can't really know if a girl is consenting, therefore I don't have to worry about whether she does.

Essentially the problem we have here is that people think "asking questions" is a way of taking a neutral stance on a complex issue. It isn't. By asking questions and not proposing any answers, Dollhouse lets rapists off the hook. This is a real problem, not a science fiction problem. A real problem. And it's not complex, it's not interesting, it's just disgusting.

The text does not treat Mynor the same way it treats Hearn. Hearn is condemned by the entire cast, and then violently killed. Mynor gets his fantasy handed back to him. Not only that, but there is a very strong implication that Echo goes back to him *deliberately* (insofar as anything a Doll does can be considered deliberate). Directly before the ending montage which you describe as "ironic" she expresses distress that "it isn't finished." We then see her going back to Mynor to finish the Engagement, to let him have his wife back for one more day.

Throughout the series we are shown that the Dollhouse is not merely "superficially beautiful" but an active force for good. We are shown, and told, time and again, that the Dollhouse allows people to have their dreams and their fantasies, and we are told in no uncertain terms that this is a good thing. When Echo goes back to Mynor at the end of the episode, the tragedy is not that Echo is still a slave and multiple rape victim, it is that Mynor's wife is still dead.

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Dan H

at 15:09 on 2009-05-19

Everything I read about this show makes me more and more determined not to watch it. It sounds like the three dolls should be named Whiskey, Tango, and Foxtrot...

They almost are. The names very specifically come from the NATO Phonetic Alphabet. I'm pretty sure there's a Whiskey later on.

Perhaps when Zulu shows up they'll finally have somebody black as well.

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Wardog

at 15:47 on 2009-05-19

Essentially the problem we have here is that people think "asking questions" is a way of taking a neutral stance on a complex issue. It isn't. By asking questions and not proposing any answers, Dollhouse lets rapists off the hook. This is a real problem, not a science fiction problem. A real problem. And it's not complex, it's not interesting, it's just disgusting.

Excuse me while I wring my hands girlishly for a moment but I'm not sure if you're not over-stating your case here. I mean ultimately there is no "answer" to the problem of rape except "it's bad, m'kay, don't do it." Yes, there's are some not entirely helpful attitudes to it implicit in society but, for all its flaws, I don't think Dollhouse ever set itself up to be The Show That Decided To Tell Us That Raping People Is Wrong And Here's Why. And although violation (I'm moving away from the word rape here), emotional and physical, is a theme of Dollhouse I think it's important to remember the premise of the show is not "what would happen if we set up a Dystopian rape factory" but

"what would Eliza Dushku look like in this outfit"

, as Niall suggests, "what would be the consequences of this technology."

Whether you think it suceeds in living up to its premise is another matter.

But I genuinely don't think we can look to fiction and expect answers to the questions it may raise.

I think Dollhouse would be stronger and the whole business would be less problematic if Joss could put down the Sex Abuse Hammer for thirty seconds. I'm actually kind of getting bored of rape.

I know you haven't seen this episode yet but I think it's Spy In the House of Love when we see Victor involved in a romantic engagement ... and the more I think about what you've written here, the more I'm starting to examine my own reactions to it. Basically I didn't give a second thought until now. Which is interesting. Or everyone can point at me and accuse me of misandry because I don't care about men getting raped...

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http://vectoreditors.wordpress.com/

at 16:34 on 2009-05-19

I'm not sure how you can deny that this colours the way people will react to the concept.

It colours the way the characters react to it. It should not colour the way that we, standing outside the show, react -- or rather, it inevitably will, but we should be able to recognize and stand back from those reactions. Characters can be horrible and right; they can be beautiful and wrong.

For what it's worth, in the specific case of Hearn, even leaving aside the fact that he *is* right, I take his commentary to be rather *more* reliable than the reactions of the rest of the dollhouse employees: they all have a vested interest in dismissing what he says, because they want to pretend they can lay claim to a few shreds of self-respect.

One of the most important steps to take in dismantling rape culture is to get people to accept the idea that the responsibility for rape prevention falls entirely on the rapist.

Hmm. What do you mean by rape prevention, here? Because my first reaction is, responsibility for rape falls entirely on the rapist, but responsibility for rape *prevention* falls on all of us, because that's what rape *culture* means: that the problems are endemic; that you and I and everyone else need to be as self-aware as we can, and call out misogyny and abusive behaviour when we see them.

Essentially the problem we have here is that people think "asking questions" is a way of taking a neutral stance on a complex issue.

That's not what *I* think. The question I suggested "Man on the Street" asks is not a neutral stance; it is, in itself, a condemnation. Asking questions is, in fact, a great way to force people to *define* their stance, as long as they're the right questions.

Throughout the series we are shown that the Dollhouse is not merely "superficially beautiful" but an active force for good.

But surely those claims are demonstrably dishonest, and hence superficial. A few good acts does not a force for good make. You can't -- much as the dollhouse's employees would like to -- separate what's done on "altruistic" engagements, or even the undoubtedly genuine, if limited, comfort that Echo brings to Mynor, from the rest of their activities, or from the dolls' origins. Nor can you slice that ending montage away from the rest of the episode, which is why it's ironic: because it is, precisely, a fantasy; a delusion; a denial of reality.

On doll names: there is a Whiskey, and I'm pretty sure there's a Foxtrot at one point. I don't remember a Tango, though.

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Shim

at 17:23 on 2009-05-19I think I've spotted a miscommunication here?

Dan:

The problem is that the nature of these characters cannot help but colour the reaction we have to the attitudes they express.

Vector:

your assumption that how we take commentary about the dollhouse should be shaped by who says it

Dan:

I'm not sure how you can deny that this colours the way people will react to the concept.

Vector:

It colours the way the characters react to it. It should not colour the way that we, standing outside the show, react -- or rather, it inevitably will, but we should be able to recognize and stand back from those reactions.

It looks to me like in this specific case, you're both saying the same thing; that is, we

do

subconsciously react to the context of the commentary. Not that we

should

, but that we

do

. I don't

think

Dan is saying we should let our opinions of the speakers affect the way we respond to their views, which seems to be what Vector is objecting to.

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Arthur B

at 17:49 on 2009-05-19More to the point, vector's point hinges on the idea that authors/scriptwriters never create characters with unappealing characteristics in order to spout the "wrong" side of an argument - in short, to raise the points that the writer wants to rebut.

Except, you see, writers

do that

. A lot. It's an ancient rhetorical technique which extends back

at least

as far as Plato. And it's common enough that it's a natural assumption for most people that in stories the Bad Guy's arguments are false, or at most have a grain of truth to them from which the Bad Guy derives inappropriate conclusions.

Essentially, if we're not meant to take the attributes of the character in question into account when considering the arguments that authors put into their mouths, then suddenly writing becomes an incredibly arbitrary process. If it doesn't matter whether Echo or Sierra or Alpha or Buffy or Angel raises a particular argument, then one of two things are true: either the characters are indistinguishable and interchangeable, which is usually a hallmark of terrible writing, or the arguments being raised and the story being told have absolutely nothing to do with each other, in which case why bother putting the arguments in the story in the first place?

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http://vectoreditors.wordpress.com/

at 18:09 on 2009-05-19Whoops. Let me try again:

More to the point, vector's point hinges on the idea that authors/scriptwriters never create characters with unappealing characteristics in order to spout the "wrong" side of an argument - in short, to raise the points that the writer wants to rebut.

If it does, your argument depends on the idea that it's possible to reliably tell when a writer is doing that, which it is clearly not. In the case at hand, I'd argue that there's no evidence that Whedon wants us to dismiss Hearn's remarks, and substantial evidence -- to wit, the fact that he is right, and the fact that the rest of the characters have good reason to ignore his comments -- that we're meant to take them seriously. His vileness, in this instance, makes him a more reliable commentator.

Kyra:

I think Dollhouse would be stronger and the whole business would be less problematic if Joss could put down the Sex Abuse Hammer for thirty seconds. I'm actually kind of getting bored of rape.

Yes. Although part of me is not sure that trying to backpedal wouldn't end up being worse; once you've asserted that this technology is going to be used in this way, it doesn't seem like something you can ignore. Though there are ways and ways of handling it, it's true.

Also, I should probably register for an account or something, so that I appear as a name and not just a URL, shouldn't I?

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http://sistermagpie.livejournal.com/

at 19:15 on 2009-05-19I'm fascinated at this whole thing and the discussion, but having not seen the show at all (which is maybe why I react to the question of "how do we not become complicit in the system" by thinking, "Um...maybe you don't volunteer to work for a mind-wiping brothel? I don't get it...") I really get stuck on the whole idea of Echo's non-changing personality.

Because it seems like there's a sort of fantasy set up in that slate metaphor (which bugged me because I just thought of course I've tried to clean a state--I did it in school. And no, you can't tell what was written on it beforehand. You wash off the chalk and it's gone.) If we're really talking about a technology that wipes out the personality, that's a major world-building thing there that it seems like he wants to avoid with the comforting suggestion that there's some essential person underneath her actual brain that will come through no matter what's done to it. But even from the little I've read about brain injuries etc., that's just not how it works. A compassionate person can become indifferent or cruel if their brain is altered. There is no essential self outside of the self you get from your brain and the way it reacts to your experiences.

If Echo is actually retaining her real personality or snapping out of it at convenient moments we were really just talking about something like wacky movie hypnosis or superpowers.

Also in the episode where she's got the personality of the rape victim, who is that supposed to be helping? Is she supposed to be getting revenge on behalf of the original victim as if the victim exists in her personality traits after she's died? Or did I misunderstand that part?

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Rami

at 20:30 on 2009-05-19@Vector: Email

editor

or

webmaster

@ this domain, and we'll set one up for you.

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Wardog

at 22:04 on 2009-05-19Yes, I can see being addressed as Vector is going to be seriously non-ideal =P

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Dafydd at 23:08 on 2009-05-19LotR has many male Characters, but only 3 females: Eowyn, Galadriel and Rosie Cotton. Whedon-verse is more democratic: amidst all the male Characters are 6 females: Buffy, Willow, Fred and their Dark counterparts.

Episode 1/ Act 2: Faith wore her hair slicked back and spectacles. She looked like Dark Buffy when she used her Mary-Sue powers of Perfect potter Intuition.

Act 3: Faith lost her self confidence = Darth Fred.

Act 4: Faith set up a situation which led to Straw rapist dying = Darth Willow.

Finale: Faith sleeps in a Go’auld sarcophagus to cure her of Willow’s guilt.

2 straw rapists: on the rare occasions that perverts get convicted of raping children, they usually get derisory sentences, 6 to 18 months. Government excuses these small sentences because ordinary criminals bully rapists. They are giving criminals a bad name.

Chief Kidnapper is straw and so is Daddy war Bucks.

Daddy is scared: bad guys kidnapped his beloved daughter.

Faith has Mary Sue hostage negotiator skills and Harry potter perfect Intuition.

Daddy questions Faith’s perfect potter intuition and gets shot.

Faith recites her Resume. Daddy don’t care.

Faith confesses that she was kidnapped = she is guilty. Daddy gloats.

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Jamie Johnston

at 23:24 on 2009-05-19

on the rare occasions that perverts get convicted of raping children, they usually get derisory sentences, 6 to 18 months.

- Dafydd

Slightly confused - is this a statement about what happens in Whedonverse or what happens in a country in the real world? If the latter, which country?

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Dafydd at 23:34 on 2009-05-19Britain is a country in the real World. Government defines the rape laws so that only a tiny percentage of perverts get convicted.

Saudi Arabia and Iran and Afghanistan are countries in the real World. Government defines rape laws so that the Victim is guilty of Adultery and must be stoned to death.

Whedon-verse is a fictional country. When the Nerds raped and murdered Triona, Buffy swore bloody Justice against the Nerds. When the Nerds murdered Tara, the Nerds suddenly became ths Good Guys and Willow becme the Bad guy.

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Dan H

at 00:29 on 2009-05-20

In the case at hand, I'd argue that there's no evidence that Whedon wants us to dismiss Hearn's remarks, and substantial evidence -- to wit, the fact that he is right, and the fact that the rest of the characters have good reason to ignore his comments -- that we're meant to take them seriously.

I think that's our fundamental disagreement. From where I stand "he's right" isn't evidence that Whedon expects us to believe him, any more than - say "Dumbledore is clearly a manipulative fuck" is evidence that JK Rowling wants us to question his suitability as a role model for young Harry.

I'd also deny that the other characters have a reason to ignore his comments. People like de Witt and Topher are supposed to be totally okay with the fact that they're in the human trafficking business. It's what they do, and they do it cheerfully. De Witt seems genuinely angry at what Hearn has done, and not because he's done the equivalent of fiddling his expenses but because she genuinely considers what he has done to be wrong.

By and large, people who willingly sell other people as sex slaves don't take the moral highground when it comes to rape. They don't need to. They know what they do and they're comfortable with it. They're very much *not* making up justifications for themselves, they're making up justifications for the *audience*.

There's also the fact that what Hearn does to Sierra genuinely harms her. She suffers consequences from it in a way that the Dolls never do from their Engagements. She cries herself to sleep at night because of what Hearn did to her, not because of what is done to her every time she's out on assignment.

The only indications that you are "supposed" to view Echo's assignments as being equivalent to Hearn's rape of Sierra come from external factors. There is nothing in the text which gives equal weight to the two acts. Far from it.

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Dan H

at 00:37 on 2009-05-20

(which is maybe why I react to the question of "how do we not become complicit in the system" by thinking, "Um...maybe you don't volunteer to work for a mind-wiping brothel? I don't get it..."

And this, pretty much, is why I find Dollhouse fandom so infuriating, because that is, in fact, the correct answer.

Don't work for the Dollhouse. Don't hire people from the Dollhouse. That's it. All this toss about fantasy and social roleplaying and expectations and whatever else the hell is just Whedon waving his cock around.

Essentially Dollhouse spends fifty percent of its time saying "The Dollhouse Is Alright Really! Look! They're doing nice things!" and the other fifty percent of the time saying "The Dollhouse is Really Bad, but the fact that you thought it was alright really shows how powerful and seductive these ideas are". It's cheap, lazy, and disingenuous.

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Rude Cyrus

at 01:13 on 2009-05-20

Essentially Dollhouse spends fifty percent of its time saying "The Dollhouse Is Alright Really! Look! They're doing nice things!" and the other fifty percent of the time saying "The Dollhouse is Really Bad, but the fact that you thought it was alright really shows how powerful and seductive these ideas are". It's cheap, lazy, and disingenuous.

I love it when a writer manipulates the audience into feeling a certain, then does a 180 and is proclaimed a genius for "defying expectations" or some such shit.

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http://descrime.livejournal.com/

at 08:18 on 2009-05-20The slate metaphor controversy is funny, but I think Whedon is simply mixing up slate with chalkboards. Or hoping the audience will.

@ which character's opinions should we believe

I definitely think Whedon counts on the audience not believing Hearn. Or, more uncharitably, pondering for a moment how awesome the show is for bringing up such deep and complex themes before forgetting it in the revelation that Mellie is a Doll. (Is that the episode where we learn she's a doll? I can't remember.)

Similarly, of the opinions offered in the "Man On the Street" interviews, I think the one Whedon ascribes to is the last:

If this technology exists then: “it’ll be used. It’ll be abused. It’ll be global. And we will be over. As a species. We will cease to matter. I don’t know, maybe we should”

seeing as it is far longer and more eloquently written than the other replies. It's said by a guy that seems more like an expert than any of the other interviewees. It's the final thought we're left with (it is the only interview I remembered from watching the episode) and it's full of shit. So, because a small minority of people abuse a technology, the entire 6 billion human race is beyond redemption? My take on the show is that Whedon sees it as an epic struggle to determine the the potential of the whole human race. It's deep, man.

@ should he have to make a statement on rape

Yes. If you are going to bring up rape and have it be such a pervasive part of the story, you have to address it. I disagree on whether we can expect fiction to answer the questions it raises. Bad fiction asks questions and stops. Good fiction ask questions and then gives an argument for it. It has an opinion. Well thought out themes aren't questions, they are stands on issues. Good fiction is willing to be wrong.

Dollhouse isn't willing to be wrong. It waffles from one side to the other, trying to balance all its plates in the air to keep from anyone pinning it down. Some of this comes from the format. Honestly, I think a normal television series is a horrible medium for trying out complex themes. You have to drag the story out for so long and some viewers will only see some episodes or stop halfway through. Dollhouse would have been much better and tighter-written, I think, if it had been limited to a mini-series.

One thing that drives me nuts in some reviews I'm reading at other sites, is how fans are blaming Fox for all of Dollhouse's shortcomings. Fox can be blamed for showing episodes out of order, but that's it. If you go in saying, I'm going to do X and Y and this will lead to the great Z. And the execs say they don't like Z, then you can't just go ahead and do X and Y anyway and blame it on the Man for keeping you down. The execs clearly wanted some formulaic episodes to start off the series. A not unimaginable desire, seeing as viewership for a new series fluctuates in the first few weeks, but Whedon made some of the sloppiest opening episodes to a series I've seen. I'm amazed it got renewed.

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Dan H

at 08:46 on 2009-05-20

Dollhouse isn't willing to be wrong. It waffles from one side to the other, trying to balance all its plates in the air to keep from anyone pinning it down

Pretty much this.

Dollhouse (at least so far) is deeply, grossly incoherent. Superficially, this incoherence resembles complexity.

An interesting comparison I was thinking about yesterday was The Sopranos, which also takes as its premise the idea that the protagonists work for a morally reprehensible organisation. The difference is that The Sopranos is actually willing to *show* its characters doing reprehensible things, instead of dancing around the edges saying "and by the way, this is morally reprehensible but look! Boobies!".

One thing that drives me nuts in some reviews I'm reading at other sites, is how fans are blaming Fox for all of Dollhouse's shortcomings

Mother-****ing word

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Dan H

at 11:48 on 2009-05-20Further to the "Dollhouse isn't willing to be wrong" argument,

this Dinosaur comics strip

sums up my issues peculiarly well.

Ultimately there are very few works of fiction that cannot be defended with the line "you are criticising only your own imagination".

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http://sistermagpie.livejournal.com/

at 16:45 on 2009-05-20

One thing that drives me nuts in some reviews I'm reading at other sites, is how fans are blaming Fox for all of Dollhouse's shortcomings.

I've seen these two and they floor me. Actually, they remind me of those elaborate real people fiction conspiracy theories that people come up with for celebrity couples, where the network has them sign a contract that forbids them from dating each other or saying they're gay, and also forces them to do things that imply they're anything but totally in love with each other. Only in this case it's the network taking control of the story and wardrobe etc.

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Jamie Johnston

at 19:27 on 2009-05-20Dafydd said:

on the rare occasions that perverts get convicted of raping children, they usually get derisory sentences, 6 to 18 months.

I said:

Slightly confused - is this a statement about what happens in Whedonverse or what happens in a country in the real world? If the latter, which country?

Dafydd said:

Britain is a country in the real World. Government defines the rape laws so that only a tiny percentage of perverts get convicted.

I say:

Well, this isn't the place to discuss government policy and conviction rates for rape in the UK, but I feel I must just quickly correct your original statement, at least as it relates to England & Wales (Scotland and Northern Ireland being separate criminal jurisdictions).

The

Sentencing Guidelines Council

places the starting-point for rape, with any aggravating factors (such as the use of serious violence), of a child aged between 13 and 16 at 10 years, and at 13 years for a child under 13. These starting-points can be reduced to take account of mitigating factors but can also be increased to take account of further aggravating factors.

By virtue of

section 225 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003

a judge must, in addition, sentence a rapist to

indefinite custody

if the offender presents a significant risk of serious harm to the public.

You may be thinking of the cases of Keith Fenn and Simon Foster, who were each sentenced to two years' custody; but this was

increased to four years each on appeal

. This, incidentally, was before the current SGC guidelines (which increased the starting-points) came into effect.

According to the Ministry of Justice's

sentencing statistics

in 2007 the average sentence for all sexual offences (including minor ones such as exposure and soliciting) was almost 4 years (chart on p. 24); the

most recent quarterly statistics

show this down slightly in 2008 to about 3.5 years (p.13). These statistics don't include indeterminate sentences for public protection (referred to above). According to a

parliamentary written answer

the average sentence for rape in 2006 was nearly 7 years.

Of course one may or may not consider such sentences adequate, and there may or may not be cases of excessively lenient sentencing, but the suggestion that child-rapists "usually get... 6 to 18 months" is simply incorrect.

We now return to our regular Whedon-judging...

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Jamie Johnston

at 19:30 on 2009-05-20(Sorry, one short post-script: the boyfriend of the mother of 'Baby P' will be sentenced on Friday at the Old Bailey for raping a two-year-old child. Let's see whether he gets "6 to 18 months".)

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http://aidansean.livejournal.com/

at 23:54 on 2009-05-20

Then there is a metric arseload of exposition.

Is that more or less than a metric miss?

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Wardog

at 09:19 on 2009-05-21Aidan! Joy! I suspect it depends on the comparative weight of the exposition. Which is heavy. Believe me.

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Niall

at 13:14 on 2009-05-21Daniel: as you say, we have a fundamental disagreement. I don't really care what Whedon *wants* or *expects* us to believe -- well, OK, that's not entirely true, when it comes to issues as sensitive as the ones Dollhouse deals with, but I care much more about what ends up on the screen. And what ends up on the screen, in my view, is that Hearn is right and the other characters don't have a leg to stand on. (I do think you're substantially misreading de Witt -- Topher, obviously, is a cheerfully amoral little shit, and it's a pleasure to despise him -- but I can't say for sure that my opinion of de Witt was the same at episode 6 as it is having seen the whole season, so I'll leave that for now.) As for Hearn's actions not being given equal weight to Mynor's, I'd argue that that's what Ballard's whole conversation with Mynor does -- Ballard is clearly disgusted, and although that scene starts to ask the audience to question their sympathies for Ballard, I don't think it excuses or defends Mynor (*explains* him, yes, but that's not the same) -- but presumably we're going to disagree on that, as well.

As for "Don't work for the Dollhouse": well, yes, to a point, but it's a bit like objecting to Buffy on the grounds that there aren't irredeemably evil people in the real world so using them as a metaphoric stand-in in a fantasy tv show is doomed to failure, isn't it? (An argument I have actually seen people make.) Metaphors always grind their gears when they come up against reality a bit, otherwise they wouldn't be a metaphor, they would be reality, and the dollhouse is no exception. Of course, the dollhouse functions metaphorically on several different axes, but I'd say the two main ones are (1) the artistic-creative axis, wherein commercial television is figured as inherently exploitative, and (2) the social axis, wherein the sort of programming the dollhouse performs is figured as an exaggeration of any societal conditioning. I am more interested in the latter -- we are all conditioned by the culture in which we live, it is very difficult to stand back and see that conditioning for what it is -- and on that level, the point about complicity is not just about not literally working for the dollhouse, it's about what you do knowing that the dollhouse exists. Ballard investigates, and finds the system working against him -- working, indeed, to make him complicit. (You may not think he's culpable for the rape of Mellie [or, strictly, Mellie/November/original personality -- although that opens the whole other can of worms that is the extent to which the imprints can be considered people, rather than just programs], but how do you think he sees it?) Obviously, in the real world there aren't people pulling levers and making sure that other people are programmed exactly the way they want. On the other hand, in the real world boyfriends don't literally turn into evil monsters after you sleep with them.

I agree that Whedon holds the can for Dollhouse's failure. The one point I would make on that topic is that I'll be interested to see how the show develops and changes in season two -- the entire first season was filmed before the first episode aired, which means the writers had no chance to adjust their course based on audience response. Oh -- and I also agree with the notion that Dollhouse would have worked better as a miniseries. I think a defined endpoint would have done it a power of good, as descrime suggests.

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Dan H

at 16:46 on 2009-05-21

but it's a bit like objecting to Buffy on the grounds that there aren't irredeemably evil people in the real world so using them as a metaphoric stand-in in a fantasy tv show is doomed to failure, isn't it?

I'd say it's more like objecting to Buffy on the grounds that it *starts off* presenting irredeemably evil people as a metaphoric stand in on a fantasy TV show, but then switches horses atrociously so that, for example, the demons which Buffy has previously - in essence - killed on spec just for being Demons suddenly become an ethnic minority with rights and a culture.

Joss Whedon has real problems keeping his metaphors straight. Magic, for example, started out as a way for Willow to wield power without being able to throw a punch, then became a *fairly explicit* metaphor for lesbian sex ("sometimes I think about two women doing a spell ... then I do a spell by myself") then became bad evil crack, then became super-awesome-shiny-female-empowerment juice, with no clear signals as to what made it switch.

A more pertinent example of this problem is in season seven, when Buffy rejects the offer of the Shadow Men to grant her more power because it's clearly Symbolic Demon Rape, and then at the end of the series she does exactly the same thing to every girl in the entire world. You can't turn your rape metaphors into empowerment metaphors and get away with it.

The Dollhouse has the exact same problem. I don't think it works as a deconstruction of his earlier works, because we clearly *are* supposed to view all the times Echo saves people and is awesome as empowering. By mixing in his empowerment metaphors with his rape metaphors, Joss actually does the whole thing a huge disservice. A good example of this is in Ghost when Echo's persona's childhood abuse experience is supposed to directly contribute to her ability to be an effective hostage negotiator, and her persona's confrontation with her abuser is presented as providing genuine closure to the dead woman. It is very much presented as empowering, not superficially, but genuinely.

I'm actually more than happy to accept the Dollhouse as a metaphor, but as you say, metaphors always grind their gears when they come up against reality. The way to deal with that is to *avoid* putting it up against reality. By comparing your "metaphorical" rape to "real" rape, all you do is highlight all the flaws in your metaphor.

I'd also add that I'm increasingly uncomfortable with the idea of "metaphorical rape" (which I know is an idea I introduced myself, I just thought I'd mention it) - the Dollhouse technology isn't metaphorical rape, it's (to borrow Kyra's term) metaphorical *violation*. I mention this because I think it's important to realize that there's actually a fairly small overlap between "rape" the real crime and "rape" the symbolic thing that happens in books and literature. Again Buffy 7 is a good example of this problem: if you're tied to a stone and a bunch of black guys stick something in you that you didn't ask for, it's Symbolic Rape. If you're just going about your life and a pretty girl does the same thing it's totally empowering.

Sorry, that got a bit rambly towards the end.

Basically I think that Dollhouse writes checks that Whedon can't cash (or maybe it should be the other way around). You raise some interesting questions about the implication of the show, the technology, and the characters, but I don't see those ideas genuinely explored in the series.

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Niall

at 17:45 on 2009-05-21Dang, I should have known you'd bring up the Crack Magic. The demons I think are more defensible. The writers never *actually* broke the one rule they established -- no soul = irredeemably evil -- they just came very close to it, and had inexplicable coughing fits every time the soul status of certain characters (e.g. Lorne on Angel) became an issue.

Back to Dollhouse. Again, part of this is that we're just watching it very differently -- I can't forget the fact that Echo is wiped at the end of each engagement, so however empowering anything that takes place within an engagement is, I find myself forced to question the artificiality of that empowerment after the fact. I don't actually dispute that Eleanor Penn finds a measure of closure in "Ghost"; but that closure doesn't take place in a vacuum, and I don't see that the episode encourages you to take it as such.

In conclusion, you should hurry up and watch the rest of the season.

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Arthur B

at 16:27 on 2009-05-22

(Sorry, one short post-script: the boyfriend of the mother of 'Baby P' will be sentenced on Friday at the Old Bailey for raping a two-year-old child. Let's see whether he gets "6 to 18 months".)

Spoiler: He got life for the rape, 12 years on top of it for his part in Baby P's death, and minimum custody of 10 years.

So a bit more than 6-18 months, then.

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Dan H

at 00:11 on 2009-05-23

Again, part of this is that we're just watching it very differently -- I can't forget the fact that Echo is wiped at the end of each engagement, so however empowering anything that takes place within an engagement is, I find myself forced to question the artificiality of that empowerment after the fact.

That's basically where we differ, I come at it from exactly the opposite angle. No matter how many times we see Echo get wiped and do the "did I fall asleep" speech, I know that next episode she's going to be running around saving people and kicking bad guys in the head and that, crucially, several key elements of her personality will be exactly the same.

Part of the problem, I think, is that we never actually see a Doll working "as intended". Echo and - it is strongly hinted - Sierra both seem to have far more awareness than you would expect for people who have been brainscrubbed by a sinister conspiracy.

Another part of the problem is that I don't quite believe that the writers know how all this stuff is supposed to work. It's like that bit at the start of

Battlestar Galactica

where they would say "They Have a Plan" and you'd think yourself "maybe they do, but you have *no idea* what it is, do you?"

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Arthur B

at 02:19 on 2009-05-23Of course, it could be pointed out that writing an entirely different personality for Echo each episode would require a monumental amount of work on the part of the writers - they'd have to invent a new protagonist on a weekly basis, for crying out loud. Which is another argument that a long-form TV series is absolutely the wrong format for the show.

Oh, and if anyone's interested,

Charlie Brooker

(who is Whedon-agnostic but generally geek-friendly) has weighed in on the subject.

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http://descrime.livejournal.com/

at 06:11 on 2009-05-23Funny Dollhouse article:

(http://www.guardian.co.uk/culture/tvandradioblog/2009/mar/31/dollhouse-joss-whedon-fox)

"Everyone was saying from the beginning, not least because it came straight from Joss Whedon's mouth, that Fox, the show's network in the US, had decreed that the first five episodes should be able to stand alone...And, yes, I have no idea why a network would decide that was the best way to hit an eager and loyal market with a brand new TV show....But for now, I'm just saying: people said don't give up through the first five episodes, and ... um ... OK, I'm repeating that. If you're going to give it a chance, give it at least six or seven hours' worth of chance."

So, basically the myth that the lackluster first five episodes were all Fox's fault seems to have come from Whedon himself. But seriously, any show that asks you to waste five hours (FIVE HOURS!) to get to the actual show, is produced by someone unbelievably arrogant. I could watch the new Star Trek movie twice in that time frame and get a hell of a lot more enjoyment out of it.

Spoiler Alert for later episodes:

The problems with the activities of the Dollhouse getting white-washed or portrayed in a positive light, only get worse after episode 6. The only other episode I watched was a murder mystery where Adele's friend gets murdered, and Adele had promised to upload her into a Doll to let her go to her own funeral (episode 10).

This episode shows the Dollhouse in an unrelenting positive light. Over the course of the episode, Echo:

- solves the woman's murder

- saves the husband's life

- write a final good-bye letter telling the husband how much she loved him

- realizes the woman's family saw her as cold and remote and through conversation and "discovered" letters from the dead woman that she wrote, is able to help the family make peace with the woman's memory and realize how much the woman cared for them

- she is is just a computer program, so this does not impinge the real woman's good perceptions of how her family

And actually, this was far better than any of the first five episodes. Because there was no one whining about how morally duplicitous the Dollhouse was and the FBI guy was absent, there was nothing to take you out of the action and remind you just how screwed up this was. This episode really should have been the second or third episode. It would have offered a wider range of jobs for the Dolls than prostitute and as actually kind of cheerful while having a nice action sequence.

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Niall

at 10:28 on 2009-05-23

So, basically the myth that the lackluster first five episodes were all Fox's fault seems to have come from Whedon himself.

Well ... From what I understand, yes, the network did ask for a bunch of standalone shows first, but Whedon appears able to

admit

that it was his responsibility to make them work, and he failed.

This episode shows the Dollhouse in an unrelenting positive light.

Of course, it's also the episode that emphasizes that the use of dolltech in this way could lead to effective immortality for the rich and powerful, with all the negative implications for everyone else that would imply...

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Dan H

at 14:28 on 2009-05-23

Of course, it's also the episode that emphasizes that the use of dolltech in this way could lead to effective immortality for the rich and powerful, with all the negative implications for everyone else that would imply...

The problem with the "implications of this technology" threads in Dollhouse is that the technology is poorly thought out and poorly explained.

For example, you can't say "this technology would lead to effective immortality for the rich and powerful" while *at the same time* asking questions about identity and self-awareness. If the rich and powerful can become immortal using Dollhouse technology, then Dollhouse personalities are real people (which, to come back to the rape discussion, means they actually are entirely capable of consenting to sex, as well as to all the other things they get asked to do).

You simply can't have a show that's about human trafficking *and* about social role-playing *and* about the theoretical implications of mind-altering technology *and* about questions of identity and free will, all using the same McGuffin as your core metaphor.

"What are the implications of this technology" is only interesting if (a) you have any idea of what the technology does and (b) you have any idea who the people using it are. With Dollhouse you don't. The technology does what the writers want it to do, at the time the writers want it to do it. Similarly the motivations of the Dollhouse, and the people *behind* the Dollhouse seem to change week by week - whether they're after money or power, or something more sinister, they don't consistently act like they want to do anything except put Eliza Dushku in a series of different outfits.

To put it another way, I'm not going to waste time considering the implications of Dollhouse tech when I'm certain that the writers haven't spent any time considering the implications of the Dollhouse tech.

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Niall

at 15:54 on 2009-05-23

If the rich and powerful can become immortal using Dollhouse technology, then Dollhouse personalities are real people (which, to come back to the rape discussion, means they actually are entirely capable of consenting to sex, as well as to all the other things they get asked to do).

Well, sure. I don't see that as contradictory. The point (if imprints are people) is that they are capable of consenting *once in full possession of the facts of their situation*; and, to date, none of the sexual engagements we've seen have involved imprints who are aware they are imprints (ie they don't know that their starting parameters include a predisposition to want to have sex with the client), so they're still all rape.

I'm not sure, with the McGuffin as presented, that it's possible to *separate* the various themes you list. You end up with a show that articulates some harsh arguments about society, but that's ok by me.

As to your (a), how the dolltech works, clearly we're not dealing with a hard-sf concept here, but here's what I take from the episodes we've had so far:

-- "Wiping" is equivalent to removing the set of instructions that make up a personality from the hardware on which they are running.

-- "Wiping" is an imperfect process, although you can invest more time in the process to make it more successful; still, there is a unique, individual unconscious left behind in most if not all cases

-- Within the dollhouse, in theory, what's left of the original personality is maintained in a docile, childlike state through the use of pacifying drugs, and a very basic set of rules for behaviour/response.

-- While on engagements, the unconscious is suppressed by the installation of a more complex series of instructions. The precise level of complexity of these instructions can vary; it's almost always great enough to pass a turing test, but probably not always as great as naturally developed personalities. This is not a perfect process, either.

-- In creating "imprints" for engagements, Topher primarily works with modules from other personalities, either recorded from actual people or previously created, usually tweaked. He also has some ability to create wholly new sets of instructions. There's definitely room for human error.

What is there in the show that contradicts any of the above? What is there in the above that is not established in the show?

Note: I am of the opinion that those using dolltech don't fully understand it (even, or perhaps particularly, Topher), so any theories as to how it works are best based on what actually happens -- which I find to be coherent -- not on what any characters say -- which I find to not match the observable facts.

It is my hope/supposition that many or most imprints are complex enough that, subjectively, their experience is as valid as yours or mine, but I don't think we have that conclusively established yet.

My theory is pretty mechanistic (blame those Greg Egan stories again). I am comfortable with the idea that we, just as much as imprints, are just sets of rules. But one thing I like about this reading, and that I think so far the show supports, is that it doesn't completely separate mind and body. No matter what Topher thinks, it's impossible to wipe someone completely; some trace of the original instructions, and presumably of any other sufficiently complex instructions that has at any point been run on that brain.

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Arthur B

at 16:57 on 2009-05-23

The point (if imprints are people) is that they are capable of consenting *once in full possession of the facts of their situation*; and, to date, none of the sexual engagements we've seen have involved imprints who are aware they are imprints (ie they don't know that their starting parameters include a predisposition to want to have sex with the client), so they're still all rape.

Well, OK, but I'm not sure how this fits with:

I am comfortable with the idea that we, just as much as imprints, are just sets of rules.

Follow me on this:

- If people are just sets of rules, imprinted on a physical body through genetics and experience, then potentially anything they do may be not a result of free will but these rules.

- Presumably, this includes sleeping with people; just as the Dollhouse can create an imprint with rules prompting someone to consent to sex with a particular person, so can society imprint real people with a predisposition to consent to sex with people of a particular type.

- If an imprint sleeping with someone because their rules predispose them to is rape because the imprint is not aware of the rules, then equally a real person sleeping with someone because their rules dispose them to is rape because the real people sure as shit aren't aware of the rules. Imprints don't know that they are Dollhouse-manufactured imprints, but real people don't know that they are socially-crafted imprints either.

Essentially, if people are the same as imprints in terms of being sets of rules, that means that free will is impossible. And if free will is impossible, the very concept of "rape" goes out the window, because without free will you can't freely consent to

anything

.

If imprints are "real" people, the immortality argument makes sense, but the rape argument doesn't - because "real" people can consent to sex, even if it's with a person they may be predisposed to sleeping with due to subconscious factors they are not aware of. If imprints are not "real", then the rape argument makes sense, but the immortality argument doesn't - an imprint of you can only ever be a close simulation, not the real deal.

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Niall

at 18:21 on 2009-05-23

Essentially, if people are the same as imprints in terms of being sets of rules, that means that free will is impossible.

Well, that rather depends how much you believe in emergent phenomena, doesn't it? Whether you can start with a set of rules and all you ever get is the working out of those rules, or whether at a certain level of complexity you get something more.

As it happens, in real life my understanding is that it's more likely than not that consciousness does happen after the fact, and free will is an illusion. (Is there a neurobiologist in the house? I'm merely a lowly biochemist.) But it feels like we've got it, so we might as well act as though we do, and debate morality accordingly; with luck that will drive selection for rule-sets that will lead to less suffering all around (he said, slightly faseciously).

And within

Dollhouse

, you're right, I don't think they're going to abandon the notion of free will and choice.

So, if you read the show as leaning towards dolls-are-real-people -- which I do, though it's not confirmed yet -- then the argument is that when you load a sufficiently complex set of rules into a doll, some sort of synthesis occurs in the operation of those rules to produce a person. Under these assumptions, trivially, you're right: a recording of a personality transferred to a new body is not going to be exactly the same as the original. (Nor, by extension, will the same imprint operate identically in two actives -- as we saw in the art-heist episode, although there there's also the issue that the longer an imprint exists and the more experience it gains, the further it will diverge from baseline.) However, it will believe it's the same as the original, and to a first approximation it will be, so frankly -- much as there's no point fretting about the fact that your body is destroyed when you go through a Star Trek transporter -- it'll do.

And as I've said, if the imprints are people with valid subjective experience, I believe that sexual encounters are still rape not because, as a set of rules, they lack free will, but because they lack full awareness of their nature and how that has guided their choices. So to go back to this:

then equally a real person sleeping with someone because their rules dispose them to is rape because the real people sure as shit aren't aware of the rules.

Yeah, you know how I said you end up with a reading that articulates some harsh arguments about society? This is one of them. The crucial difference, of course, is that an active doll has been *deliberately* programmed for certain responses, whereas a naturally-developed person has picked up certain responses over the course of their life -- so I wouldn't say

Dollhouse

goes so far as to condemn all sex as rape. But would I say it suggests that we are shaped by the society we grow up in, and are encouraged to accept some deeply unhealthy ideas about (among other things) sex and sexuality, to the point where we don't always think about how our assumptions are driving the choices we make? Certainly. Confronting an imprint with the nature of their origin, in this reading, would be a literal act of consciousness-raising.

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Rami

at 19:10 on 2009-05-23To weigh in slightly on this discussion:

If we say imprints are constructed with the illusion of free will, but an subconscious 'tweak' that encourages them to sleep with someone, then that's analogous to people (who possess the illusion of free will) being given chemical tweaks (e.g. roofies) that encourage them to sleep with someone.

Since the latter is still undeniably rape, I'd say that by analogy so is the former...

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Arthur B

at 19:32 on 2009-05-23

If we say imprints are constructed with the illusion of free will, but an subconscious 'tweak' that encourages them to sleep with someone, then that's analogous to people (who possess the illusion of free will) being given chemical tweaks (e.g. roofies) that encourage them to sleep with someone.

Except that analogy doesn't work; in the case of the Dolls the thing that gives them the illusion of free will and the thing that gives them a subconscious tweak is

the same thing

- the imprinting process itself.

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Rami

at 19:48 on 2009-05-23If we are saying that imprints are the same or similar rule-sets to personalities, then Topher tweaking them on his computer before uploading them into a Doll is just the same; it's just doing it before the program is loaded rather than while it's running.

But then, lots of SF has dealt with a whole range of different ways personalities can be copied or simulated or artificially emulated, and I reckon Whedon's just lifted a very vague concept out of that entire mixture and thrown it at the screen -- I don't think it holds up to this level of analysis!

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Arthur B

at 20:19 on 2009-05-23Rami:

If we are saying that imprints are the same or similar rule-sets to personalities, then Topher tweaking them on his computer before uploading them into a Doll is just the same; it's just doing it before the program is loaded rather than while it's running.

Ah, but the programs on Topher's computer

mean nothing

when they are on Topher's computer: they're just information. It's when they are imprinted on a Doll that they actually become personalities. It's the process of

imprinting the program on a Doll

which is analogous to the social conditioning we receive throughout our lives - at least, that's the only way I can see to make the idea of imprinting as social conditioning work at all.

But then, lots of SF has dealt with a whole range of different ways personalities can be copied or simulated or artificially emulated, and I reckon Whedon's just lifted a very vague concept out of that entire mixture and thrown it at the screen -- I don't think it holds up to this level of analysis!

I agree with that. I also think that seeing the Dollhouse as representing social conditioning is kind of a weak metaphor. There isn't actually an identifiable group behind the social forces which mould us throughout our lives, and there's absolutely no way to conceive of any way we could live free of social conditioning in the first place, unless we all become hermits.

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Rami

at 21:10 on 2009-05-23

Ah, but the programs on Topher's computer mean nothing when they are on Topher's computer: they're just information.

But that's all programs are! As the true master is aware... code is data, and data is code...

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Arthur B

at 22:52 on 2009-05-23

But that's all programs are! As the true master is aware... code is data, and data is code...

And both are equally useless until they're installed in compatible hardware (or wetware, in the case of Topher's personalities).

Has

Dollhouse

done an episode yet where they disclose how they harvest these personas, by the way? It would be interesting to see whether it's by consent (as, in theory, the Doll process is) or whether they ever snatch people off the street to eat their mind.

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Dan H

at 01:30 on 2009-05-24

What is there in the show that contradicts any of the above? What is there in the above that is not established in the show?

I think you're missing my point. When I say "how does it work" I don't mean "construct a treknobabble explanation for how it works" I mean something more specific and concrete. I mean:

a) What can this technology do and, more importantly, what can it *not* do?

b) Why, exactly, is it able to do what it does?

c) Most importantly, given the things it is able to do, why is it not used to do simple, obvious things that should be possible with the technology?

For example: how *exactly* do they program echo to be "good at being a hostage negotiator"? Did they program that specific way of behaving into her, if so, how did that make her good at doing hostage negotiations - and how did Topher, who isn't a hostage negotiator know? If they can make somebody good at doing hostage negotiations, what else can they make people good at? And how? How does programming somebody with a sequence of kung fu moves bypass the necessity for actual physical training?

Note: I am of the opinion that those using dolltech don't fully understand it

Okay, here's my problem with this. By and large, technology does not work that way. Trite Arthur C Clarke quotes to the contrary, technology is very easy to distinguish from magic. You seem to be asking me to believe that Topher can build, from scratch, the greatest hostage negotiator who ever lived - one who somehow manages to get results despite doing things that no other hostage negotiator does or would think of doing - but somehow had no idea how he did it.

I am comfortable with the idea that we, just as much as imprints, are just sets of rules

My problem with this theory is that it is, functionally, meaningless. What does "we are just sets of rules" actually *mean*?

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Niall

at 09:38 on 2009-05-24I'm missing something. How does my previous explanation not answer your (a), (b), and (c), or rather, not establish parameters for them? When it comes to the hostage negotiator, per the episode, Eleanor Penn was constructed from modules of existing personalities with experience in the relevant fields. Topher didn't have to know how to be a hostage negotiator; he had to have access to a library of personalities, which included skill at hostage negotiation. Also per that episode, they can make people good at anything they have an imprint for.

The kung fu moves thing is handwaved as "muscle memory"; which is dumb, but at least they've addressed it. Not hard sf, as I said.

As for technology being distinguishable from magic, that's not my point. Dolltech is clearly figured as technology, rather than magic, in that it has learnable, usable, rules. But we can't yet fully predict, I don't know, side-effects of what are meant to be specifically targeted pharmaceuticals, despite the fact that we know how said pharmaceuticals work, because we don't have complete knowledge of the system we're altering. The same appears to be true in Dollhouse.

And "we are just sets of rules" means just that: that there is no ineffable *extra*; that there is, to use the Buffy terminology, no soul; that our personalities can be treated as sets of instructions to be chopped and changed in exactly the same way that genetic code is a set of instructions that can be chopped and changed.

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Dan H

at 10:27 on 2009-05-24

I'm missing something. How does my previous explanation not answer your (a), (b), and (c), or rather, not establish parameters for them?

How does it?

To put it another way, how is your explanation functionally different from "the Dollhouse technology just does whatever the writers need it to do".

To stick with Eleanor Penn: okay, so they jam a bunch of hostage negotiators together into a Super Hostage negotiator, but how does Topher isolate "skill at hostage negotiation" from "fondness for cupcakes"? In fact, what even defines what "skill at hostage negotiation" *is*.

A big part of your "explanation" for how the Dollhouse technology works is "human error". The problem is that "human error". If there is so much scope for human error in the Dollhouse technology, it should not be possible to program a Doll to perform a complex function. You can't have human error apply to things like "whether the Dolls turn psycho" but not have it apply to things like "whether she can actually do those martial arts moves properly".

But we can't yet fully predict, I don't know, side-effects of what are meant to be specifically targeted pharmaceuticals

We can't predict the *specific* side effects that will be produced in a *specific* person, but we *can* predict the side effects which a particular pharmaceutical is likely to have on people in general. Real research scientists don't run around saying "no, no, this is impossible this should be impossible" - which Topher seems to do every other episode.

Taking an aspirin might give you a headache or - in extreme cases - make you vomit blood. It won't turn your skin blue, it won't give you superpowers.

And "we are just sets of rules" means just that: that there is no ineffable *extra*

Except, half of the way the Dollhouse *works* is predicated on the existence of the "ineffable extra". You yourself draw a distinction between the "rules" which are removed by the imprinting process and the "subconscious" (which is really just tech-speak for "soul") which is not. One of the basic themes of Dollhouse is that there *is* in fact an "ineffable extra" which is what allows Echo to develop a growing sense of self-awareness, instead of just dissolving into a quivering pile of schizophrenia.

The Dollhouse technology only *fails* when it goes up against what for want of a better term I would call the "human spirit". People's "true" or "original" personalities resurface through the wipes and cause them to behave erratically. That's not a plausible representation of fallible technology with realistic implications, that's a fantasy representation of magical technology the implications of which don't stand up to close scrutiny.

Earlier on in this thread you draw the comparison with the Star Trek transporter - a piece of technology which, were it real - would raise all kinds of questions about the nature and continuity of identity (particularly with things like the Tom Riker incident). It's an absolutely correct analogy, but the key thing is that Star Trek does *not* ask us to consider the implications of transporter technology in any way. The transporter is, in fact, just a McGuffin that was originally designed to save the original series the expense of animating a shuttle landing every episode.

The Dollhouse technology is no better thought through than the replicators or teleporters of Star Trek and this by itself pretty much precludes the show from being a serious exploration of the social consequences of this kind of technology.

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Dan H

at 10:29 on 2009-05-24

then that's analogous to people (who possess the illusion of free will) being given chemical tweaks (e.g. roofies) that encourage them to sleep with someone

The problem is that it's *also* analogous to people (who possess the illusion of free will) being given chemical tweaks (e.g. hormones and emotions) that encourage them to sleep with someone.

It's worth noting, incidentally, that in episode seven Echo does, in fact choose not to have sex with the client, which for me is actually the final nail in the coffin of the "you're supposed to see it as rape" argument.

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Arthur B

at 16:12 on 2009-05-24

It's an absolutely correct analogy, but the key thing is that Star Trek does *not* ask us to consider the implications of transporter technology in any way. The transporter is, in fact, just a McGuffin that was originally designed to save the original series the expense of animating a shuttle landing every episode.

In fact, to build on this, the premise of

Trek

was never "what if we had teleporter technology?" - if that were the case, why would it feature starships at all? - but "what if we could explore the galaxy?"

Trek

has always been far more interested in the process of exploration itself than the technology behind said explanation; this is why the

Enterprise

can do pretty much anything so long as its engineers can come up with a suitable technobabble explanation for what they are about to do, whilst the Prime Directive - which is the guiding principle behind the exploration program - never changes (although it does become significantly more developed).

Dollhouse

, conversely, more or less explicitly says "What if we had a technology that could do this, and a group willing to use it?" - and the organisation comes a distant second place to the tech. I mean, that answer given by the professor in the beginning of

Man On the Street

focuses almost exclusively on the technology and its implications, whilst most of the other answers provided would apply equally well if the technology was run by the Dollhouse or the White House or the Samaritans or McDonald's.

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http://arkan2.livejournal.com/

at 15:02 on 2009-05-30(Coming in late once again ...)

The Epic Dollhouse Response of Doom

:

Another excellent article Dan. You know, when I watched Episode 2, I started getting an inkling of the possibilities for a show where the main character could have a completely different personality each week. I knew Whedon and team had muffed badly, but I couldn't put a finger on why. Maybe it's, as you say, that Echo's personality doesn't really change throughout the series, only her background.

Hmm, you're probably right that Whedon just plain Does Guys Better. On the other hand, I'm not sure Mal “Kicks-Helpless-Prisoners-Into-Engine-Intakes-For-A-Bit-Of-A-Laugh” Reynolds is really your best example in that regard.

Re: Episode 5: ... Wait, so the US government knows about the Dollhouse, and they're okay with that kind of behavior so long as they get their in? ... Figures.

If somebody is offended by something, or considers it racist, or sexist, or literally criminal (in the case of the Dollhouse if it actually existed) then saying 'I understand that you feel that way but you should accept that is only one of several possible interpretations' is actually just a long winded way of telling somebody to shut up and stop trying to stand up for themselves.

Excellent point, and masterfully put, as usual. Reminds me of a discussion the other month ago about the limitations of the philosophy that “all truth is subjective, y'know.” The example given in that case was truth commissions—in which instance, insisting on “respect for differing viewpoints” can only hamper justice.

Put simply, if the Dollhouse really is 'human trafficking' then it cannot be 'beautiful' it cannot be romantic or empowering or cool. It can only be wrong. Unambiguously, entirely, unremittingly wrong, and the people who are involved with it are bad people for being involved with it. Yes that includes Boyd. Yes, that includes Fred from Angel. Yes, that includes the Asian girl with the nose stud.

Ah, now here I can't agree with you. Certainly, if the Dollhouse is human trafficking it's unambiguously bad, and the people involved with it are doing unambiguously bad things BUT, that does not make them, in themselves, bad people. Military organizations—being as they are, in the business of killing people as their

raison d'etre

—are unambiguously bad, as are the things which people in those organizations do. However, I would argue very strenuously that no soldier is a “bad person” simply because they belong to the military. (Yeah, this is something I've thought about quite a bit.)

The problem is that the attitude to rape displayed in

Dollhouse

is not that rapists are bad people because they commit rape, but that rapists commit rape because they are bad. To put it another way, it’s the attitude that rape is something that happens in the mind of the attacker, not the mind or body of the victim.

Ooh, another great observation. Basically, what you’re saying is that

Dollhouse

morality is the morality of every self-serving asshole in history: “It’s only rape if somebody else is doing it.” I've more to say on that subject, I think I'll let it wait for the essay.

To put it another way, I'm not going to waste time considering the implications of Dollhouse tech when I'm certain that the writers haven't spent any time considering the implications of the Dollhouse tech.

I love this site. It's so quotable.

As for interpretations of the Dollhouse ... I dunno, I kinda think it

is

supposed to be human trafficking. I think that's the whole point of including Ballard, and that scene at the end of the first episode where Sierra goes in and wastes the kidnappers' hideout, including the two not-so-bad kidnappers.

I think that at some point (like the end of the penultimate season) Echo's going to realize the predicament she's in, possibly with the assistance of Ballard, at which point, the Dollhouse suddenly becomes the enemy. Boyd and all the other sympathetic members of the Dollhouse team will have a change-of-heart and switch sides or die before they get a chance—if they're not dead already. Big confrontation, Dollhouse comes down, somebody dies in a sufficiently angsty way, Echo/Caroline rides off into the sunset, yadda, yadda, yadda. (And Whedon and co. could care less if it's dishonestly stuffing a genie back in the bottle.)

The problem is, as many of you have already pointed out, that instead of having just a mini-series for the storyline, Whedon's created a tv series which is intended to run for

seven years

if I remember correctly. So he has to give his characters a metric arseload of busywork to mark time before getting around to “Oh wait, what the Dollhouse is doing is actually kinda, y'know,

evil

.” Well, since the story is about Eliza Dushku, and she's being controlled by the Dollhouse, that means the Dollhouse is

de facto

the protagonist until Echo comes into her own.

Firefly

has shown us that even though Whedon is perfectly capable of writing protagonists who are outright villains, he can't bear to make himself acknowledge that they're outright villains, and so the result is an extended filibuster about why “They're the good guys, really, honestly.” Except, since I believe the Dollhouse will indeed turn out to be evil in the end, we're subjected to the Metaphor Whiplash discussed above.

That said, I also think Dollhouse-as-human-trafficking metaphor is pretty stark and heavy-handed. Niall, I really love your analysis of being a Doll = alienated labor and how the system convinces them that they're happy in their exploitation (there's hope for you yet!). And the whole part about how We're All Complicit, even the person who's trying to bring it down (Ballard), because this is so often the case in real life problems such as sexism, racism and militarism etc.

Thing is, while I'm ready to believe that those more sophisticated interpretations are there, I think it's completely unintentional, and furthermore, that to a certain extent, you have to be deliberately looking at it in that way in order for it to work. To put that another way, you have to

want

to see that interpretation and have some idea that it might be there for it to hold up. Otherwise, it's just a half-formed, half-coherent ur-theme at best.

Also, while this has been a great discussion, I think both it and the article have missed a few crucial points.

For one thing, I think there's a flaw in your Rape Watch Meter, Dan: You have a “Straw Rapists” byline but no “Straw Misogynists” tally. I mean, I thought the guy in episode 1 was pretty cliché after

Firefly

, but I didn't have a huge problem with him.

Then came episode 2, and the guy who

hunts women in the woods like animals

. You may not have more to say about that, Dan, but I do. After finishing that episode, I e-mailed my sister saying something along the lines of “I wonder what the world will look like when that man [meaning Whedon, obviously] rediscovers subtlety.”

I know

we've discussed Whedon's habit of relying on Straw Misogynist villains before

, especially in his more recent series, but this was what really clinched it for me. In Whedonland apparently, sexism has devolved into “Straw Misogynists who go around abusing women (though not necessarily raping them per se) because they're capital E Eeeevil, and need to be heroically killed off by a Strong Woman or suitably worthy Nice Guy.”

You also seem to be touching on but not really addressing an issue which was a big one in Episodes 1 and 2, and which I strongly suspect holds for the rest of the series: to whit, that it's incredibly

dull

.

I've already imparted my reaction to Episode 2. To Episode 1, my response was: “Well that was ... okay.” The acting was decent, the premise was bland, the sets were pretty good, the dialogue was uninspired (as my sister pointed out, this is the one thing Whedon genuinely is

really good

at—normally), the plot was passable ... oh, and the characters were all two-dimensional.

I mean, I've had my issues with Joss Whedon when it comes to characterization, particularly in

Firefly

, but I can't remember the last major Whedon character who inspired only indifference in me—in

Dollhouse

, I can't find any characters who inspire anything

but

indifference.

Take our mate Ballard. In the first two episodes, at least, he's a walking cliché: the loner cop who knows (or strongly suspects) the truth, even though nobody else believes him, and is seeking justice regardless; a cop who's edgy enough to do some legally and morally questionable things (like threatening a lead), but is still basically on the side of right. That's it, I just summarized Ballard's whole character. Oh, and he has a totally unoriginal and uninteresting romantic subplot with a woman who apparently turns out to be a Doll.

I liked Boyd slightly more than everyone else on the show, but only because I felt like I caught a few brief flashes of actual personality in him in Episode 2. Beyond that, bland, bland, bland, bland.

I liked

Buffy

and

Angel

, and have a love/hate relationship with

Firefly

, but

Dollhouse

is the first Whedon effort I've come across that was genuinely uninteresting.

(Ye

gods

but I'm long-winded)

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Arthur B

at 15:53 on 2009-05-30

Ah, now here I can't agree with you. Certainly, if the Dollhouse is human trafficking it's unambiguously bad, and the people involved with it are doing unambiguously bad things BUT, that does not make them, in themselves, bad people.

I think it depends on what you mean by "bad people". I don't think Dan means "bad people" in the sense of "people who are innately evil inside, and therefore do bad things" - that would contradict his comments about rapists that you pick up on a bit later. I think Dan is using "bad people" to mean "people who do bad things". If the Dollhouse is a monstrosity - and it does certainly look that way - then by this definition the people who run it are bad people. The possibility of reform does exist, but that would require those people to cease their involvement with the Dollhouse, because if you don't stop deliberately doing bad things you can't stop being a bad person.

In other words, evil's what you do, not what you are.

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Jamie Johnston

at 16:31 on 2009-05-30

The problem is, as many of you have already pointed out, that instead of having just a mini-series for the storyline, Whedon's created a tv series which is intended to run for seven years if I remember correctly.

- Arkan

I heard on the radio a year or two ago that, for reasons wrapped up in the economics of the U.S. television industry, a reasonably high-budget American drama series has to run for at least four or five seasons in order to make significant money for the commissioner. This, apparently, is why we get so many series running for years on end when it's brain-meltingly obvious to any creative person that the core concept can't support more than one complete plot cycle (the prime example being

Lost

, but also

Heroes

,

Damages

,

24

); others do lend themselves more to being longer-running but still either drag on beyond the natural end-point implied by the premise (e.g.

Grey's Anatomy

after the interns stop being interns or

Buffy

after the high-school students leave high-school) or simply postpone indefinitely the resolution of the over-arching plot (e.g.

The X-Files

).

(Disclaimer: I haven't watched every season of every one of the above-mentioned series, so to some extent I'm going on the basis of plot summaries &c.)

In comparison, commissioners of high-budget British drama seem to be quite content to let things end when they ought properly to end (e.g.

Life On Mars

,

Queer As Folk

,

The State Within

), but on the other hand we don't seem to produce serials that could and should sustain an over-arching plot for more than a couple of seasons.

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http://arkan2.livejournal.com/

at 20:02 on 2009-05-30

In other words, evil's what you do, not what you are.

I think that's what I was trying to say.

On the other hand, given the webs of power, corruption and oppression, I think the vast majority of the planet's population are "bad people" by those standards. Which I think is part of Niall's point. *shrugs*

Jamie, I haven't watched even

one

episode of most of the above-mentioned series.

I'm a little curious as to your definition of "over-arching plot": the overarching plot of the first three seasons of

Buffy

, as best I can tell, was "teenage girl beats up super-powered monsters in modern, suburban US town while dealing with life in high school." (For seasons 4-7, you can replace "life in high school" with "life in college/young adulthood," substituting "young woman" for "teenage girl" when appropriate.

As it is, it doesn't strike me as particularly "over-arching." Certainly not more than, say,

Doctor Who

, though maybe you consider that the exception.

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Arthur B

at 21:16 on 2009-05-30

On the other hand, given the webs of power, corruption and oppression, I think the vast majority of the planet's population are "bad people" by those standards.

That's an awfully big claim to make. Would you care to explain how you are a "bad person"? (Or if you wouldn't consider yourself by this definition, how you might have been a bad person if you made different decisions in the past?)

You cited military organisations as being inherently bad by this measure. Does this include the military of, say, Switzerland, which specifically never gets involved in any international adventures and exists solely to defend Switzerland from attack?

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Jamie Johnston

at 12:13 on 2009-05-31Arkan, you're right, on reflection I see I should have distinguished between two different things that can naturally limit a series' lifespan: one is over-arching plot, the other is premise.

A series' premise limits its lifespan simply by creating a natural ending at the point where it ceases to be true / possible. For example

The West Wing

's premise was 'it's about the senior staff of President Bartlett': the series therefore naturally ended when Bartlett stopped being president. In theory I'd say this applies even to series that have absolutely no over-arching plot and seem able to run forever:

House

, for example, is about Greg House the diagnostician (if that's a word) and would have to come to an end if that character died or gave up medicine, or if all human disease and injury suddenly came to an end.

By 'over-arching plot', on the other hand, I mean something fairly vague but still, I think, real, though it's hard to define. Perhaps you could call it an element in the premise that demands resolution. I used the example of

The X-Files

, in which the premise is something like 'Mulder and Scully are FBI agents investigating supernatural happenings against the background of shadowy machinations by unknown officials'. The first part of the premise creates an off-beat police procedural that could run forever (barring changes equivalent to those I just mentioned for

House

), but the bit about the shadowy machinations promises and demands eventual resolution in the form of our heroes discovering what the machinations are and (assuming they turn out to be sinister) foiling them. A clearer example would be

The Wire

('a special team of narcotics and homicide detectives assembles to investigate and break the Barksdale drug gang of West Baltimore'): the 'heroes' have a specific long-term goal, and if they ever achieve that goal (NB I've only watched season one so far, so please nobody tell me what happens after that!) it'll be a natural end to the series.

My comment about

Buffy

was really about premise, and even then it's not a very strong example because the 'high school' element is arguably not part of the premise. I suspect it was originally part of the premise when the show was being pitched and developed, but perhaps ultimately it's more accurate to say that the crucial setting is Sunnydale rather than the school. So yes,

Buffy

wasn't a good example on that point, even if I had made it clear that I was talking abuut premise and not plot.

I suppose my comments about British series were more about plot than about premise:

Doctor Who

is certainly an example of a long-running British series, but probably without a long-term plot that implies an inevitable conclusion (I confess I haven't really followed the series: I have the impression that since David Tennant started there has been a tendency towards longer-term plot, but I don't know whether this amounts to an over-all plot whose conclusion would require the whole series to end). But

Doctor Who

is in many ways an extremely unusual television programme.

Incidentally, I'm not arguing that any series that goes beyond the natural end implied by its premise or its long-term plot suddenly becomes irredeemably bad. I would tend to assume that a series that continues after the resolution of its long-term plot is likely to be bad because it's hard to see how that would happen except as a result of creative failure, but there may be counter-examples. A series' premise is in some ways more flexible, and can to some extent be changed after the series is under way, and if high school was indeed an original element of

Buffy

's premise then the series certainly survived abandoning it without suffering much. The prime example of a 'successful' change of premise is

Taggart

, which has managed to carry on for years after the title character actually died - I never particularly liked the series to start with, but people still watch it so I assume that it retains much of whatever original quality it had.

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Shim

at 13:28 on 2009-05-31

I suppose my comments about British series were more about plot than about premise: Doctor Who is certainly an example of a long-running British series, but probably without a long-term plot that implies an inevitable conclusion (I confess I haven't really followed the series: I have the impression that since David Tennant started there has been a tendency towards longer-term plot, but I don't know whether this amounts to an over-all plot whose conclusion would require the whole series to end). But Doctor Who is in many ways an extremely unusual television programme.

Actually, there has been something like this. For quite a long time in the early years, the Tardis was broken and the Doctor couldn't leave, which is where all the UNIT stuff came from - he was a special advisor and got repair supplies in return. You could have ended the series then - plot resolved, Doctor has a whole universe to explore and no special reason to spend all his time on Earth. But they've adapted the series to cope with it.

Speaking personally, I'd rather like to see a version that

wasn't

mostly about Earth and humans, but I still like it.

In the old days, there was also a limit to the number of regenerations Time Lords could have, which put a long-term cap on the series, although I think that's been retroconned away now, or at least lured down a dark alleyway and quietly disposed of.

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Arthur B

at 14:04 on 2009-05-31

In the old days, there was also a limit to the number of regenerations Time Lords could have, which put a long-term cap on the series, although I think that's been retroconned away now, or at least lured down a dark alleyway and quietly disposed of.

I believe it has, in fact, been retconned away since at least the Tom Baker era: the Master doesn't regenerate in quite the usual manner, and it's known that the Time Lords had some means of granting people extra regenerations.

Of course, that's all Old Canon, but it's a well-established axiom of the new series that the writers can use Old Canon as and when they find it convenient. :)

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http://arkan2.livejournal.com/

at 18:00 on 2009-06-01

That's an awfully big claim to make. Would you care to explain how you are a "bad person"?

Glad to Arthur, although I warn you, there is a distinct possibility that we're about to embark upon a political debate that would make the

Prince of Nothing discussion

look like a bit of small talk.

Okay, anyway, how am I a bad person, where “bad person” carries the meaning of “someone who does things which are unambiguously evil”? Well, here's a partial list:

I live in the United States, making me a citizen of a government which has been described as “the world's leading purveyor of violence” and “the most powerful terrorist organization in the world.” A government which has caused the deaths of thousands (perhaps millions) of innocent people in Iraq and Afghanistan, and who-knows-how-many in Pakistan, and that's just within the last couple years. A government which subsidizes at least one brutal occupation in the Middle East, and I-don't-know-how-many-dictatorships. A government which continues to steal land from and otherwise disenfranchise American Indians, who have been persecuted by people of European descent since long before the United States ever existed. A government which is even now in the process of spending billions of dollars in welfare for the moneyed elite who were responsible for the current financial meltdown which is destroying the lives of millions of people just here in the United States. Rewarding the people who have caused untold suffering while leaving the victims without help and often without hope.

As a consumer, I give my money to those elites who caused that suffering. To corporations which exploit sweatshop labor and child labor in in South America, Africa, an Asia. Corporations which pollute air, water and soil all over the world, causing who-knows-how-many deaths from cancer and a host of other diseases. Corporations which produce the weapons with which my government and its minions and allies kill its enemies—and anyone in their vicinity—and with which other people kill each other all over the world. Corporations which often take over public utilities such as communication, transportation, education, and even health care and water services, and then proceed to burden their costumers with unbearable prices (unbearable for the economically disadvantaged, that is—the ones who are in the most need).

And as we've agreed in several discussions, no one can entirely escape their cultural context. That means that in my words and in my deeds, the way I dress, the way I move, the way I interact with other human beings, in subtle ways I am reproducing a culture of rape, a culture of misogyny and misandry, a culture of racism, heterosexist, ageism, classism, ableism, imperialism, militarism, and heaven-knows-what-all.

In these was and in many others, I perpetuate systems which oppress and dehumanizes myself and my fellow human beings. For these reasons I am (by the definition explained above) a “bad person.”

As for Switzerland: Again, this is going to be highly contentious. My personal outlook is that yes, it's military is bad—the reason being that even if it is only self-defensive, it's still organized around the idea of killing other people to get what you want. Its reason for existing is still to kill other people—just under more palatable circumstances than most other militaries.

We can argue whether a defensive military is necessary for a society (as a pacifist, I would argue that it isn't, but realize that I'm in the minority on this issue) but I think people who believe defensive violence is sometimes necessary, it's still bad.

I believe it has, in fact, been retconned away since at least the Tom Baker era: the Master doesn't regenerate in quite the usual manner, and it's known that the Time Lords had some means of granting people extra regenerations.

Yeah, there are special exceptions to the rule. In general, I believe, the 12-regeneration limit holds. (Since the Doctor isn't about to stoop to the underhanded tactics employed by the Master, and the Time Lords can't exactly grant him extra regenerations what with them all being vitally challenged, the producers are going to be in a bit of a tight situation a couple regenerations down the road.)

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Dan H

at 18:16 on 2009-06-01Sorry it's taken so long to reply, got distracted.

Military organizations—being as they are, in the business of killing people as their raison d'etre—are unambiguously bad

I'm not going to engage with that point, if you don't mind, because I don't think that's a totally accurate summary of the nature of military organisations, but I'd like to respond to the general point.

Obviously when I said "bad people" I was deliberately oversimplifying. The more complex way of putting it is that whatever a person does for a living, they have to be the *sort of person* who does that sort of thing for a living. Sure, the Krays were nice to their mother, but they were brutal in their business dealings.

The problem with the Dollhouse is that it presents as human traffickers people who do not act like they work in human trafficking. It's like Damian's

Iron Man Article

. The problem is not that Tony Stark is an arms dealer, the problem is that the film raises the moral issues surrounding the arms trade and then doesn't address them.

To go briefly back to your military analogy, it's like the way that trad fantasy novels frequently have Armies of Good and Armies of Evil, and the Armies of Evil basically behave like actual armies - wrecking the landscape, pillaging and looting and generally doing the things that an army actually has to do if it's going to remain mobile behind enemy lines, while the Armies of Good mysteriously never need to.

I don't mind that the characters in Dollhouse are sympathetic. The problem is that they're *made* sympathetic by the simple expedient of glossing over what they actually do (even Topher is sanitized to an extent). Again I'd draw the comparison with the Sopranos. The characters are all sympathetic, and many of them possess admirable qualities, but the show never flinches from the fact that they are ultimately bad people. It never hesitates to show them brutalizing, torturing and exploiting people. By comparison, the Dollhouse staff are presented as no more morally dubious than the Scooby gang.

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http://arkan2.livejournal.com/

at 20:00 on 2009-06-01Okay, now that makes sense, and I don't really have anything to add to it.

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Arthur B

at 21:40 on 2009-06-01

We can argue whether a defensive military is necessary for a society (as a pacifist, I would argue that it isn't, but realize that I'm in the minority on this issue) but I think people who believe defensive violence is sometimes necessary, it's still bad.

Surely the fact that you're in the minority on this is

the

best argument against pacifism being a workable system? ;)

On the wider point, I don't really think it stands. Disagreements about the morality of American policy and culture aside (and your country, whilst being a hegemon and therefore acting accordingly, is still the most benign hegemon the world has ever seen), I don't think "participating in a society which uses your capital and labour to bad ends a long way down the chain" really entails the same sort of personal responsibility that being an active member of the Dollhouse staff. You're not waterboarding POWs or personally genociding anyone right now, after all. For the analogy to work, you'd basically have to say that not only are the people personally running the Dollhouse "bad people", but also the guy who delivers their mail is a "bad person", as responsible for the mindwiping as the people strapping down the Dolls and zapping them with the funny tech.

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http://arkan2.livejournal.com/

at 00:02 on 2009-06-02

Surely the fact that you're in the minority on this is

the

best argument against pacifism being a workable system?

Maybe so, but it's still not an ironclad argument. It depends if you think people can actually learn better, which I obviously do.

(I'm prepared to accept that my government is the most benign hegemon the world has ever seen--or to put it another way, the least oppressive. However least reprehensible =/= morally good.)

Maybe not

as

responsible, but if the Dollhouse didn't get its mail delivered, or its windows cleaned, or its phones and power connected, or its zoning approved, it wouldn't be able to run. Therefore, the persons who provide these services are complicit (even if unknowingly) in the human trafficking involved. So again, strictly from the definition of "people who do things which are unambiguously evil" (aiding and abetting in human trafficking) they are "bad people."

There's also the argument from intentionality: The Dollhouse staff know what they're doing, while their service providers probably don't.

I agree that awareness is part of the story, but it's not sufficient. If it were, then we get questions of "what is awareness"? Sure, I slave owner who kills their slave knows what they are doing, but do they know that it's morally wrong? Well, some may, but all of them? (Plus, while it's conceivable not to know what the Dollhouse is up to, you'd have to be willfully ignorant not to know what kind of atrocities my government and the corporations are up to.)

But anyway, I think Dan has satisfied my objection, and that his point is entirely valid, so I don't know that there's any particular need to further the discussion. (Of course, if you feel differently, I'm willing to oblige.)

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Arthur B

at 00:35 on 2009-06-02

Maybe so, but it's still not an ironclad argument. It depends if you think people can actually learn better, which I obviously do.

Except that's still untenable; pacifism requires

everyone

to a) learn the arguments why pacifism is necessary and b) accept them. As soon as you get a situation where a) fails (a situation where not everyone has the case for pacifism put to them) or b) fails (a situation where some people outright reject pacifism)

the entire system

fails.

Re: the Dollhouse - I think intentionality and knowledge are key here. I don't think there's anything "unambiguously evil" about delivering mail to a house that happens to be a centre for human trafficking, unless you're prepared to accept a situation where Royal Mail interrogates you every morning to make sure you haven't been brainwashing Dolls in secret: not only is the mailman entirely ignorant of what goes on in the Dollhouse,

he has no legitimate reason to intrude

, unless he actually runs across a Doll running screaming from the Dollhouse whilst on his rounds. Not only is it really not his problem (that's the FBI agent's job), it would imply really disturbing things about him if he made it his problem - he'd be a creepy voyeur who spies on the people on his mail route for no good reason.

I don't think you can denounce the actions of people who are acting out of ignorance if they had no legitimate reason to try and gain further knowledge of the situation. It's all very well to say that people have a moral obligation to make sure they are not aiding and abetting coercive prostitution, but requiring public utilities to investigate us before they provide us with heat and light is probably going too far.

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Shim

at 06:24 on 2009-06-02

There's also the argument from intentionality: The Dollhouse staff know what they're doing, while their service providers probably don't.

This one is a bit more acceptable to me. Otherwise you seem to end up, not only with virtually everyone being bad (because some of their products and services eventually will be used by bad people) but also the Earth, the Sun and the laws of physics that let them exist.

Okay, enough from me, I try to steer clear of philosophy.

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Rami

at 09:36 on 2009-06-02

Okay, enough from me, I try to steer clear of philosophy.

No need to worry, so far it's been a pretty good rehashing of Moral Philosophy 101, just with fewer definitions.

raises the moral issues surrounding the arms trade and then doesn't address them

I think that's the real kicker here -- I have, since this article was posted, watched several more episodes of Dollhouse and it really does just throw issues up, zoom into them for about two minutes so you know that it's a Major Dilemma, and then ignore them completely in favor of Eliza Dushku / Tahmoh Penikett kicking ass.

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Arthur B

at 10:02 on 2009-06-02

I think that's the real kicker here -- I have, since this article was posted, watched several more episodes of Dollhouse and it really does just throw issues up, zoom into them for about two minutes so you know that it's a Major Dilemma, and then ignore them completely in favor of Eliza Dushku / Tahmoh Penikett kicking ass.

This sounds like yet another symptom of the show refusing to actually have an opinion (which seems to be a recurring theme in this discussion). You can't really explore an issue beyond saying "Wow, this is a problem isn't it?" without asserting some sort of conclusion, even if it's only on the level of choosing to accept or reject a particular perspective.

Tangent time: the Dollhouse has cells in every capital city and can program people with pretty much any behaviour you could care to mention. Why are they even for hire in the first place? Why don't they

rule the world

yet? When you have easy access to what's effectively highly skilled slave labour you don't

need

to worry about funding, you just send your sex kittens out to lure in a few billionaires and reprogram them to give you all the money you could possibly want.

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Rami

at 11:15 on 2009-06-02

choosing to accept or reject a particular perspective

You could argue that the show is raising awareness of these issues, and so the Minority Warrior is doing his job... but I think that by sidestepping any actual exploration the show could imply that they're not worth exploration, and that awareness is enough -- which it isn't. And that brings it back down to standard TV, really, where issues are worth little more than two minutes of the public's attention because they're just so darn complicated!

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Arthur B

at 11:22 on 2009-06-02This is true, but there's a part of me that doesn't trust that sort of awareness-raising for the sake of it. I mean, if you care about a subject enough to encourage people to think about it, you must have some kind of opinion about it - nobody raises awareness about issues they're apathetic towards - but if you keep your own views to yourself then you end up inviting discussion whilst refusing to actually participate in the discussion. It's feigning a position of neutrality over an issue which you're actually not at all neutral towards, which strikes me as mildly deceitful.

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http://arkan2.livejournal.com/

at 15:30 on 2009-06-02You're assuming, Arthur, that the only way to deal with violence (the failure of a pacifist system) is by dealing violence in return. In fact it is possible to deal with people who reject pacifism in ways which are in line with pacifist ideology (i.e. nonviolent direct action).

Re: Dollhouse - now you're just arguing my earlier point (which Dan has since addressed to my satisfaction). Yes, you can't use the term

bad person

to refer just anybody whose actions lead to evil.

At the same time though, I'm not sure that someone who participates in evil unwittingly or against their will is entirely free of guilt. I, for instance, live on land that was stolen from the American Indians (killing millions of them in the process) and given to my ancestors. I live in houses which were built with machines that were probably built by other machines running on coal that was mined in the 1800s and early 1900s before safety regulations.

I was born with the blood of those American Indians and those miners and millions of others on my hands. Like the mail carrier and the power company for the Dollhouse there's no reasonable way I could have avoided it. I certainly didn't ask for it or want it - any more than the Native Americans asked to have genocide committed against them or the miners asked to be forced to work in extremely unsafe conditions for low wages and no real prospects for the future.

It's nothing you can take before a judge of course, nor should it be. I'm not saying the unwitting mail carrier should be punished for complicity in the Dollhouse's crimes. I'm just saying the complicity is still there, as is the blood on my hands, and a lack of evil intentionality (whatever that may be) doesn't wash the blood away.

Why are they even for hire in the first place? Why don't they

rule the world

yet?

Oh, that's easy. Because Joss Whedon needed the Dollhouse to have that much power but to behave in a certain way for the story had in mind to work out, and never mind if any organization would act that way in real life. (I'm not sure if an organization like the Dollhouse would necessarily want to displace the Illuminati, but I agree they probably wouldn't limit themselves to an exotic brothel with a side order of hostage negotiation, private security, private espionage, and all the rest.)

I mean, if you care about a subject enough to encourage people to think about it, you must have some kind of opinion about it - nobody raises awareness about issues they're apathetic towards - but if you keep your own views to yourself then you end up inviting discussion whilst refusing to actually participate in the discussion.

I'm not so sure about that, Arthur. I mean, yes, it's good to put your own views out there, but maybe it's also good to include other people's views. Make your own arguments, but also bring up the counterarguments. (I can't count the number of times I've read an argument against some political stance I hold and that 'Pfft, that's totally inapplicable, and here's why ...')

If you just include your own view, then you're spouting propaganda. Now, there's nothing inherently wrong with that. If your intention is to make people question an issue (which it may not be), then I think you spoil the effect by imposing your own views upon it, instead of leaving the ultimate decision up to your audience.

(I maintain that Michael Crichton's

State of Fear

would've been much better if he'd kept the moral to "we don't know enough about the planet to tell whether climate change is a danger or isn't" instead of letting it degenerate to "no, there is absolutely no possibility whatsoever that climate change is a real threat.")

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Arthur B

at 16:42 on 2009-06-02

In fact it is possible to deal with people who reject pacifism in ways which are in line with pacifist ideology (i.e. nonviolent direct action).

This works only when the people threatening violence aren't actually psychotic enough to go all the way with it. Take Burma for an example: the military junta over there have nobody with the authority to call them off (and if there were a civilian government asking them to lay off would probably just shoot them), don't care who they have to shoot to keep control, and do not give a fuck what the rest of the world thinks. They are doing quite well for themselves.

Nonviolent protest works best against forces which respect the rule enough to listen to their civilian governments when asked to calm down, and when the forces/governments/people electing the government in question are either squeamish about using violence in the first place or are worried about public opinion. Mass pacifism might work well against the corrupt-but-rational, but it's absolutely hopeless against actual psychopaths.

A world of pacifists could be conquered by one sociopath with a gun, a box of ammo, and a willingness to keep shooting people until someone actually decides to break their pacifist stance and wrestle the gun out of the killer's hand.

As far as "complicity" goes, I really don't think it's the right word for a situation which you couldn't have avoided, can't change, and can't be held responsible for by anyone else. Complicity implies some sort of personal moral failing, some kind of responsibility; if there's no way you could have acted to avoid being associated with the wrong in question, I can't see how you'd be complicit.

I mean, yes, it's good to put your own views out there, but maybe it's also good to include other people's views. Make your own arguments, but also bring up the counterarguments.

Why?

I mean, this is obviously a valuable approach if it isn't actually something you feel strongly about, and you're genuinely able to see both sides of the argument. And I can see how, if you have strong feelings on an issue, it can be helpful to raise the points your opponents have made in the discussion and criticise them. But in my experience if an author actually genuinely feels strongly about a subject, it's a really bad idea to try and pitch the other side's arguments for them; because in in the author's heart of hearts they think their opponent's arguments are flawed, inaccurate, or just plain wrong, it's nigh-impossible to pitch said arguments convincingly. At worst, you end up throwing up strawmen, and will be rightly criticised for doing so; at best, you smother the argument you wanted to make in the first place.

What's more, if an author genuinely feels a particular way about a subject they are writing about, I would much rather they felt free to actually express their opinion and get on with it rather than diluting their passion by having to argue for the other side. I mean, by all means acknowledge that other opinions exist, but presumably if you don't share their position it must be because you disagree with that position - so

tell us why

rather than bringing them on for the sake of balance and then leaving it at that. (That is, if you must clutter stories with your thoughts about Issues in the first place; if you're just writing pulpy adventure fiction quit with the talking and get on with the fighting.)

Michael Crichton's

State of Fear

is a good point: he clearly

did

believe that climate change isn't a real threat at all, and clearly felt strongly enough about the subject to write a book about it, and if he'd pretended otherwise for the sake of being nice he would have swapped writing a crappy-but-spirited book based on a scientifically unsound opinion of his for writing an inclusive-but-soulless book that his heart wasn't actually in. I don't see that that's a positive step.

Give me spirit and passion over fairness through gritted teeth, at least when it comes to writing.

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Jamie Johnston

at 20:04 on 2009-06-02On presenting both sides of the argument:

I think I largely agree with Arthur on this one, except that I'm not sure it's quite true that if one feels strongly about a question one necessarily has a strong view about what the right answer is. It seems to me that "ye gods this is a complex and urgent problem and it upsets the hell out of me but I simply can't see the solution" counts as a strong feeling. But I don't go so far as to say that it's a strong feeling capable of being expressed powerfully in a work of fiction because I can't at the moment think of an example.

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Dan H

at 22:24 on 2009-06-02If you just include your own view, then you're spouting propaganda

It depends very much on the kind of questions you're addressing.

Even handedness is a luxury that comes with power. It's easy to present the other guy's viewpoint when you know that when push comes to shove, the other guy is never going to win.

When you're writing about the abuse of women, you need to be *crystal fucking clear* when things are not okay, particularly if you're going to keep patting yourself on the back and awarding yourself giant feminist cookies, because saying "aah, but *is* it rape" is just as bad as saying "it's not rape".

At the risk of invoking Godwin's law, it's like making a film about the Holocaust and then "exploring the idea" that it's just something the Jews made up after the fact.

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Arthur B

at 23:26 on 2009-06-02

I think I largely agree with Arthur on this one, except that I'm not sure it's quite true that if one feels strongly about a question one necessarily has a strong view about what the right answer is.

This is of course true; passionate and deeply-held uncertainty is of course an interesting take on things. (I think some of Milan Kundera's stuff might fall into this category.) I should have said "a strong attachment to a particular side of the argument" rather than just "strong feelings".

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Andy G

at 15:54 on 2009-06-03I like how the front-page feed reads:

Arthur B says: I think I largely agree with Arthur on this one.

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Jamie Johnston

at 17:07 on 2009-06-03Which is appropriate, since failure to agree with oneself is essentially what he's criticizing. :)

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http://arkan2.livejournal.com/

at 22:36 on 2009-06-03Re: Nonviolence

You make some good points, Arthur, but you forget that a dictator is only as powerful as their followers make them. That military junta in Burma wouldn't be controlling anybody if a large number of soldiers weren't following their orders.

Now a dictator may be crazy, but the bulk of their followers are not. They follow the dictator because the dictator has some illusion of legitimacy, at least for them. There are very nonviolent methods of demonstrating to followers that the dictator's legitimacy is indeed false. It's hard, it's time-consuming, and it's costly, but then, so is violent resistance.

Once you've broken a dictator's power base, said dictator is reduced to your "one sociopath with a gun."

Here it really depends if you think some people are genuinely incapable of developing a moral compass. I don't believe it but I admit the possibility. If so (and if there isn't some other nonviolent method to resolve the situation that neither of us has thought of) then yes, some limited violence might indeed be necessary, but hardly anything on the order of a full-scale military. (Of course, in a world of pacifists, one wonders where said sociopath

found

said gun.)

As far as "complicity" goes, I really don't think it's the right word for a situation which you couldn't have avoided, can't change, and can't be held responsible for by anyone else.

I think "complicit" works just fine, but I'll agree to disagree.

It depends very much on the kind of questions you're addressing ... When you're writing about the abuse of women, you need to be *crystal fucking clear* when things are not okay

Okay, Dan, you're right, it very much depends on the issue. One some, like violence against women or domestic violence in general or the Holocaust being "fair" and "balanced" means giving equal voice to arguments which are rational, intelligent, well-thought-out, and have mountain ranges of evidence to back them up and arguments which are batshit stupidity.

I guess, though, that I'm trying to avoid the strawman effect (and there certainly was a lot of it in

State of Fear

).

Here's my reading on that book. It seems to me that Crichton wrote in an attempt to get those members of his audience who were convinced of the danger of climate change to question that belief and ideally to conclude that climate change is not a danger after all.

Now, I've always believed in the danger of climate change, but I also try to be open to other people's arguments.

I thought Crichton's initial argument that "We Don't Know Enough About Climatology to Tell One Way or Another" was a strong one. Personally, I don't even know how much climatology the climatologists know and how much they don't.

So I could go along with Crichton that far. But then he went into an extended filibuster that not only undermined his earlier point (apparently, we do know enough to say with assurity that climate change is

not

a danger), but also completely failed to be convincing--partially because of his over-reliance on straw men.

So if you accept my assessment of Crichton's motive for writing a novel about climate change, then it would have, I think, to be deemed a near-total failure. Maybe you're right, Arthur, that it was the only book Crichton could've written, but I don't know how much of a comfort that would be for him.

And for myself, if I were ever to write a book with, say, militarism as a major theme, I don't think I'd try to convince my readers that militarism is inherently evil and completely unnecessary. Because I don't think I could do it. But I might be able to get them to question with militarism is good or necessary, and then let them decide for themselves. It seems to me that would best be served by leaving the book's moral that "this is a question yet to be answered" or, at least, "this is my answer, but it's up to you to find yours."

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Arthur B

at 23:11 on 2009-06-03

You make some good points, Arthur, but you forget that a dictator is only as powerful as their followers make them. That military junta in Burma wouldn't be controlling anybody if a large number of soldiers weren't following their orders. Now a dictator may be crazy, but the bulk of their followers are not. They follow the dictator because the dictator has some illusion of legitimacy, at least for them.

I think that a great number of soldiers in North Korea and Burma follow those nations' respective juntas for a very simple reason: it puts them on top of the heap, socially speaking, and they just plain like the power, prestige, money and sex they get as a result of their position. Look at North Korea's Military First policy, which basically says "the soldiers get first dibs on food, services, and everything; the civilians get the scraps", for example. And, of course, the totalitarian regime idolises the military, so everyone understands that the way to get ahead in life is to sign up and serve. There's always going be a certain proportion of people who say to themselves "Hmm, now do I make a principled stand and confront the illegitimacy of the regime I am presented with, or do I do what the man with the gun says and get a share of the loot?" And the tragedy is that they don't even need to be a majority; there just needs to be enough of them to get some good old-fashioned groupthink going. Very often in this sort of regime you find that the military/police end up operating much like some sort of organised crime outfit: if you want protection, you do what they say, you pay tribute when it's demanded, and you don't break ranks.

Actually, organised crime is a damn good example of the problem of pacifism: the Mafia and their ilk are basically organisations that use violence for no higher end than the enrichment of their members. You can cry that this enrichment is not a legitimate or proper path all you like, but that isn't going to stop them if their attitude is "fuck morality, I'm in it to make me and my mates rich".

So I could go along with Crichton that far. But then he went into an extended filibuster that not only undermined his earlier point (apparently, we do know enough to say with assurity that climate change is not a danger), but also completely failed to be convincing--partially because of his over-reliance on straw men.

Surely now you are making my point for me - Crichton attempted to present the other side's argument, but because he had absolutely no sympathy for it all he had was straw men.

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Dan H

at 12:54 on 2009-06-04

You make some good points, Arthur, but you forget that a dictator is only as powerful as their followers make them. That military junta in Burma wouldn't be controlling anybody if a large number of soldiers weren't following their orders

This is true, but only by a kind of circular logic. If they didn't have soldiers following their orders, they wouldn't be a military Junta in the first place. Having soldiers following their orders is kind of how military Juntas work.

Which comes back to Arthur's original point, which is that pacifism only works if everybody is a pacifist.

There are very nonviolent methods of demonstrating to followers that the dictator's legitimacy is indeed false

At the risk of sounding glib: name six.

At the risk of sounding even more glib, explain why none of those methods have yet been used, successfully, by the people of Burma.

Ultimately it's very easy to be a pacifist if you're living in a peaceful society protected by a large and powerful military. It's easy to promote nonviolent methods of solving problems when you have the *option* of resorting to violent methods.

Arguing that it is wrong for people to take up arms *specifically in order to defend themselves* is actually very hard to justify morally. It's effectively saying that *other people* have to die because *you* don't like the idea of them fighting.

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http://arkan2.livejournal.com/

at 22:00 on 2009-06-04Okay, let me lay it out for you this way: most people (more than 95%) have a functioning moral compass. It may not be exactly the same as yours or mine, but there are common threads that we can pretty much all agree on. (If they were exactly the same, morality would not be contentious, if there were no common threads, it would be a hopeless exercise.)

Oppressive systems like a junta or the mafia or patriarchy or racism for that matter are just sophisticated excuses for overriding those essential moral precepts. "Yes, of course, Though Shalt Not Kill, but under these particular circumstances ..."

Nonviolent action on a group level, as I see it, is such an overwhelming withdrawal of support from oppressive regimes that the die-hards of that regime do no have power to continue ruling because no one is listening to them. In order to turn people against the regime (its legitimacy in the eyes of its supporters must be undermined). I'm not going to name six specific strategies for doing this, Dan, but the basic principle is to expose the inherent contradictions between people's moral positions and their actions. Putting the lie to the "but under these particular circumstances" argument.

So the job is to call attention to these moral contradictions. At this point, I'm hampered by the fact that (as in all other struggles) tactics tend to be specialised, and I simply don't know enough about either Burma or the Mafia to suggest an effective tactic to use against them (nor am I a master strategist by any stretch). A general rule, though, is to push the regime farther than it's willing to go, however far that may be. This usually means calling a ton of repression and violence down on your head, but then, so does all struggle against oppression.

Tiananmen Square is an excellent example of such a tactic failing to work.

Lots

of repression (more than the protesters bargained for, I believe), but no crisis of legitimacy--or not enough of one, at least.

I never claimed, however, that nonviolent action is some sort of magic bullet. Like all other tactics of social struggle, sometimes a specific nonviolent strategy will work, sometimes it won't.

At the risk of sounding even more glib, explain why none of those methods have yet been used, successfully, by the people of Burma.

I

could

say "You might just as easily ask why no violent methods have yet been used, successfully, by the people of Burma." In fact, I kinda just

did

say that, but it's not my answer.

My answer is that I don't know. As I said, I haven't studied the Burmese case in any detail--but even if I had, I couldn't tell you.

I don't know why nonviolent tactics worked in Serbia but failed (so far) in China. Or why they took so much longer in Chile than in Argentina.

But then, from what I've learned of revolutions, nobody has really been able to explain satisfactorily why they do or do not take place in a given situation. People can point out factors that contributed to or helped prevent a revolution, but they can not say definitively "This is the reason."

Ultimately it's very easy to be a pacifist if you're living in a peaceful society protected by a large and powerful military. It's easy to promote nonviolent methods of solving problems when you have the *option* of resorting to violent methods. Arguing that it is wrong for people to take up arms *specifically in order to defend themselves* is actually very hard to justify morally. It's effectively saying that *other people* have to die because *you* don't like the idea of them fighting.

Now who's propping up straw men? (And cliche straw men, at that.)

If you look at the comment which started this whole argument, you will find that I said "We can argue whether a defensive military is necessary for a society (as a pacifist, I would argue that it isn't)."

This is a simple statement of opinion. I

believe

that killing people to get them to stop killing you is a) evil in turn (though sometimes less evil) and b) not really necessary because I

believe

there are always better options available.

Arthur was the first one to bring up the junta in Burma, asking what my pacifist ideology dictated in the Burmese struggle for justice. Since he asked my

opinion

, I gave it.

Not once in this conversation have a presumed to dictate to people struggling for their livelihood and wellbeing what tactics they should and should not employ, nor would I do so. (This is, in fact, one of my criticisms of President Obama's policy towards the crisis in Israel and Palestine.) Yes, I hold beliefs about what other people should do to fight injustice (doesn't everyone?) but stating my opinion on the topic =/= attempting to dictate their behavior.

Surely now you are making my point for me - Crichton attempted to present the other side's argument, but because he had absolutely no sympathy for it all he had was straw men.

Maybe so. And I suppose if Crichton had set out to write a triumphalist story "nya, nya, I'm right, you're wrong" that would be well enough, although for my part, I cordially detest triumphalist fiction.

On the other hand, if we think Crichton was genuinely trying to write a convincing argument for questioning and even disbelieving in climate change, then it must be either because a) he was not sufficiently skilled as an author to portray the opposition at all accurately or b) that

did

possess such skills but couldn't be bothered to apply them.

I think our argument may come down to which interpretation we go by. If we accept proposition b, then one wonders if it was worth Crichton even trying to convince anyone and if he wouldn't've done better just to write a triumphalist novel.

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Arthur B

at 22:23 on 2009-06-04

Nonviolent action on a group level, as I see it, is such an overwhelming withdrawal of support from oppressive regimes that the die-hards of that regime do no have power to continue ruling because no one is listening to them.

This is a fine idea until people start getting shot. 95% of people might have an operative moral compass, but

almost everyone

has a survival instinct, and I would argue that for a sizeable proportion of people their survival instinct heavily outweighs their moral compass. It is easy to say "Yeah! We'll sit in the street and wave our signs and not go to work until the junta collapses!", but when the tear gas is flying and people to the left of you and the right of you are getting shot dead it's awfully hard to actually stick to that principle.

On the other hand, if we think Crichton was genuinely trying to write a convincing argument for questioning and even disbelieving in climate change, then it must be either because a) he was not sufficiently skilled as an author to portray the opposition at all accurately or b) that did possess such skills but couldn't be bothered to apply them.

Or c): Crichton was a crank whose conspiracy theory about climate change was just plain irrational, and therefore wouldn't make sense to any reader that was rational...

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Dan H

at 00:43 on 2009-06-05

Not once in this conversation have a presumed to dictate to people struggling for their livelihood and wellbeing what tactics they should and should not employ, nor would I do so

Perhaps I've misread you, then, because what you've said so far strongly implies (to me at least) that you believe that the use of violence should not ever be an option for anybody under any circumstances. You quite specifically said that nations should not have armies, even for the purpose of defending themselves.

That, to me, is a quite categorical statement about what tactics people struggling for their wellbeing should and should not employ. Indeed, you outline quite clearly what tactics you think people should employ: "push the regime farther than it's willing to go, however far that may be".

If you don't want to dictate what tactics people can use to fight for what they believe in, you have to accept that violent tactics are as legitimate as nonviolent ones. Otherwise, well, you're dictating.

Either people have the right to kill in self defence, or they don't. If they do, then you accept that killing is sometimes justified. If they do not, then you have just dictated to other people what tactics they should employ to protect themselves.

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Dafydd at 02:32 on 2009-06-05I could say "You might just as easily ask why no violent methods have yet been used, successfully, by the people of Burma." In fact, I kinda just did say that, but it's not my answer.

Because the Burmese government has more rifles than the Burmes Peasants. The whole point of tyranny is that the government has better weapons than the Peasants.

Likewise, when the government preaches the Ideology that it is immoral for Peasants to bear arms, they win without a shot being fired. that's logical, Captain. They would say that wouldn't they?

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Dan H

at 13:15 on 2009-06-05

Because the Burmese government has more rifles than the Burmes Peasants. The whole point of tyranny is that the government has better weapons than the Peasants.

Daffyd has the right of it here.

Non-violent resistance is a great way of dealing with dictatorships if you have absolutely no other options, but it frequently simply fails to work, and when it does work it's frequently because of a variety of complex reasons (some of which, frequently, involve the threat of military action).

The British got out of India because we were overextended after the war. Milosevic was overthrown in Serbia partly because of non-violent protests, but partly because NATO had already shown that they were willing to take military action against him. Put simply, dictatorships do not fall for moral reasons, they fall for pragmatic reasons.

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http://arkan2.livejournal.com/

at 18:00 on 2009-06-05Two things, Arthur: First, that withdrawal of support from the regime would include military support. You can't oppress the people if nobody is willing to operate guns and tanks on your behalf.

Militaries (even those controlled by juntas) are still composed of human beings: human beings who can be persuaded not to attack fellow human beings. (It helps when the fellow human beings are specifically not attacking them or anyone else.) There are times in history when the military itself has rebelled (as in the Philippines) which shows that it can be done. It's not easy, I'll grant you, but it can happen.

Second:

It is easy to say "Yeah! We'll sit in the street and wave our signs and not go to work until the junta collapses!", but when the tear gas is flying and people to the left of you and the right of you are getting shot dead it's awfully hard to actually stick to that principle.

Yeah, that's what I thought for the longest time, too, until I started studying accounts of actual resistance. Sometimes the military backs down before it comes to that (see above), but often the police or military do attack, with tear gas and sometimes even with live ammunition. And sometimes, people break. But just as often, they don't. People are brutally attacked, and sometimes they knuckle under--and just as often, they don't.

For some reason in that moment of terror--and for significantly more than 5% of people--their resolve is greater than their urge to survive. (Partially, I think it's due to the fact that a lot of the people who go so far as to defy the ruling authority know and accept what the consequences may well be.)

Perhaps I've misread you, then

Partially. My belief is a) that violence is never a moral option and b) that violence is never a necessary option, i.e. I believe there are always other tools available to people. And I have tried to list some of the reasons (though I'm by no means an expert in this field, yet) why I believe proposition "b" is valid, some of the alternatives methods people have for resisting violence.

If you don't want to dictate what tactics people can use to fight for what they believe in, you have to accept that violent tactics are as legitimate as nonviolent ones. Otherwise, well, you're dictating.

I disagree. As I've pointed out, all this is my opinion, which people are free to accept or disregard as they choose. I accept that (for the moment, at least) some people are going to utilize violent methods in their their struggles against injustice. If I believe their cause is just, I will not denounce or attempt to hamper them unless they do something truly unconscionable. Which does not in any way preclude me from believing--and in some cases, opining--that they had better, more moral options available to them.

I could say "You might just as easily ask why no violent methods have yet been used, successfully, by the people of Burma."

This, of course, tying back to my point that nonviolence is not a magic bullet (and I

just now

realized the irony of that analogy) any more than violence is.

Likewise, when the government preaches the Ideology that it is immoral for Peasants to bear arms, they win without a shot being fired.

Only if you accept the assumption that the only way for the peasants to resist the government's oppression is through force of arms ... which is the very proposition I am currently attacking.

I'll grant you India, Dan. (At least, I'll grant that the war certainly helped the Indian cause. Whether they could've won nonviolently even without the war--well, we'll never know.)

As for Serbia ... that's certainly one interpretation. There's another which states that the NATO bombings actually

helped

Milosevic's cause, because NATO and the U.S. then became a scapegoat for Milosevic to blame everybody's problems on. Milosevic knew the bombings weren't going to hurt him, and what did he care how many other people died in the bombings? They didn't do him any harm.

Put simply, dictatorships do not fall for moral reasons, they fall for pragmatic reasons.

Precisely my point. Specifically, they fail because they are forced into failure. The primary force that topples can be external or internal.

I grant that sometimes, regimes topple because of violence or threat of violence from the outside. But in other cases, the regime topples because nonviolent

action

(which goes beyond protests) from the inside makes the country literally impossible to govern. Whatever the dictator does, no one else (including the military and police, by the end) is going to do what they want. It doesn't get much more pragmatic than that.

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Arthur B

at 18:30 on 2009-06-05OK, this conversation's probably derailed Dan's article's comments for long enough, so it's time to sum up.

In my view, successful non-violent revolutions - when they are in fact popular revolutions against an undemocratic regime, rather than one set of rulers ousting a different set of rulers - are very much a modern phenomenon. One could argue, in fact, that they only became possible once you had enough powerful democratic/liberal societies in the world to strongly disapprove of other nations purging their people, and responding with sanctions or the threat of military force.

In my country I am pretty sure we would never have had many of the freedoms we enjoy today without a certain amount of violence (for example, had the Civil War gone the other way the pendulum would have swung towards absolute monarchy as opposed to parliamentary rule), and I suspect the same is true in a lot of other modern liberal democracies. These days, of course, we absolutely shouldn't resort to violence to get our way - but that's because we have alternate means of winning the day, and the only reason those means are open to us is because people killed and were killed in the past.

I think rejecting violence is admirable as an ideal, but like all ideals can only work so far; violence should never be the first recourse, but if it's a choice between fighting for survival and dying in the dirt, I'd never condemn anyone for choosing the former.

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Dan H

at 19:02 on 2009-06-05

My belief is a) that violence is never a moral option and b) that violence is never a necessary option, i.e. I believe there are always other tools available to people

I think the problem here is the term "necessary". You're right that there are always alternatives to violence, but sometimes those alternatives involve allowing other people to kill you.

Again, I know it's a cliche, but I think it's very easy to say "there are always alternatives to violence" when you live in the world's only remaining superpower. When the alternative to violence is "have your country invaded and your family killed" I don't think choosing violence is particularly immoral.

If I believe their cause is just, I will not denounce or attempt to hamper them unless they do something truly unconscionable

Thing is, you can't say "it's immoral, but it's okay". You can't say "I won't denounce them" because you just have. By saying that violence is always immoral, and there are always better ways to do things, you are denouncing and dismissing the decisions of everybody who has ever decided to take up arms for any reason.

It's the equivalent of saying that you think being gay is unnatural, then insisting that this doesn't make you homophobic, because you haven't said you think it's wrong.

Milosevic knew the bombings weren't going to hurt him, and what did he care how many other people died in the bombings? They didn't do him any harm

Not personally, but they damaged the infrastructure of the country, and they did kill a reasonably large number of soldiers, which isn't something the military usually looks kindly on.

Ultimately Milosevic went down because the police and the military stopped supporting him. Since the police and military had proven themselves quite willing to kill civilians, it seems extremely likely to me that they were more worried about the risk of international reprisals (soldiers being the group of people who have the most to lose in the event of war).

Whatever the dictator does, no one else (including the military and police, by the end) is going to do what they want. It doesn't get much more pragmatic than that.

I still can't quite get my head around your argument here.

You seem to be arguing that an organized military is not necessary in order to maintain control of a stable society, and you cite as evidence for this the fact that some dictators have been removed from power by non-violent action once the army has turned against them.

This, in fact, is why non-violent action hasn't worked in China and Burma. You can only overthrow a despotic regime by getting the army on your side. When the army *is* the regime, you don't have that option, and no amount of martyring yourself will change that.

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Rami

at 21:46 on 2009-06-05OK. For the sake of not carrying this on beyond the ability of the database to support, let's agree to disagree on the non-violence issue. I think we've hit a significant philosophical dissonance which is going to prevent your point of view coming across to those of us who are a bit too cynical for our own good.

You know what I'd like to think is possible? I'd like to think it's possible to create a good TV show, that does actually address an issue or two, without getting sententious or dramatically offensive or Just Plain Wrong. Anyone with me here?

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Arthur B

at 22:51 on 2009-06-05

You know what I'd like to think is possible? I'd like to think it's possible to create a good TV show, that does actually address an issue or two, without getting sententious or dramatically offensive or Just Plain Wrong. Anyone with me here?

I think it's possible, but it hinges on having the right sort of format for the show.

Edge of Darkness

is brilliant, and does precisely what you ask for with the issues it addresses, but it's a 6-part series which was expressly designed to end where it ended.

The Wire

, by all accounts, seems to have managed it for 5 full length-seasons, which is quite a feat.

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Sonia Mitchell

at 00:45 on 2009-06-06Anyone with me here?

Me!

(As long as we can keep the odd bit of trashy TV too.)

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Viorica

at 02:10 on 2009-06-06

Anyone with me here?

Me! I used to think Joss could do that, but . . . apparently not.

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Dafydd at 03:12 on 2009-06-06You seem to be arguing that an organized military is not necessary in order to maintain control of a stable society, and you cite as evidence for this the fact that some dictators have been removed from power by non-violent action once the army has turned against them.

That is the doctrine of Macchiavelli's "Arte of War". A professional Army is a danger to any Reublic because Armies need War, that is what they are there for. That's what it says on the Can.

Macchiavelli's solution was conscripting a patriotic Peasant militia = people who want to finish the War quickly and go home. Peasant Militia are not as efficient soldiers as full-time Professionals; but sheer weight on numbers would give Militia the edge, in any state that does not forbid Peasants to bear arms.

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http://arkan2.livejournal.com/

at 20:00 on 2009-06-06

You're right that there are always alternatives to violence, but sometimes those alternatives involve

allowing other people to kill you.

I suppose this is what I deserve for being such a nitpicker over details myself. Yes, obviously I meant "alternative forms

of resistance to oppression

" and not just lying down and taking it. You've all made it quite clear that you don't believe there are viable nonviolent means of

resisting oppression

in all circumstances, but give me the credit of acknowledging I wouldn't be so uptight and stuffy about pacifism if

I

didn't believe there were.

You can't say "I won't denounce them" because you just have.

I believe that all violence is morally wrong and avoidable. I believe it, but I can't know for sure. And I know that while I believe there's always a nonviolent option

of fighting for justice

, for the moment at least, and for a variety of complicated reasons, many people the world over are not going to take that option.

In other words, they're not going to live up to what I consider the human ideal. So what? People fail to live up to ideals all the time, and I don't fault them for it. Heaven knows I do it myself often enough. I would have to be a really uptight, hard-nosed, overly-demanding jerk to expect everybody to take the best possible option (especially since I don't know for sure that it's possible, I just believe it) every single time, and denounce them every single time they fail to take it.

The above two points concern my personal moral integrity, and I feel bound to address them. Out of respect for Rami and Arthur's wishes (I may not agree with you Arthur, but the way you put that was very conciliatory, and I appreciate it) I will address any of the other counterarguments raised. Nor will I attempt to defend myself on this issue any further in this forum.

Since it's rather arrogant of someone to attempt both to end a line of conversation

and

try to have the last word, I invite Dan and anyone else who disagrees to have one more go at my integrity if they feel so inclined. I will not argue further.

(Why yes, I can be incredibly pretentious at times.)

I'd like to think it's possible to create a good TV show, that does actually address an issue or two, without getting sententious or dramatically offensive or Just Plain Wrong. Anyone with me here?

Possible, yes, but fiendishly difficult. A mini-series might have a chance at it, but it seems to me that it would be practically impossible for a long-running tv show not to make one of those mistakes

somewhere

along the line.

(I've never seen

The Wire

, Arthur. Is it really that good?)

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Arthur B

at 20:41 on 2009-06-06

(I've never seen The Wire, Arthur. Is it really that good?)

I've only seen the first season so far, but everyone who's watched the rest assures me it maintains its standards throughout.

As far as the season I've seen goes, it's one of the few shows I've seen lately where the hype has been genuinely justified. You know how sometimes there's TV shows or films or books where everyone will say you need to watch and then you watch them and you can't understand what the fuss is about?

The Wire

is the reverse: it's the one that everyone recommends, and then you watch it, and then you get pissed off that people didn't recommend it to you

even more

than they already did. It's that good.

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Jamie Johnston

at 11:22 on 2009-06-07As to violence &c.:

You've all made it quite clear...

I haven't been participating in this bit of the discussion, and don't propose to, simply because my views on the point aren't sufficiently considered or coherent; but in view of the above I feel I should just say that I incline to Arkan's view (at least on rightness if not on effectiveness).

As to

The Wire

: very very what Arthur said.

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Andy G

at 19:41 on 2009-06-07I never miss the chance for a bit of Wire evangelising - it really is very good, and crucially it's also something addictively watchable rather than just being something you want to have watched, to paraphrase Mark Twain.

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Dan H

at 09:04 on 2009-06-08

would have to be a really uptight, hard-nosed, overly-demanding jerk to expect everybody to take the best possible option ... every single time, and denounce them every single time they fail to take it

Okay, in that case I think this is basically an argument about semantics. You seem to be using language like "morally wrong" and "unambiguously evil" where I'd use "undesirable".

My chief objection to your argument was that if you describe a course of action as morally wrong, then I understand you to be declaring yourself to be morally superior to the people who take it, but that doesn't seem to be the way you're using the term so ... fair enough I guess.

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http://arkan2.livejournal.com/

at 10:02 on 2009-06-08Sorry to generalize, Jamie, I guess by "all" I meant "everyone else who's contributed to this part of the discussion."

Well with that many recommendations, I suppose I shall have to check it out ...

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Jamie Johnston

at 22:55 on 2009-06-11No need to apologize, Arkan - I wasn't complaining! I just didn't want you to have the impression that you'd been speaking to a unanimously unpersuadable audience.

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Bookwyrm

at 01:54 on 2013-02-03I've got a question, why would Dollhouse use their amazing mindwiping technology for mundane purposes like creating personal bodyguards? I mean bodyguards, prostitutes, and hostage negotiators are not that uncommon. And the Dollhouse is probably really expensive. Why would people go to the Dollhouse when there are cheaper, less shady places to find those people?

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Dan H

at 10:43 on 2013-02-03I know! It just makes no sense whatsoever.

I *think* there's a notion that the Dolls can be programmed to be *superhumanly* good at whatever they do - the hostage negotiator is this composite super-negotiator, for example. But that doesn't really come across in the actual show, so you just wind up with this absurd situation where people spend a shit-ton of money in order to have somebody custom designed to do a job that somebody else could have done just as well for a fraction of the cost.

If I was in the mood to be very, very generous to Joss Whedon I might suggest that this is part of the point, or part of the cruel irony or something. Perhaps going to the Dollhouse is mostly a status symbol, the point isn't that the Dolls do their jobs better but that for the hyper-rich the ultimate luxury is custom-built humans.

The problem is that most of the time the Dolls *aren't* being hired by the decadent super-rich as an idle curiosity, they're being hired to do actual jobs by people who think those jobs are crucially important.

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http://jmkmagnum.blogspot.com/

at 16:46 on 2013-02-03There's a notion I've seen cropping up that a fancier way of doing something, or a more technologically involved way of doing something, is NECESSARILY better. Like, it requires much more advanced technology and effort to create an Active, so clearly people would try to use it over just finding a hostage negotiator. It's extremely technology-intensive to replace our hair with photosynthesizing material, so even though its use doesn't seem to actually solve any problems for anyone it becomes universal. Over on another forum, I've seen people unable to let go of the idea that wizards in fantasy settings wouldn't disrupt all economic activity forever, despite the fact that the actual ratios of time and materials to output are nothing by modern standards and often not hugely impressive by what we think of as roughly cod-medieval standards. The magical way is just intrinsically better, even if it doesn't really seem to perform that much better.

I think there's this general notion that all sufficiently difficult technological improvements will become massively widespread and disruptive.

[kateeorg]

Art of Adaptation: The Literary Webseries

Classic novels ingrained in Western culture have been adapted in many ways over years – plays, musicals, miniseries, films, modern teen novels, even text posts (no, really). In recent years, with the success of Game of Thrones, we’re seeing more and more books and series adapted to television format.

But one of my favorite methods of adaptation is one rarely discussed outside of internet culture: the literary web series.

These modern retellings of public domain works turn classic protagonists into Youtube vloggers, who let their story unfold before an audience. Literary web series have to be particularly inventive in bringing classic stories to modern day, organically integrating racial & gender diversity and modern sensibilities to works made over a hundred years ago.

Breaking down the structure of these series, there are five components to an effective adaptation:

Components

Initial conceit (or, why does this character have a blog?)

Audience acknowledgement & interaction

How are other perspectives integrated?

Inventiveness (with camera stuff, settings, etc.)

Quality of Adaptation (modernization of problematic elements, captured the spirit of the original)

Let’s look at some examples to see how this breaks down. (spoilers ahead)

The Lizzie Bennet Diaries, 2012-2013

(Adaptation of Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice, 1813)

Conceit

Pretty straightforward – Lizzie Bennet is a grad student in Communications doing this as her project, presenting her views in contrast to her mother’s. What starts out as documenting Lizzie’s opinions ends up getting involved in a whole lot of drama.

Audience acknowledgement & interaction High acknowledgement and interaction. Lizzie’s videos are very public and very popular in-universe. The story even takes from the audience quite a bit, responding to the multiple requests for Darcy, and even affecting the self-esteem of Lydia. Acknowledges the problems of putting your life and the lives of those around you on the internet, but how communicating with strangers can help to communicate with people closer to you.

Are other perspectives integrated? Other characters take over Lizzie’s vlog or have their own side vlogs, and show the holes in Lizzie’s sometimes biased logic.

Inventiveness This was pretty much the first well-known literary web series, so launching the whole art form definitely counts! Also, two words: costume theater.

Quality of Adaptation Lizzie Bennet Diaries, rather than being a straight point-by-point adaptation, streamlined the events to make sense for modern day – house parties become weddings and pub visits, estates become companies, problems with inheritance laws become problems with student debt and bad economy. Characters barely sketched out in the original text are fleshed out, and Lizzie herself is not only the modern Elizabeth, but the voice of self-exploring 20-somethings everywhere.

But my favorite method of adaptation was the new life injected into main themes of pride and prejudice. When the original book came out, the audience would have been surprised to discover, along with Elizabeth, the hidden depths of Darcy.

200 years later, when “Where is my Darcy?” is the common phrase among Austenites, no one is surprised Darcy is better than he seems. So, Pemberley Digital brought back the element of surprise by making Lydia Bennet, an irresponsible flake in the original book, the one truly misunderstood by Lizzie (though dear Darcy still plays an important role).

The only thing maybe lost in adaptation is the fact that, in the original book, Lizzie was more right than wrong, whereas in the web series, she seems more wrong than right. Additionally, Lizzie’s confrontation with Caroline Lee near the end of the series, meant to mirror the one with Lady Catherine De Bourgh, loses its power since Caroline doesn’t have nearly as much power over Lizzie. Lizzie standing up to her is not as big a deal.

Note: I highly recommend the companion novel The Secret Diary of Lizzie Bennet, as it fills in some elements of the story that couldn’t be put on screen.

Emma Approved, 2013-2014

(Adaptation of Jane Austen’s Emma, 1815)

Conceit Emma Woodhouse is documenting her greatness in lifestyle excellence as head of the consulting firm Emma Approved. Eh…it does fall in line with the character, but some see it as over-the-top.

Audience acknowledgement & interaction Emma’s videos, except for the Q&As, are private. But she has cameras on the desks of everyone who works there (to the consternation of some of them). I think this is where a lot of fans got lost, because the audience didn’t affect the story the way it did before.

Harriet’s music videos are a little more interactive, but not part of the main storyline.

Are other perspectives integrated? Swiveling to other people’s desk cameras helps. Also, Harriet has a music blog which often reflects her mood and her growing confidence in herself.

Inventiveness Month-long arcs of consulting clients in an office setting. More space, multiple rooms, in-universe charities made real.

Quality of Adaptation I love the way the characters were adapted, on one hand.The themes of appearance vs. true character are even more apparent in a web series format, where often charisma rules the day. Emma starts out ingratiating, but we really root for her by the end. Knightly is as lovely as ever, but now with more of a sense of humor (also helps that he’s not above Emma in station this time around). Harriet no longer stands in Emma’s shadow and grows beyond a project to a true friend.

The supporting characters are all well-sketched and memorable, with the addition of LBD’s Caroline Lee as the infamous Mrs. Elton an incredible twist. The resolutions of the main pairings (Emma/Knightley and Harriet/B-Mart) were extremely satisfying, almost more so than the ones in LBD!

But the adaptation of the story felt choppy. The month-long arcs of Emma counseling a client weren’t quite organic, and didn’t quite fall in line with the format of the original book. And by keeping the action confined to the offices, it’s argued that an important element of the story  – mainly Emma’s interactions with her neighbors and her father – is lost. So, as an adaptation, it may not be the strongest. Still, it’s an enjoyable, inventive twist on a classic.

(Oh, and PS - the actors playing Emma and Knightley ended up dating in real life. If you just watch for their chemistry, that would be enough)

Autobiography of Jane Eyre, 2013-2014

(Adaptation of Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, 1847)

Conceit Jane Eyre is a nursing graduate embarking on a new chapter in her life, and wants to be brave like Lizzie. Though Jane narrates her own story in the original book as well, she’s a shy character who might seem unlikely to put herself on display on the internet. But once she gets going it becomes a great form of self-expression for her (the original Jane was an artist, updated to a photographer).

Audience acknowledgement & interaction Jane’s videos are public, and she does do Q&As, but the audience doesn’t affect the story more than that. However, Jane does acknowledge that her audience might serve as witness to the weirdness going on, proving she isn’t crazy (and possibly account for her whereabouts if she turns up dead! Ah, gothic novels.)

Are other perspectives integrated? Sometimes other people find the camera, or don’t realize that Jane left her camera on somewhere. Mostly, however, this is Jane’s story, and she tells it well.

Inventiveness Outdoor shots, not afraid to get downright creepy, meta-commentary episode of Mary Rivers watching all of Jane’s videos.

Quality of Adaptation Jane Eyre is a pretty weird novel, by modern standards, and a problematic one, what with its shortsighted treatment of race, mental illness (the half-Creole Mason family hinted as being somewhat crude and prone to mental illness), and culture (Adele and her mother are put down for being French), and its arguably unhealthy relationships (since Rochester is kind of a jerk who has slept with a lot of women, and St. John is… well… Jane’s cousin). So I’m glad a lot of this is either removed or approached with more sensitivity, while preserving much of the darkness of the original novel.

However, the adaptation does lose the supernatural element that makes the original a gothic novel. Also, since Jane isn’t facing nearly as steep of odds in terms of her class and gender, she’s as a result a softer character. But she is nonetheless strong and principled in the face of going it alone, and her story of finding a place and people to belong to is just as fulfilling as the original.Though the ending may feel rushed due to circumstances beyond the show’s control, overall it’s a strong modern adaptation.

The New Adventures of Peter and Wendy, 2014-2016

(Adaptation of J.M. Barrie’s 1904 play, Peter Pan, and 1911 novel, Peter and Wendy)

Note: This only covers Seasons 1-2, as I haven’t gotten around to Season 3 yet.

Conceit In the town of Neverland, Ohio, 27-year-old Wendy Darling runs an advice blog through her family’s paper, the Kensington Chronicle, which also captures the lives of her brothers, John and Michael, her vitriolic female friend Lily Bagha, and her best friend (who wants the be more-than-a-friend), Peter Pan.

The blog fits with Wendy’s motherly personality from the original story, but realistically doesn’t show all the action happening in front of Wendy’s camera.Not-as-realistically, the rest of the action occurs from Tinkerbell’s perspective, but it is so brilliantly done that it seems like fairies should have been included in a web series ages ago!

Audience acknowledgement & interaction On Wendy’s vlogs, Wendy does talk to the audience and answers questions, though I think most are fabricated to move the plot along.During the fairy-cam moments, no acknowledgement of audience directly, but the businesses and characters created by audience members on the Neverland Twitter registrar are sometimes referenced (and on that note, the P + W social media platforms interact a LOT with their audience).

Are other perspectives integrated? The fairy-cam gives the audience more movement and perspectives than Wendy’s vlog alone would allow, and each character gets their day in the sun, so kudos to P + W for that! Season 2 also adds cameras in Wendy’s office at JhMedia (similar to Emma Approved) and Peter’s playacting videos, splitting the narrative between the small town and the big city in interesting parallel ways.

Inventiveness The fairy-cam, and inclusion of magic in a web series in general (though it doesn’t really effect the plot). Also, surprisingly might be the most lewd of the shows reviewed so far, due to veiled references to smoking pot and “magic” brownies.

Quality of Adaptation New Peter + Wendy is by no means a faithful adaptation of the beloved novel in terms of plot. And really, how could it be? By choosing a fantasy over a comedy of manners/period piece, the creators faced a particularly huge challenge in adaptation.

The basic tenants are there – Wendy being too old to stay where she is, escapes with Peter, but realizes she has to grow up and leave Neverland, leaving Peter behind by his own choice. But other than that, the adaptation basically takes the original characters, fleshes them out as modern 20-year-olds, and uses them and Neverland as a launch point for a rumination of what it means to grow up – or not – in the 2010s. This is highlighted even more by depicting the Neverland gang and the pirates/executives of JHMedia as contemporaries. Adulthood, here, is not about age but about attitude.

The characterizations are spot on, the plot both whimsical and deeply thought provoking, and the magic of the original is still retained in surprising ways. They even made sure Hook went by “Jas” rather than “James,” a facet of the original story lost in time.

Changing Tiger Lily, a stereotyped Native American character, into a complex woman of actual Indian descent, sacrifices the problematic element of the character without whitewashing, which the reviled prequel Pan got flack for. In a major departure, the web series also explores sexuality more in depth. (If you’d told me John Darling and Smee could be an adorable pairing before this series, I’d have called you crazy. But there you go.)

Wendy’s character, however, strays from the original in that she is allowed to be more flawed. The original Wendy was meant to be an argument in favor of women’s suffrage by depicting a female character as more sensible and responsible than the male characters. While modern Wendy is still the most responsible of her friends, she is also zany, ambitious, and sometimes even cruel, making some questionable decisions the original Wendy might not have made. Her character arc reminds me a bit of Peter Banning’s in Hook as she tries to find balance between childhood and adulthood.

I can’t say whether it was effective or not without seeing Season 3, but I love that the writers are tackling those themes.

It’s difficult to pinpoint a single element that makes an adaptation a good one. But if I had to take a stab, I think it is heart, humor, and sincerity in the characters, plus a relatable plot dealing with changes and new beginnings, that most draws people to a series, and all the ones above definitely managed to capture that!

For more literary web series, check out this comprehensive list. My recommendations: Misselthwaite Archives, From Mansfield with Love, Northbound, The Cate Morland Chronicles, Edgar Allen Poe’s Murder Mystery Dinner Party/Gala for Friends Potluck (aka Poe Party).

So, what do you think? Do you think these web series capture the best of the books they’re based on? Got any other examples you want to talk about?

[lizziebennet]

Order of favorite to least favorite Harry Potter movies and why? :)

i love getting questions like this!!! 

1. HARRY POTTER AND THE PRISONER OF AZKABAN 

this movie is the Official™ best harry potter movie. director alfonso cuaron (who would later go on to win a best director oscar for gravity) completely elevated the series from chris columbus’ movies that were obviously aimed towards children. cuaron took the source material seriously and gave us a well-crafted, well-directed, and pretty faithful harry potter movie. PoA isnt my fave book – not even close to my fave actually but this is both the best movie cinematically and the adaptation that is most enjoyable to watch over and over and over again. there are some sticky moments tho: dan’s acting in the infamous “HE WAS THEIR FRIEND!!!!” scene, the opening scene not making any sense .. at all…,  the character of dumbledore just… in general, the introduction of ron as a vehicle solely for comic relief, and the dropping of wizarding robes at hogwarts. listen, i can complain ab small things from every hp movie for HOURS but overall this movie is just FANTASTIC!! the score!!!!!!!!!! the only movie where they got harrys hair right!!!!! and definetly has the best ending of any harry potter movie. if u wanna know more ab why this movie is awesome check out this video essay which goes in depth about cuaron’s directoral style in this movie.

2. HARRY POTTER AND THE GOBLET OF FIRE

i feel like this is such an underrated hp movie tbh. goblet of fire is such an important book because it sets up the conflict for the rest of the series w voldemort’s return. and thats the main reason this movie gets my #2 spot tbh: the graveyard scene at the end of the movie. this movie isn’t perfect always, but the graveyard scene is a pivotal moment in the series and imo they hit it out of the park in this movie. they didn’t edit the scene to shorten it for time – they have harry and voldemorts first interaction be as tense and lengthy as it is in the books. the scene where voldemort comes out of the cauldron and rubs his head… it gives me chills every time. i think the dark parts of this movie is where it really shines – the opening with frank for example. it makes me SO happy that they opened the movie the same way they do in the book. they do a pretty good job w the character of moody and with showing harrys feelings of isolation and general angst. and yes, everyone has shitty hair in this movie but what can u do. i also take offense w the treatment of fleur in this movie… in fact whose idea was it to make beauxbatons an all female school? and durmstrang all male?? because that was a fucking dumb idea noah fence. another thing that i hate about this movie is the “conversation” between dumbledore and harry at the end of the movie – if you can even call it that. the talk they have in his office in the books is integral to the plot going forward and it is so shitty that they just had like a .2 second scene instead. actually, dumbledore is just horrible throughout this whole movie. another infamous moment w the “DIDYA PUT UR NAME IN THE GOBLET OF FIRE!?!??!?!” i remember that michael gambon (dumbledore) just refused to read the books ever and they completely missed the mark on dumbledore. i actually know of a lot of hp fans who hate this movie but i

3. HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF BLOOD PRINCE

i know this is a lot of people’s fave or second fave harry potter movie, but i just couldnt give it that #2 spot. its tough because hbp is my 2nd favorite book behind ootp and it means so much to me and there are just some things the movie royally fucks up that i cannot give it so much praise even though, overall it is a good movie. simply put: if i hadn’t read the books this might be my #1 or #2 movie. but alas i have so i get to judge it harshly. lets start out with what the movie does well: this movie does a gREAT job of being a coming-of-age film. we really get a sense of the characters growing up and being teens in this movie and its great and hilarious at some points. this movie also does the best job with the harry/dumbledore relationship. michael gambon stretches himself to be closer to the soft and omniscient dumbledore from the books. he doesnt exactly get there for me but its closer than in any other film with him. they do a good job with the pensive stuff and the introduction of horcruxes, and with the climax of dumledore’s death. the reemergence of quidditch is lovely. HOWEVER, this biggest most irksome thing that i just cannot get over in this movie is the fucking MESS that is harry and ginnys relationship. one of my absolute favorite parts of the book is their relationship – the way harry pines for her and the way they get together (”several sunlit days”!) and they just completely throw all of that in the trash along with ginny’s character. i also dont love how hermione is portrayed in this movie. the way they did her and ron’s relationship is just… not great. in the books its so obvious that they belong together but in the movies its like theyre both just stupid. this movie does a fantastic job of balancing comedy – giving us some of the funniest scenes in an y harry potter movie – with the darkness and threat of voldemort. the way the did the whole sequence in the cave is great. the scene where the death eaters attack the burrow is stupid and unnecessary however. and while i think they do a great job like telling the story in this movie, they dont really go deeper into harrys psyche which is one of my favorite parts of the book – harry realizing and accepting his role as the savior of the wizarding world. the prophecy is kind of ignored in the movies which is … lame but we also miss out of some of my favorite book moments: harry understanding why his parents died and vowing to fight voldemort w his last breath, harry flipping out when he learns that snape is the one who overheard the prophecy, harry fighting scrimgeour. overall, this is a fun movie to watch and it isn’t half bad, but it couldve been so much more in my opinion. 

4. HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER’S STONE

the original!!!!!!!!!! i rewatched this recently and this is ?? such a solid movie?? most of the credit for this being a good movie goes to jkr for writing a great book, but still they coudlve easily fucked up this movie and then there wouldn’t be a franchise!!!!! so i have to give it a lot of credit. it does a wonderful job of introducing us to the wizarding world, giving us our main characters, and giving us hOGWARTS. the pacing of the movie is great, the kids are soo soosososo cute in it i cant even stand it!!!!! the comedic beats hit, the emotional beats hit. the one beef i have with this movie is that they cast like 40 yr olds to be james and lily in the mirror of erised and they are not!!!!! that old !!!!!!! also they do a great job w effects considering when it was made. watching this movie is like being held by a warm blanket of childhood memories and i love it so much. 

5. HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS PART 2 

im sure some of you are surprised to see this movie so far down on my list but guess what this movie fucking infuriates me!!!!! let me just start by saying that the majority of this film is actually really good. but the small percentage of the movie that isnt good RUINS THE WHOLE THING FOR ME!!!!!! ill start with the good tho: the gringots sequences. badass. the cinematography in this movie is just like 5x better than most of the series so well done them. snape’s memories sequence is just like really fucking good okay ill give them that like the moment harry looks up after emerging from the pensive knowing he has to die GIVES ME CHILLS. voldemort killing harry in the forest. this is well shot and executed scene. harry being dead and talking w dumbledore is good too one of the only times michael gambon like acts so. the courtyard apocalypse scene. hermione’s “ill go with you”. while i object to this scene being in the movie that line is [gets choked up and cant continue]. like i said the majority of the movie is good, great even. BUT THEY FUCK UP SOME OF THE MOST IMPORTANT PARTS OF THE ENTIRE SERIES!!!!!!!!!! lets start slow: ariana dumbledore. bet u forgot she was in this movie. dont worry the writers did too. why did they make harry some kind of horcrux gps???? no???? WHY DOES HOGWARTS RANDOMLY HAVE A BOATHOUSE THAT WE’VE NEVER SEEN BEFORE?? AND WHY DID SNAPE DIE THERE?? ron and hermiones kiss in the chamber of secrets was stupid and doesnt compare to the moment in the books. dont even get me stARTED on harry and ginny. THEM NOT MENTIONING THAT REMUS AND TONKS ARE MARRIED/HAVE A KID UNTIL LUPIN IS DEAD RIP. those things bother me but nothing compares to the fucking mess that is everything after harry comes back to life. good god its the fucking most important act in the entire series… and it is a complete disaster in my opinion. just so many?? horrible?? decisions?? starting with voldemorts speech after harry is “dead”.. why did he hug draco. why. also i dont get nevilles speech at all that was stupid. the reveal that harry was alive is stupid. the fact that they dont kill the snake and have it be like this ooo will they kill the snake in time thing is STUPID. voldemort wrapping harry up in his robes?????? why???? voldemort and harry jumping off a building together???? WHY???? voldemort and harry melding faces????? WHY?????!?!?!?!?!??!?! it just doesnt make any sort of logical sense and its not so exciting to watch. why wouldnt voldemort just KILL HARRY ANY OF THOSE TIMES??? iT DOESNT MAKE SENSE?? i fukcinNNGNNG hate it im sorry. and the final like showdown between them is just not as good as it is in the books??? like them circling each other in the great hall with everyone watching as dawn breaks >> them crawling through rubble outside on a bridge. also it REALLY FUCKING IRKS ME THAT VOLDEMORT LIKE DISINTEGRATES INTO PAPER WHEN HE DIES LIKE. that completely undoes a lot of what the books are saying and like lessens the impact of his death imo. the whole point is that he was trying to be like this immortal god but in the end he died just like everyone else he was HUMAN. they also do that w bellatrix like when molly kills her she like ?? explodes?? it just lessens their deaths i think. and the lack of closure with the elder wand like harry just fucking throwing it into the distance is DUMB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ugg ugg ugg. i know my expectations were high and i know its a tough task to finish the series buT they really let me down with the FUCKING CLIMAX OF THE SERIES. like guys it was epic enough in the books u dont need to add this nonsense!!! jfc!!!!

6. HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS PART 1   

noah fence this movie is just really unenjoyable to watch. its a tough movie to make bc its like 95% just setting up for what happens in part two, but i think they def couldve done a wayyy better job in some areas. one of the great things ab deathly hallows the book is harrys psyche and how angry he is with dumbledore, how he is trying to figure out these clues, his desperation, his fascination with the hallows etc. they really underplayed harrys anger with dumbledore imo giving it just one or two scenes and a handful of moments when i think it couldve been such an interesting emotional core of the movie. they do a good job showing the war and having it be like war movie and being isolated. but they struggle with pace in this one a LOT. however two sequences really stand out to me as Good: 1. bathilda bagshot’s house. in the theater the snake was TERRIFYING waiting for it to jump out that was a good action sequence. 2. the tale of the three brothers. beautiful animation. the ron/hermione conflict with couldve been another emotional center of the movie is glossed over in my opinion (maybe this has something to do w the fact that emma watson can not act like she is enraged???). overall meh tho. i dont go to rewatch this one very often. 

7. HARRY POTTER AND THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS

this movie is………….. not great. again it relies totally and completely on jkrs work for any of the good parts of this movie and considering that this may be my least favorite book well…. the camera work in this movie is just bad honestly like they just plop the camera in one spot and film the scene???? gilderoy lockhart is HILARIOUS in this movie however a real gem. there are some good sequences and i love this movie but there are also lots and lots of cringey moments. 

8. HARRY POTTER AND THE ORDER OF THE PHOENIX 

i debated whether i hate this movie or CoS more but ultimately decided on this one because this movie makes me so angry and CoS is just like moderately not great. [deep breath] ok guys heres the thing: OOTP is my favorite harry potter book. and this movie takes exactly zero (0) of my favorite things about the book and does them in the film. the tone of this movie is angst and suffering but not even in a good way. i love LOVE the angst in the book because it is justified it is raw it is harry working through his feelings and being attacked from every side. the movie just communicates…. sad. theyre just like “oh lets uh have this be blue toned… nice.” they do not go deeper than the plot of OOTP, just the events that happen. they dont get into the story, the message, the POINT OF THE BOOK!!!!!!!!! were they afraid to have people yell in this movie??? like ??? they have mrs figg be soft spoken and just like murmur to harry and uncle vernon and aunt petunia dont really go in at harry like its all very tame?? and then THEY MISS OUT ON HARRY DRAGGING RON AND HERMIONE SO HARD WHEN HE GETS TO THE BURROW!!!!! an iconique scene that instead harry just like says some stuff passive aggressively and then fred and george come and are like “we thought we heard u yelling harry” like how??? he was just speaking at a normal voice??? the movie skips out on the fascinating moments with the order at grimmold place and with ginny and the weasleys to instead give us sirius naked in some weird room at the train station and harry dreaming about voldemort in a suit??? why????????? generally they do a good job with the umbridge stuff but again fail to communicate the deeper meaning of what the fuck is happening like the mINISTRY OF MAGIC IS DENYING THIS!! and what does that do to harry?? and his angst?? some of the stuff with the DA is good but some of it is… not. this movie really fails when they try to incorporate comic relief. it doesnt land great and it just makes me think about how much time we are wasting on this when we could be doing other things. FOR EXAMPLE GRAWP????? GRAWP.  i hate the dumbledore stuff in this movie. like. their relationship isnt set up enough in the previous movies to understand how hurt harry is by dumbledore. instead we get like half-assed scenes like when harry just like calls “sir” to dumbledore but he walks away fast like. really?? THE WAY THEY DID SNAPES’ WORST MEMORY [SCREAMS FOR 1200 YEARS]. LAZY! AS! SHIT! GOD GOD GOD GOD GOD GOD GOD GOD WHAT A NIGHTMARE WHAT A TOTAL DISASTER MY GOODDDddddddd AND THEN ITS LIKE NEVER EVEN ADDRESSED AGAIN???? JESUS CHRIST I SWEAR TO GOD THIS MOVIE IS A MESS. the break into the ministry is okay… its starts the david yates trend of like not saying spells while ur dueling and just having like bright lights come from ur wand which i HATE and also the stupid trend of death eaters apparating with black smoke which i HATE. i have mixed feelings about “nice one james.” sirius’s death is GOOD like the way they have it silent with harry like screaming i like that they did a good job a+. however dumledore and voldemorts fight is……….. strange and just not as good as in the books. also when voldemort possesses harry and harry like has a chat w him?? DUMB. and that leads me to the greatest sin of all…… the reason this movie gets the last ranking… THE LACK OF HARRY AND DUMBLEDORE’S TALK AFTER SIRIUS’S DEATH. my absolute favorite moment in the books. unparalleled. some of the best writing i have ever seen in my life. JUST COMPLETELY GONE. IT MAKES NO SENSE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THEY MENTION LIKE THE PROPHECY IN THE MOST FUCKING LAZY WAY EVER IN LIKE HALF OF A SCENE THAT LASTS 1 MINUTE. AND JUST SHOW SOME LAME ASS NEWSPAPER MONTAGE WHICH IS SOOOOOO LAZYYY OH MY GOOOOOODDDDDDDDD. we get NO emotional resolution for harry and dumbledore. we get NO resolution for harry and sirius. its like these events that happen have ZERO consequences. THE PROPHECY!!!! THAT IS THE CENTRAL PART OF THE STORY MY GOD!!! harry finds out he is THE CHOSEN ONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! JUST CUT OUT OF THE STORY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! BUT NO WE NEED A SCENE WHERE FILCH GETS BOILS!!!!!!!!! like harry after sirius’s death is so critical like him asking nick if sirius can come back…. harry smashing the mirror… you get none of that emotional depth, that grieving. the ending of the movie is also stupid. also why tf is harry wearing a BLAZER????? god i hate this movie. 

i swear i did not mean for this to get so long but once i start talking about harry potter i CANNOT shut up im so sorry and thanks for asking babe

[zhangedward]

How To Get Cat Pee Out Of Leather Jacket Marvelous Useful Tips

When they got along perfect and were surprised to see why.A medicated bath is commonly found on amazon it was pretty easy to ensure that your allergy is fur specific, not in its own habits, abilities and behavior.Because of the soiled area very well, you can do the things that you can be used to the cat's metabolism.Scratching is probably the most significant things about cats in the litter box owing to its proprietorship.

This means that you are having a heatstroke by trying one or more, check it out.Outdoor cat safety is one issue most cat lovers have waiting for him. Mild bad breath that persists or gets worse despite home treatment may require a magnet on their illness to your home.More importantly, future pregnancies are easily available at your cats attention and love.We all know cats have always had a cat urine on carpets, to spraying, to not neutering your male cat fixed, a female cat will respond when they want when they reach to scratch to its new home on your cat has been noticed that their tongues are like that.

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Cat Pee Bacteria

Rough play, scratching, biting and scratching, and hissing.These types of troubles call for exceptional care.Scratching is also perfectly acceptable and can be quite easily made.Start with them that they will be familiar with your cat, the last joint of all is, they are using their claws removed.You should also include a fur spray that horrid scented urine!

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That's where you can continue to feed and keep them separated for a few feet away form a mixture.Be sure to know its name, this is by using the litter box and dispose of it.You can do to help keep the neighborhood cats and in no time.Part of the cat feel comfortable cutting your own touch to hair of the sink so the following things.Renovations in the house when you utter a certain area, it nevertheless lays claim to its territory.

Cat Spraying Blood

The most common problems leading to inappropriate elimination and urine smell and hear one another and a very unpleasant when they do not scratch or puncture the cat's ear.Vinegar is one cause of concern to the cat what she wants everyone to know by nature that they display is instinctive for them will probably behave differently, in some occasions, and grief follows after an animal's death due to the cat from an area, other cats that are left.Plants to grow and common in neutered cats are like rabbits when it is quite rainy, or watching them come and you just invested in?Insects - Fleas are a number of diseases that cause aggressive behavior, especially those that suffer from symptoms carry and inhaler to help your cats have occupied all continents, Asia, Europe, and America, except for Antarctica.Antifreeze leaking from a certified vets office, don't take the advice you find that they mark their territory.

Take notice if the bristles are metal, can cut his mouth.So how are trapped to be very troublesome for those who aren't.These foods work well and then there are some of it to be tied down to rest, suffocating your now squashed bedding plants.Steam cleaning carpet and clean the area and then cover the material of choice, but still not ideal as your furniture when the baby comes home.It is very old, it will be far more effective spot cleaning.

[esonetwork]

A blog of ice and fire: Thoughts on Game of Thrones seasons 4 & 5

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A blog of ice and fire: Thoughts on Game of Thrones seasons 4 & 5

I’m still mad about the infamous “red wedding,” but nevertheless, my first-time viewing of Game of Thrones continues with seasons 4 and 5.

I’m really starting to pick up speed now — I watched the first season in about a month, but I finished season 4 in a week. It’s interesting because even though I heard what I thought were a lot of spoilers about this show, there’s still a lot of details I don’t know, and I’m dying to find out what happens to certain characters. (Also, they had better not let any harm come to poor Samwell Tarly — he has such a lovely, kind soul and at least ONE PERSON on this show deserves to find happiness, darn it!)

Revenge and forgiveness

***Warning: Spoilers ahead!***

The Stark family keeps running into worse and worse luck, but at least now it’s time for the Lannisters to have a little taste of their own medicine. Karma finally catches up with King Joffrey and he’s poisoned at his own wedding. Also, Tywin’s days of manipulating his family are over, as the patriarch also meets his end, at the hands of his son Tyrion.

While Joffrey’s death comes as a relief to viewers (and just about everyone in Westeros), his absence doesn’t really settle the political tensions in the realm. In fact, it kicks off a murder “trial” (I’m putting “trial” in quotation marks here because there’s nothing particularly just or impartial about it), which eventually leads to Tyrion first killing his father, as referenced earlier, and then officially joining #TeamTargaryen.

As viewers we’ve been waiting a long time to see Joffrey get his comeuppance. He’s both a terrible ruler and a terrible person, and he was bad news for the future of Westeros. And yet, it’s interesting how revenge is never really as satisfying as you think it’s going to be. Joffrey’s death doesn’t erase all the evil things he’s done; Ned Stark is still dead, and there’s still a war going on. The legacy he left continues to poison those around him.

Speaking of revenge, I’m curious to see how Arya Stark’s character continues to develop, and how her feelings regarding her quest for vengeance may or may not change. (Side note: Her time training with the shape-shifters is super interesting, and I’m excited to see more magic making its way into the show.)

Arya has experienced far too much trauma and tragedy for someone who’s still so very young, and I don’t blame her for wanting to avenge her family. Still, there’s a very fine line between justice and revenge, and a good person who’s consumed by a desire for vengeance can easily cross over to the dark side themselves.

The opposite of revenge is, of course, forgiveness, and I’m curious to see what Game of Thrones has to say in regards to this theme. We haven’t seen much forgiveness at work, which is a shame because redemption and forgiveness are two of my favorite themes in stories (it’s why I love Star Wars so much, and it’s also why “Return of the Jedi” is one of my top favorite Star Wars movies). I believe that forgiveness and healing are an important part of the human experience.

Game of Thrones is challenging, though, because there are some characters that I really, really hate, and who seem beyond redemption. Some of the villains on Game of Thrones display a level of evil and cruelty that force me to look away from the screen. How does a character like Arya reach a place of forgiveness and peace within herself, while also ensuring that justice is done and that corrupt leaders are prevented from harming others in the future?

Daenerys is also wrestling with these same questions, as she tries to cement her status as queen and end corruption in the realms she encounters. What kind of punishment should she dole out in the lands she conquers, to the people who have done genuinely bad things? How do you mix mercy with justice?

I don’t think the show has really revealed what it thinks the answers to these questions are yet, but I’m sure this will continue to be explored in coming seasons.

A dangerous dynasty

Even though I’m very much #TeamStark (a fact I’ve probably mentioned too many times already in this series of blogs), a character who has really grown on me throughout this series is Tyrion, and it was hard to watch almost all his friends and family abandon him during the trial where he is falsely accused of murder.

Peter Dinklage puts so much emotion and depth into his performance, and you can’t help but empathize with him. And what an epic speech when he tells off the entire courtroom full of people from King’s Landing; it didn’t exactly go over well with his audience, but I was definitely cheering!

It’s interesting to watch how the Lannisters regularly serve as the architects of their own doom. Jaime Lannister started this whole mess all the way back in season 1 by pushing Bran out the window. Joffrey’s selfish cruelty paints a giant target on his back. Then, Tywin’s repeated mistreatment of his son Tyrion leads to his own death and the loss of one of the best strategists in King’s Landing.

Well, the capital’s loss is Dany’s gain, as Tyrion takes his clever wits and political prowess to the Mother of Dragons, lending his support to the Targaryen dynasty. I can’t wait to see how their partnership plays out.

Tyrion will also be extra glad that he got out of King’s Landing when he finds out about the dumpster fire that place has turned into. Cersei gambles on an alliance with the High Sparrow, only to have him turn on her and throw her into prison. Cersei really can be a nasty person, but in the end I do pity her, because her life, on the whole, has probably been a very unhappy experience.

Cersei is smart and capable, but in the male-dominated world of Westeros, she’s treated dismissively. She has to fight for whatever power she does wield. If both she and Tyrion had been treated with more respect, and were placed in a more welcoming environment that allowed them to truly flourish, it’s interesting to ponder what they may have accomplished.

There are way too many other character arcs to cover in one blog, but it’s also cool to see Jon Snow emerging as a leader and trying to combat the growing threat of the White Walkers. Brienne of Tarth continues to be one of my favorite characters, and I love that we get to learn more about her backstory. Plus, Podrick is a great sidekick for her, and I love seeing their adventures together.

Also, in the beginning I really hated Theon Greyjoy, and I’m surprised to admit that I now genuinely feel sorry for him. He’s done some bad things, but seeing the way Ramsay Bolton has broken him physically, mentally, and emotionally is just gut-wrenching.

Speaking of Ramsay Bolton, he now joins King Joffrey on my list of most hated fictional characters of all time. I flinch every time he’s onscreen, and I’m getting mad just writing about him. Ugh ⁠— it’s time for him to go!

Responsibility in storytelling

This leads me to the final point I’d like to discuss, and it’s one I’ve heard other viewers talking about throughout the series. Does Game of Thrones sometimes go too far in its depiction of violence, particularly its focus on sexual violence against women?

There’s a scene in season 5 involving Ramsay Bolton and his new wife, Sansa Stark, that so deeply troubled me that I don’t even really want to write about it. I don’t cry a lot while watching movies/TV, but his horrible treatment of Sansa really got to me. We’ve seen many female characters who have been sexually mistreated throughout the series, including Cersei, Dany, and nearly Brienne.

Is this something that should be shown onscreen? I know that events like this happened in the real-life medieval era; however, any time you portray a sensitive topic in fiction, you have to do it responsibly. Hopefully Ramsay will be called to account for all the awful things he’s done, but that won’t erase the trauma Sansa has experienced.

I love Game of Thrones, but I believe it is perfectly fair to call out the writers, and to wish that they’d handled these sensitive scenes with greater care. Also, the scene of Jaime forcing himself on his sister Cersei felt out of character and has made it tough for me to root for a redemption arc for him anymore. According to an article I read, that scene wasn’t even in the books, which makes its inclusion in the show all the more frustrating.

This issue is more complex than can be covered in one article, but I think it’s good to talk about it. Fiction can raise awareness about the realities of rape and sexual violence throughout history, and motivate people to take action against it. But this topic should never be sensationalized or used for mere shock value, which is sometimes the case in Game of Thrones.

Closing thoughts

I am now over halfway through this series, and pieces of the narrative continue to fall into place. Also, thank goodness I have heard some spoilers about season 6, because the ending of season 5 is definitely a shocker. The Night’s Watch turns on Jon Snow and leaves him bleeding out on the ground, presumably dead.

I definitely would have been raging at “red wedding” levels of angry, but thankfully I already know he comes back, so the scene wasn’t as traumatic as it otherwise would have been. Still, I’m definitely going to be in a hurry to get to the library after work today to pick up a copy of season 6!

[timeflies1007-blog]

Doctor Who Reviews by a Female Doctor, Season 6, p. 1

Warning: These reviews contain spoilers for this and other seasons of the reboot, as well as occasional references to the classic series. 

Previously on Doctor Who: The universe ended, but then it didn’t. (Hurray!) Last season ended on the most unequivocally positive note of any season of the reboot, in which nobody died (at least not permanently), nobody suffered a catastrophic fate, and everything concluded with a lovely wedding. This season is a very different kind of story; in spite of the numerous deaths that don’t stick, this season is full of consequences, and of the dark side of the much brighter narrative that we got in Season Five. “Dark side” is the easiest term to use in describing this shift, but it doesn’t get at the entirety of what is going on here. I would argue that this is, in some senses, among the most hopeful seasons of the show, and certainly one of the most redemptive character arcs. Problems are awfully hard to fix this season—much, much harder than in most previous ones and certainly than in the immediate predecessor—but our heroes try so strenuously to emerge from these problems that I wind up with feelings that are a lot warmer and fuzzier than one might expect from the relative bleakness of this narrative.

This season has a reputation for devoting too little attention to Amy’s feelings, particularly in light of her pregnancy and subsequent separation from her baby. It’s a widespread view, but not really one that I get. To me, about 90% of the season is about Amy, to the point that I can understand criticisms that it’s too closely focused on her feelings more than I can understand the opposite. I do think that the season is better at representing her feelings of loss and grief than it is at exploring her bodily experience, but overall we get enough detail about her mental state that I only very rarely feel like she’s being underwritten. A more complex issue is the methods by which Moffat portrays Amy’s crisis. This season is pretty thoroughly wrapped up in concepts of silence and, to a lesser extent, vision. This raises the possibility of ableist metaphors, the kind that develop when writers use blindness, deafness, muteness, etc. as ways of making a point about moral failings. For the most part, I think the season avoids falling into this trap. As I’ll explain in more detail later in the season, I think that the inobservability of certain forms of trauma, as well as the difficulties in communication that stem from them, are very real parts of Amy’s circumstances, so that while there are metaphorical treatments of these issues, they are tied to very real mental health issues in which sight and speech play integral roles, and so it doesn’t come across to me as using disability as an analogy for unrelated experiences. It’s a difficult issue, though, and one that I’m trying to be attentive to as I write about these aspects of the season.  

There are so many ways to interpret this season, and this can lead to questions about what Moffat actually meant this narrative to be about. It’s certainly a question worth considering, but I’m not terribly invested in the answer. Amy’s story this season means very specific things to me, grounded in my own experiences, and I’m not particularly concerned with whether or not Moffat completely intended the story to function in the way that I see it. I do think that at least pieces of the story seem to have been intentionally composed in the ways that I understand them, but there are so many pieces to this narrative that my interpretation of some of them might be completely different from what Moffat meant. Explaining how this season comes across to me is especially difficult because it’s so dependent on how the episodes fit together with each other; it’s hard to articulate the importance of individual episodes, sometimes, and so this season’s review may be more than usually centered on the review of the season as a whole at the end.

This is also the season in which we get a pre-credits voiceover sequence, a.k.a. Amy Pond telling us “When I was a little girl, I had an imaginary friend…” and then going into a tiny synopsis of her friendship with the Doctor. I’m not really sure why this is here or who it was intended to be useful for, because anyone who’s seen the show before knows this information and anyone who jumps into the show in the middle of this season is going to have a lot of questions that aren’t answered by this segment. It’s pretty annoying, but if you watch on Amazon the fast-forward button is a very helpful friend whenever this voiceover comes up. Given the unusual amount of connection between this season and its predecessor, though, something of a recap of what has gone before is appropriate, particularly as a way into Amy’s mentality. A more accurate and useful version might go something like this: “When Amy Pond was a little girl, she had an imaginary friend, and she spent much of her childhood struggling to keep believing in him. He came back, and so did Amy’s belief in his capacity to rewrite time. He’s done so many wonderful things that even death seems rewritable. Amy’s particular brand of faith ran away with her, and they’ve been running ever since.” And…here we go.

A Christmas Carol: There are about sixty billion versions of A Christmas Carol, but to my knowledge this is the only one with flying sharks. This episode features a lot of whimsy, both shark-related and otherwise, but it’s deceptively serious as well. Some Doctor Who Christmas episodes are integral to seasonal arcs on the show, while others function more as standalones. This one is unusual in that it looks like the latter, but turns out to be much more connected to the season than it initially appears. In fact, it’s connected to two seasons, and one could see it as Season Five’s endpoint almost as much as the start of Season Six. In some ways, it functions as a sort of bridge between the two seasons, but I see this primarily as our first foray into the odd combination of light and solemnity that characterizes much of Season Six. “Halfway out of the darkness” could be seen as the theme of this season, and so the Doctor’s use of this phrase to define Christmas is our introduction to an important concept.

           It’s also our first step into the troubling side of the “time can be rewritten” idea, which is hugely important for Season Six. At the end of the last season, the Doctor basically rewrote the universe, fixing at least some of the pieces of existence that disappeared through the time crack and rewriting time on a very large scale. Here, this happens on a much smaller, more personal level, and while it brings about Kazran Sardick’s redemption, it also comes across as invasive and potentially destructive. Season Six devotes a great deal of time to the human cost of miracles, and it’s pretty concerning that, while Kazran might have wound up a better man because of the Doctor’s interference, he’s also a different one, to the extent that his technology no longer recognizes his brain. The ethical implications of essentially rewriting a person, even if the rewrite is morally superior to the original, are not really discussed here but this moment of his brain literally becoming unrecognizable highlights just how much of an impact the Doctor’s actions can have. It’s such a dramatic change that it’s difficult to avoid thinking “Would the Doctor really be all right with just giving someone an entirely new backstory, complete with memories of experiences and connections that had never existed before?” and this question persists until we go back to the honeymooning couple and remember that last season’s happy ending pretty much depended on exactly that happening to Amy.

We also get the season’s first mention of silence—not, in this case, a scary monster, but an aspect of loneliness. I didn’t really listen to the lyrics in Abigail’s song the first time I watched the episode, but they’re eerily appropriate for the upcoming season. Lines like “When you’re alone, silence is all you know” and “Let in the shadow; let in the light of your bright shadow” are awfully cheesy, but Christmas episodes can get away with a little bit more cheese than usual, and the song is just so pretty that it gets away with the lack of subtlety. Given the rest of the season’s attention to Amy remaining steadfastly silent about a lot of her problems and refusing to acknowledge the shadow in her life, in retrospect it seems like a song about the growth that she needs to do this season. Because the episode feels like a commentary on Amy’s arc this season, I’m ok with her relatively small role in this episode, and even the return of the kiss-o-gram outfit only annoys me a little bit.

I am more bothered by the treatment of Abigail herself, even though I love her and I’m happy whenever she’s on screen. It’s sort of weird to apply the concept of fridging to a character who is so vibrant and lively throughout the episode, and who doesn’t actually die in it, but if you’re going to have a female character’s impending demise operating as an important plot point, it’s probably a good idea to avoid literally putting her in a giant freezer. There are quite a few rankings of Christmas specials on the internet, and while there are of course fluctuations between the lists, this one is the clear favorite. I do think that it’s the most creative and possibly the most fun, but I would rank it behind at least one and maybe several of the other specials on the grounds that Moffat doesn’t manage to give Abigail a storyline that’s meaningful to her (as opposed to being a motivation for Kazran’s narrative) to go along with the dynamic personality and gorgeous voice.

           When it’s not putting Abigail on ice, this episode is thoroughly delightful in spite of its serious attention to the season’s darker themes. The production design brings together exactly the right combination of quirk and genuine beauty in creating a stunningly gorgeous planet. The fish/sharks are brilliant—the whole scenario is weirdly believable as the basis for this planet’s economy and power structures, and young Kazran’s account of the bonding that he missed out on when he was away from school during a fish attack gives us an intriguing glimpse into the role that the fish play in this culture. The Doctor reacts charmingly to them, particularly in his optimistic assertion that “I bet I get some very interesting readings off my sonic screwdriver when I get it back from the shark in your bedroom.” Even beyond the goofy charm of the fish, the episode is a strong adaptation of Dickens’s novella. This is partly because of Michael Gambon’s strong performance as Kazran Sardick—a name that nicely exaggerates Dickens’s proclivity for character-appropriate naming. What’s most impressive, though, is the way the episode works with the past/present/future structure. Much of the episode weaves smoothly between the first two, allowing us to watch the older Kazran remember the memories that didn’t exist until the Doctor showed up. I fully expected the future part of the story to involve a trip into Kazran’s near future, as the TARDIS would make it easy enough to get him there. Just when the episode looks like it’s going to do a pretty conventional take on Christmas Yet to Come, it does something thoroughly unexpected; this season is pretty plot-twist heavy, but few of the later revelations startle me quite as much as the sudden appearance of young Kazran, staring fearfully into the old man who has become his future. I can’t quite articulate why this works so well, but I was so surprised by this approach when I first saw the episode that it completely took my breath away.

While Abigail’s literal fridging diminishes my enjoyment a bit, I’m incredibly impressed with how well this special brings together serious psychological issues with a truly fun, entertaining story. We get a lot of attention, in this season, to the rewriting of time, and to the presence of Silence—in most cases, these are part of big, complicated, large-scale stories. Seeing them operate as pieces of a much more intimate, personal tale of loss is an important introduction to how one should think about the events that lie ahead. The episode isn’t without missteps, but a beautiful set, stunning character work, and flying sharks all in one episode are a pretty fabulous Christmas present. A-

The Impossible Astronaut: This is technically the start of the major arc of Season Six, but it picks up so many ideas from “A Christmas Carol” and from the end of Season Five that it feels like the opening number of Act Two rather than the beginning of a completely new story. Watching the Doctor die a few minutes into the episode is a shocking moment, both because it’s the protagonist’s demise and because of the unusualness of the murder method—namely, being shot by an astronaut who has emerged from the depths of an American lake. It’s pretty clear that the Doctor isn’t really dead, as the show can’t exactly move forward without him, but trying to figure out exactly what happened and how he wriggled out of what looks like certain death is fun even in the certainty that it won’t stick.

           There is an immensely enjoyable sense of silliness at work here that erases any sense of self-importance that might otherwise come from appearing to kill of your lead character in a season premiere. The Doctor’s attention-getting historical forays at the beginning of the episode are a bit hit-or-miss for me, but the scenes at the White House are sublimely funny (with the very brief exception that we definitely didn’t need the Doctor referring to his companions as “the legs, the nose, and Mrs. Robinson.”) The shocked reaction to a big blue box turning up in the oval office is particularly well done, as is the dialogue in the ensuing scene: the Secret Service officer yelling “Do not compliment the intruder!” is probably my favorite line, but the Doctor trying to requisition a fez and some jammy dodgers is a close second. Canton is an immediate delight, coming across as smart and snarky and just a little bit bewildered about all of the sci-fi material that is suddenly unfolding around him.

           The episode’s considerable humor competes with quite a lot of serious material. This is due in part to River’s increasing consciousness of the difficulties of her relationship with the Doctor, who knows less about her each time they meet. Even more importantly, Silence has been threatened, foreshadowed, and even sung about, but this is the episode in which it finally becomes monstrous. I don’t think I’d get a lot of agreement on this, but to me, the Silence are Moffat’s greatest monsters. Yes, I like them better than the Weeping Angels. The idea of a monster that you forget when you’re not looking at it is inherently frightening, offers a lot of potential for really interesting subtext, and works incredibly well in a visual medium. Watching the characters go back and forth between terror and total ease is fascinating, and the music underscoring some of these scenes helps to make these moments even more effective.

           The monsters aren’t the only things creating emotional imbalance in this episode. Amy, who is finally in an outfit that no one could reasonably interpret as an attempt to over-sexualize her, goes through quite a lot of turmoil here. After the events of the previous season, it’s unsurprising that her ability to process grief in a healthy way is slipping. She does react tearfully to the Doctor’s “death,” but her immediate reaction to it also essentially involves rewriting it in more palatable terms in her mind—“maybe it’s a doppelganger, or a clone,” she insists, as she frantically tries to piece together the version of this story in which things will turn out okay. Even after she sees the Doctor alive again, she starts thinking about how his eventual death can be unwritten. This reaches its climax when she grabs a gun and shoots at the astronaut, which is shot in crazy slow motion that should be awfully cheesy but somehow is marvelous. There is a lot of focus this season on Amy’s disillusionment with certain aspects of her relationship with the Doctor, and this is the first moment that she turns away from his principles, even if it is brief and she misses. (I would see this as a cop-out if the events of the season finale didn’t happen, but they do and so I don’t.) “Time can be rewritten” is a hopeful expression, sort of, but it’s also one that takes away the possibility of closure, that stops one from recognizing the need to move on. Amy’s willing to do anything to rewrite time here, even to the extent of pointing a gun at a stranger and pulling the trigger, and for all the excitement in this episode, it’s her psychological state that I find most chilling. A-

Day of the Moon: Sometimes, Moffat has a tendency to write something stunningly brilliant and then distract from its brilliance by including one or two really annoying things, and this episode is one of the most prominent examples. This story, and particularly this second part of it, is terrific, and if it were not for a couple of glaring missteps, I would put this episode well within the top 30 of the reboot. Its ranking plummets, however, (to, I think slightly outside my top 70 in the eleven seasons so far) because of a couple of brief moments that draw attention to their own stupidity and distract me from how fabulous the rest of the episode is.

           I’ll get into the things that bother me in a little bit, but let me first say that what definitely doesn’t bother me is the plot-driven nature of this two-parter. It is inarguably the case that a LOT is happening here, and the sheer magnitude of the plot is one of the things that puts a lot of people off about this season. There are definitely some aspects of the seasonal arc that suffer from the narrative twistiness, and while I do think that there is far more character-driven work this season than it tends to get credit for, this episode is one of the plottier ones. The thing is, plot twists are usually intellectual devices grounded in being flashy and impressive, but sometimes events come together in such a perfect way that I do wind up reacting emotionally. Watching what looks like chaos be revealed as order carries with it a sort of surprised sense that things look nicer than what I expected, sort of like suddenly seeing a kitten. My heart just goes, “My goodness, I wasn’t expecting you!” and pieces of this episode bring out that kind of reaction in me, to the point where, if I were a person who tended to cry at television shows, I’d be sniffling about how lovely the narrative structure is.

           We begin the episode with precisely the kind of giddily brilliant scenes that I’m talking about, as Canton appears to hunt down and kill the entire Pond family, while keeping the Doctor locked up in a familiar-looking prison. (And yes, you could see this as a bit repetitive, but I kind of love that there was pretty clearly an offscreen exchange in which Canton asked the Doctor how to construct the facade of a perfect prison for containing him, and the Doctor just described the Pandorica. It’s nice when he’s willing to get ideas from all his worst enemies. I hope the Doctor did impressions of all the monsters while he was explaining the plan to Canton.) The invisible TARDIS suddenly coming to light, the Ponds complaining about a lack of airholes in their body bags, River falling backwards off a building and into the TARDIS swimming pool…it’s such a stunning bit of goofiness and I love it. The show can’t spend too much time on hijinks like the swimming pool business or it would start to look awfully self-indulgent, but in small doses it’s just incredibly charming.

After the delights of the opening sequence, we learn more about the Silence and the efforts being made to remember them. The lines drawn on the skin as a memory technique never fail to scare the hell out of me this season, but I also like the implanted voicemails, which are nicely creepy ways of getting across just how much is being forgotten. The children’s home is a solidly atmospheric setting, and while I get a bit annoyed about the amount of time spent on a kidnapped Amy pleading for help, her initial wander around the house is a strong introduction to her role in the little girl’s life. The notion that the Silence have manipulated humanity into traveling to the moon so that they can get access to fancy spacesuits is also pretty frightening—this whole episode really emphasizes just how much influence the Silence have had on Earth, and their input on space exploration is a good example of how far their impact has extended. I do have a few qualms about the role that they have played in influencing human affairs; there are moments in this episode that seem to lurk pretty close to just removing human agency altogether through the suggestion that the Silence have been manipulating us into almost everything we’ve ever done. The depiction of 1960s America is so vibrant in this episode, though, and the characters are so full of purpose and energy, that it doesn’t come across as a brainwashed world.

The entire plot is captivating, but the Doctor’s defeat of the Silence is the clear high point, and is one of my favorite resolutions ever on this show. A couple of factors make this work, the first being how suggestible people are when they are looking at a Silent. The Doctor makes clear—by having Canton look at a Silent and telling him to adjust his bowtie—that people can be influenced by what they have heard while looking at a Silent, even when they have forgotten the entire experience. The quasi-hypnotic possibilities certainly play a role here, but I would say that the pattern of remembering and forgetting associated with the Silence also makes the Doctor’s plan work. It has been established that everyone forgets the Silence only when they are not looking at them; Amy, for instance, remembers seeing the Silent at the lake when she sees another in the White House bathroom. Everyone who ever watches the footage of the moon landing will therefore see the “You should kill us all on sight” message, immediately forget it once the image has passed, and then remember it only if they happen to come across another Silent. The proper version of the moon landing thus stays intact in everybody’s memory, but if they find themselves in the company of a Silent, they will suddenly regain the knowledge that they need to see the Silent as an enemy. In spite of the hypnotic influence of the Silent’s words, this doesn’t necessarily mean that everyone will actually try to kill them—I can imagine that some would be too frightened to take them on, and others would just be incapable. The increased presence of human knowledge and aggression, though, means that the Silence face a world that is more hostile and dangerous, and have a legitimate reason for seeking a new planet to rule. What’s especially brilliant about the Doctor’s plan is that because of the general state of forgetfulness, it doesn’t push humanity to hunt down the Silence and try to drive them away; whether the “kill us on sight” line is functioning as hypnotic influence or people are remembering instructions when they see a Silent, the impulse depends on being in close enough proximity to the Silence that they are actually visible. This gives the Silence the information that their safety has been compromised, thereby giving them the incentive to go somewhere else, and so if they’re careful about not being seen, they should be able to get away. (They’re good at appropriating human technology, so I can imagine that they would be able to get themselves to another planet.) It’s a revolution by warning, in which nobody really needs to get killed, and the whole notion of uploading cell phone footage into a 1960s video in order to let scary monsters know that they need to abandon Earth is just such a creative way of resolving things that I absolutely love it. You could make the argument, and many have, that Moffat can get too clever-clogs for his own good, but watching the narrative click into place like this—I don’t know, the world just looks a bit sunnier for a while. It’s not often that you want to hug a cell phone, but I really do by the end of this story.

The surprises don’t stop there, as we conclude the episode with the revelation that the little girl that they have been looking for is regenerating. We know so little about her at this point that I don’t have that much of a reaction to the character’s experience, but it’s such an unexpected moment (at least it was to me) that it makes for an extremely strong ending to the story. There is as much genuine surprise in this episode as almost any other in the episode, and these twists are incorporated so beautifully into the story that it’s a joy to experience the rush that comes from realizing just what has happened.

In spite of the fabulousness of much of this episode, it doesn’t make my all-time favorites list because of a couple of smaller pieces that lower the quality of the entire episode. One problem with this episode is the brief and thoroughly unwelcome return of the Amy/Rory/Doctor love triangle. It’s present only as a miscommunication—Rory hears Amy say something to him that sounds like it could be addressed to the Doctor, and worries that she is regretting her choice to marry him. She also tells the Doctor that she’s pregnant without telling Rory, suggesting that she places more trust in the Doctor. Of course, everything is resolved by the end, but while her explanation that she didn’t want to tell Rory about her pregnancy because she’s worried that her baby will be born with “three heads, or like a time head” is believable enough, this whole element just comes across as extremely contrived. Amy’s use of the “fell out of the sky” language to describe Rory doesn’t really accord with the notion that they’ve been friends since childhood, and so it just looks like Moffat made her say intentionally confusing things in order to create a space for marital drama. The interaction between the Ponds at the end of the episode is awfully cute, though—I particularly liked Rory’s jubilant exclamation that he’s “never going to stop being stupid!”—so while I did not enjoy this throwback to last season’s most irritating subplot, I was still happy with the Ponds as a couple by the end of the story. The larger problem is the exchange between Canton and Nixon in which we learn of Canton’s sexuality. I really, really like Canton; the actor is great, the character’s combination of obvious intelligence and befuddlement about what on earth is happening is endearing, and he’s a solid source of support for the Doctor and Ponds in this story. I’m glad that the show is making more of an effort to include LGBT characters this season, after not doing at all well in this regard in Season Five, and Canton was, I think, at this point the second-most screentime for an LGBT character, after Captain Jack. Given that for both Captain Jack and the soon-to-debut Vastra and Jenny, their sexuality is a defining element of their characterization, it’s sort of a nice bit of variation to have a character who is primarily known for his work in the monster-fighting plot, and whose sexuality emerges as a minor part of his background. However, while getting across Canton’s sexuality in just a line or two is a reasonable move on those grounds, the actual lines are completely misguided and deeply problematic. Nixon’s reaction that the moon is “far enough for now” just comes across as laughing at the sixties for being a homophobic time period, which is blatantly unfunny both because of the tremendous discrimination facing gay couples in the 1960s and because in many ways that discrimination hasn’t stopped. Nixon’s inability to accept such a relationship is the punchline here more than Canton himself is, but it’s a completely inappropriate piece of humor. Even the soundtrack emphasizes the jokey nature of the exchange, making this even more grating.

If you took out the five seconds devoted to Nixon’s reaction to Canton’s sexuality, you would have a very, very strong episode; I would put up with the brief return to the Pond Relationship Drama in exchange for all of the fascinating stuff that happens to them here. There’s just enough that annoys me, though, that I don’t love the episode as much as its stellar plot warrants. In a way, this makes this two-parter a fitting opener to the regular season, as Season Six is, in general, a giant mass of brilliance that wanders off into total stupidity at intervals. Overall, this two-parter is a mostly glorious, intermittently frustrating opening to a season that is full of both wonderful and terrible things. B+

The Curse of the Black Spot: It’s a shame that this utterly boring episode happens here, in what is otherwise a terrific string of episodes. A few questionable things in “Day of the Moon” aside, the string of eight episodes that starts with “Vincent and the Doctor” and ends with “The Doctor’s Wife” is full of glory—except for this episode, which manages to make pirates dull. I do like the setting for the episode, which is what keeps it out of my bottom five episodes of the reboot—watching the characters run around on a pirate ship is entertaining enough to lift the episode above the slog of unimaginative plotting that otherwise characterizes this story. Still, for an episode that has the automatic fun of featuring pirates on a pirate ship, this is a huge disappointment.

           There are some decent moments here; the beginning of the episode, in which pirates react with terror to extremely minor injuries, is relatively intriguing, and Lord Grantham from Downton Abbey does a good job as the lead pirate suddenly forced to take responsibility for the son he abandoned. The whole Siren story is just so inane, though, that the poignancy of the father/son narrative gets completely overshadowed. The Doctor interprets events incorrectly over and over again, which is an approach that appears to good effect in a number of other stories but is mostly just annoying here. The usually delightful Ponds are reduced to yet another silly love triangle, this time with the mysterious Siren: Rory spends a significant amount of time being spellbound by her beauty, leading to extremely tiresome jealousy on Amy’s part. The Siren herself is sort of a fragmented version of the sexy nurse cliché; she spends part of the episode nurturing sick and injured pirates, and the rest of it trying to sensually lure men to their deaths, or at least so it seems. Nothing makes me quite as angry as Ursula the paving slab in “Love and Monsters,” but this episode probably spends a larger amount of time on sexist nonsense than any other in the reboot.

           There are some nice pieces of continuity here with the rest of the season; I like that a season in which magic eye patches are a major plot point has a pirate episode in it, and the episode provides one of several installments in the season’s thematic focus on the inseparability of parents and their children. Otherwise, though, this is an awfully pointless episode. C-

[smilekraftnagpur-blog]

Social media's effects on patient trends 

  Like it or not, social media and the “selfie” era are here to stay.According to a recent survey released by the American Academy of Facial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery (AAFPRS), social media’s impact on aesthetics has been enormous, especially in how people perceive and project themselves. The survey results showed that in 2017, 55% of facial plastic surgeons consulted patients that wanted to look better in selfies. This is a 13% increase from 2016.

  This phenomenon has also thrust aesthetic practices into participating on social media platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat, to promote and market their services. To resist social media would be to ignore a foremost modern marketing tool.

For better or worse, social media is actually advancing the aesthetic cause, stated Jason Emer, M.D., F.A.A.D., a cosmetic and dermatologic surgeon in Beverly Hills, Calif.

“It’s not just filling a line anymore, it is full facial shaping,” he said. “When we talk about the stomach, it’s not regular liposuction anymore, it is body contouring and shaping because people see what these devices can do, and they talk about it online.”

Social media has also made people more comfortable and interested in visiting aesthetic clinics.

“Patients are more informed than they used to be and are doing more research before they step foot into a practice,” said Mara Shorr, B.S., CAC, vice president of marketing and business development for Shorr Solutions (Winter Park, Fla.).

“They’re learning not only about the procedures offered and what the different providers are doing, they are also getting a feel for the providers’ personalities,” she said.

There are some downsides associated with social media apps, such as so-called “SnapChat dysmorphia,” in which someone requests an outcome that matches their exquisitely Photoshopped, digitally enhanced smartphone-generated image.

“I have seen people bring in a filtered Snapchat photo and say they want their skin to look like that all the time, without makeup,” said Sheila Nazarian, M.D., a plastic surgeon in Beverly Hills, Calif.

Although using filtered photos can help patients communicate ideas of how they might look, “Some people ask for relatively extreme procedures to achieve unnatural results,” stated Leif Rogers, M.D., F.A.C.S., a plastic surgeon in Beverly Hills.

“The most common look today is the ‘JLo Jaw,’” Dr. Rogers continued. “Many female patients are asking for a highly defined, yet feminine jawline. Many people will use various apps to achieve a look that they will present to me as their desired after result, but what they don’t realize is that it could mean major surgery to achieve this look.”

As Ms. Shorr pointed out, one reason for SnapChat dysmorphia is that people are much more critical of themselves because they spend so much time looking at their selfies.

“Even a generation ago, people did not spend this kind of time looking at photos of themselves,” she said. “Selfies have changed social behavior. This may be good for the medical aesthetic business, but may not be good for society, overall.”

Furthermore, amateur photography often overstates the dysmorphia problem, Dr. Nazarian noted

  “Sometimes, in these photos, a person’s nose looks big because the camera is too close to the face, which is a known optical illusion,” she said.

  Patients today tend to be hyper aware of their bodies – sometimes to the point of being falsely aware and unrealistically hopeful,” Dr. Nazarian remarked. “This can put both the physician and patient in a weird spot, because the patient has impossible expectations.”

“There are definitely people who have an altered perception of reality,” Dr. Emer concurred. “Many patients don’t realize they have unrealistic expectations. They look at Kylie Jenner and think, I want her lips. What they don’t realize is that she’s received 10 to 15 syringes of a dermal filler that cost $10,000 to $15,000. They think one syringe is going to work.”

Spotting Problem Patients

In Dr. Nazarian’s experience, people suffering from this syndrome are pretty easy to spot.

“I’ve turned some patients over to therapists,” she admitted. “You definitely want to do surgical procedures for people who are joyous and excited about doing it, not someone that is unsure and emotional.”

To help weed out those with dysmorphia issues, Dr. Nazarian includes specific questions on her intake forms, such as, ‘Are you doing this for anyone else? Is anyone pressuring you to do this? Are you depressed?’

“There comes a point when the physician has to take prudent medical care versus the exacerbation of beauty,” Ms. Shorr maintained. “Physicians should not allow the patient’s will and desires to control their surgical and / or artistic ability.”

Both body dysmorphia and social media addiction have become relatively common in the cosmetic surgery patient population, reported Dr. Rogers.

“It works as a contraindication to a surgical procedure, and the risk of a dissatisfied patient is significantly higher,” he said.

“Another important note is that an addiction to social media does not necessarily indicate unreasonable expectations for a cosmetic procedure,” Dr. Rogers added. “And social media addiction is a problem all of its own and affects all age ranges.”

Social Media Influencers

Increasingly, patients go online to discover the latest aesthetic treatments from social media influencers – YouTube stars, Facebook-based pundits, Instagram celebrities and other online personalities that have developed a strong presence across the most popular online platforms and command hundreds of thousands of followers.

Social media influencers and celebrities that get caught up in the world of aesthetics have enthusiastically tried out new procedures on livestreaming TV, and share their experiences online with information-hungry fans.

.

“It is really funny how patients want to relate,” Dr. Emer added. “They want more than just a before-and-after or an expert. They want someone that is real and reveals all of the treatments they’ve had on social media.”

  “Social media influencers are the true celebrities today,” opined Dr. Nazarian. “I would much rather advertise with a social media influencer or reality TV star than a traditional TV celebrity or actress. These influencers talk about the procedures they are getting done, so they bring awareness to plastic surgery. Yes, they crave attention, but they are the ones influencing the digitally inclined, which is a majority of the population right now,” she continued.

A controversial reality TV star is more likely to livestream her labiaplasty than a mainstream personality or actress, Dr. Nazarian pointed out.

“For example, I recently streamed a labiaplasty on Farrah Abraham, from MTV’s reality show, Teen Mom. While she may not be the person I want my kids to watch, I knew her presence was more likely to bring awareness to a practice or physician. I got 44 inquiries about labiaplasty after I did that event with her. She made it okay to talk about, and that is a public service,” she said.

Then there are the rock star practitioners that end up being social media influencers themselves, as a result of creating recognized digital brands and flooding social media sites with treatment images and videos.

For instance, “Dr. Miami,” a.k.a., Michael Salzhauer, M.D., has over 285,000 fans on social media and around 1.2 million SnapChat views daily. In 2017, he outdid himself with a reality TV series and a Billboard charting dance single.

Control the Conversation

With so many social media voices in play, it is important that the practitioner control the messaging to draw in new patients and keep existing ones happy.

“The online conversation is controlled by the patients, regardless of the age group, and there are positives and negatives,” Ms. Shorr stated.

For example, consider the surgeon who brands himself as specializing in the Brazilian butt lift. A potential patient looking around on social media for a surgeon may see this type of promotion and assume the doctor only specializes in butt enhancements, Ms. Shorr elaborated.

“If I’m interested in a rhinoplasty or facelift, then I am going to rule out that physician because I am unaware that they offer more than just butt lifts,” she said. “So sometimes this type of branding could negatively impact part of your practice.”

Taking control over the online dialogue is important, Ms. Shorr reiterated.

“There are times when you’re not able to control the dialogue in social media. This can be a very good thing when people are going on about how amazing your practice is and how much they love your results,” she said. “But, it can be harmful to your reputation if you lose control and someone suddenly becomes negative. The social media crowd can be swayed easily.”

To better understand how the online world perceives physicians, Dr. Emer shared this insight: “People want to go to someone that they see as an artist, but also one that they can identify with. They watch videos on YouTube to find the leading experts, see what procedures differentiate them from other practitioners, and also to see a personal side of the physician.”

  Patients not only watch for the newest treatment modality, they also look for the physician using that modality in a novel manner.

“It could be the physician who is doing cutting edge combination treatments,” Dr. Emer remarked. “People get really excited and attracted to that, and it brings them in.”

Getting into the Stream

Practitioners that post or stream procedure videos are educating viewers, as well as doing external marketing in the process.

“You don’t even need advertising and marketing as much in the traditional sense if you’re constantly posting on social media,” Dr. Emer reported. “Social media posts catch people’s attention and are easily accessible.”

Ms. Shorr concurred, “Social media is going to continue to be the wave of the future and will get even bigger. The old, archaic advertising methods do not work as well on the demographics of millennials and generations to come. These people are all digital all the time.”

Cracking Assumptions

It is commonly believed that 20- and 30-somethings are easiest to reach via social media platforms. But according to Dr. Emer, if you look at the statistics you will see it is a mixture.

“The growing populations of patients are the 25- to 35-year-olds and those aged 65 and up. Everyone is using social media. If you focus on the millennial only then you’re short-changing yourself,” he said.

In Dr. Rogers experience, “One does get the younger demographic to some degree, but we have also seen an increase in patients aged 40 and older, as well as a rise in the return rate of established patients.”

The younger patient is not as highly influenced as one might think, simply because cosmetic surgery isn’t on their radar,” he added. “And they are not the typical patient that follows a cosmetic medical practice.”

So, how should one assess the modern, digital and social media savvy aesthetic patient?

“Social media tends to create a very self-conscious patient that is overly preoccupied by what others think,” Dr. Rogers commented.

“That being said, I believe there are good things to come from social media,” he stated. “For those that have learned to use social media to create a business or brand, I solute you for being innovative and thinking out of the box, just don’t let it – and the patient attitudes that it has spawned – rule your life.”

[blog-optimisticcoffeestuden-blog]

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"Hillside New Jersey Cheap car insurance quotes zip 7205

Hillside New Jersey Cheap car insurance quotes zip 7205

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Hillside New Jersey Cheap car insurance quotes zip 7205

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My fianc and I would like to get married. About how much would it cost for the two of us and our 14 week old?

Insurance notification?

if you go to the doctor with insurance and pay the co-pay there, will the people paying for the insurance still be notified. I need to go the doctor to get birth control, which i can legally get without my parents {I'm 15}. I was wondering if I use my insurance card that's linked to my parents insurance, will they still find out that I went if I pay for the $10 co-pay? I have a boyfriend for about a year but we aren't having sex. I want it to clear my acne and to have lighter periods, although if I ask my parents they will think that we are having sex.""

Will i have to buy individual health insurance starting 2014?

I have a job I am paying Medicare tax. Is it still mandatory for me to buy individual health insurance starting 2014?

Can I sell my own shipping insurance?

I sell products online that I make myself. So in the past it has been a pain for customers to deal with the postal service in case of damaged in shipping. So instead I would like to just offer my own shipping insurance. Then customers can deal directly with me and everything will me a lot faster and smoother. Is this legal since I am not a real insurance company? If it's not legal how do I have to word it so I can charge like $5 and handle shipping damage myself?

Cheapest and best flood insurance?

I live in Az and was told my townhome was is in a flood zone and I need flood insurance. How much does this cost and wheres the cheapest place to get it. Another guy in the unit next to me said his mortgage company forced the insurance on his loan and it was 2,500 a year so his mortgage went up 300 a month!! thats seems like an insane amount? Please help.""

Hillside New Jersey Cheap car insurance quotes zip 7205

Hillside New Jersey Cheap car insurance quotes zip 7205

Where can i find the cheapest insurance??

im 19. i live in california. ive never been in an accident and ive never gotten a ticket. i drive a 2004 suzuki forenza and i pay almost 200 dollars a month for insurance!!! i have to have full coverage because im still paying off my car, but come on i think thats a little ridiculous.. its more than my car payment. Any idea where i can get it cheaper and if so, how do i go about changing it?? any help is greatly appreciated!""

I'm 16 and Looking at a 2003 Mach 1 Mustang how much would Insurance be?

I have a job and plan on paying for it myself, I just want an idea of the cost.""

How will adding 40 million more people to the Health Insurance rolls improve Health Care?

But don't be misled. We know the status quo is unsustainable. If we do nothing, millions more Americans will be denied insurance because of pre-existing conditions, or see their coverage suddenly dropped if they become seriously ill. Out-of-pocket expenses will continue to soar, and more and more families and businesses will be forced to deal with health insurance costs they cant afford. David Axelrod Senior Advisor to the President Why suddenly focus on the insurance industry? If, as Axelrod says, the status quo is unsustainable .. How will adding 40 million more to the insurance rolls suddenly make it sustainable ? . How will adding to the costs of Insurance Companies decrease their costs? . How will doing nothing , and thereby sustaining the huge profits of the drug industry and the medical industry, reduce medical care costs to the average American?""

Insurance violation 16028 (a)?

I was riding my friends motorcycle today. I got pulled over for doing 75 in a 65. My friend does have insurance on the motorcycle but there was no insurance paperwork on the motorcycle. I got written up for no insurance, the cop said as long as the bike does have insurance the court should drop it. My question is, do I need to be insured on the bike or does just the bike need insurance since I was just riding it that day?""

""Will my insurance rates go up if I got a ticket for driving in the HOV lane on I-95 in Broward County, FL?""

I was just pulled over for driving in the HOV lane on I-95 and got a ticket for $165 (kinda steep in my opinion, but the cop said he wasn't giving me a ticket for speeding). The cop said that I won't get points on my record and I verified that with the Florida Department of Motor Vehicle's web-site. I know I'm guilty so I'll just pay the ticket. Will my insurance rates go up if I do that? Should I plead no contest and go to traffic school? I'd still have to pay for my traffic ticket if I did that, but if going that route would stop my insurance rates from going up then it will financially worth it in the long run.""

""Just passed driving test, 22 yr oldwhere should i go for cheapest insurance quote.?""

Just passed driving test, 22 yr oldwhere should i go for cheapest insurance quote.?""

What is the least expensive car insurance money can buy?

So i REALLY need a car, but i CANNOT afford insurance. Honestly, if it was legal to not have insurance on a car, i would do that. So the only reason i'm getting insurance is so that i'm legal on the road. I don't care if the insurance covers only the tires of the car, what is the least expensive company and quote i can get?""

Saving on insurance...own or finance?

What is cheaper to insure a car that is being financed or a car that is owned? I haven't decided how to pay for my new car and since I am getting 0% it wouldn't cost more to finance, I do have the cash to buy it. I am just trying to see ways to lower insurance. If you know of any other ways to lower insurance I will take that advice too. Thanks""

Good car insurance??

I will be 16 in a few months and am hoping to get a Mustang two doors. soo it might be a little higher insurance..Is there an insurance company thats better than another?

Can I sue my Car Insurance Broker?

I recently got into an accident. I was at fault. Rear-ended a guy, who rear-ended another car because of me. Was talking to my children in the backseat. Just bought a NEW car, a month ago, October 13. When we purchased the car, my Insurance Agent mentioned there was a problem with our insurance, that they needed to correspond with New Jersey Indemnity about some drivers that could be associated with my insurance. The Insurance Agent then called us back, said everything was okay, we purchased the car, and was able to drive it out from the dealership with our new insurance (full cover) on October 13. On October 16, the Broker made an appointment for an Insurance Inspection Report. We also paid an Endorsement to Insurance Company via our Insurance Agent. My accident was a month after the purchase of the car, November 12. Got our police report, went to our insurance Broker, they say that our policy was cancelled October 15, TWO DAYS after we purchased our new car. Please educated answers only. Can I sue my broker? What else can I do? I have children, would never drive without insurance...""

What if an auto insurance valuation is too low?

The insurance company wants to total my car, which was in a parking lot accident. The value that they are giving it is way too low. I know some people want more than their car is worth and the insurance company would like to save themselves as much money. However, objectively looking at it.... I cannot find another car for the price that the insurance company says it's worth. Online dealer ads list some cars with somewhat higher mileage at $2,000-2,500 more. When I offer the amount that the insurance company offered, they are polite but decline the offer. The insurance company uses comparisons with cars that are all much higher in mileage, some double. I suspect those cars are beat up. The state insurance commissioner will do nothing much, according to what their website suggests. At most, they will be an informal moderator that encourages resolution. They also tabulate the number of complaints. They will not get involved unless there is a clear violation of law, not just low ball estimates. They even say that. Actually, the repair estimate plus salvage value equals the value they assign. If the value is higher, it should be repaired, which I want. I am willing to accept a fair valuation and settlement but it is not fair now. What should I do?""

About how much would insurance cost for a 2012 chevy volt for one year?

I need to know about how much it would cost for one year of insurance for a 2012 Chevy volt. This is for my drivers ed class, and if you could tell me what insurance company you are getting your answer from.""

Is insurance affordable under the Affordable Care Act?

Is insurance affordable under the Affordable Care Act?

What is the insurance cost for a 16 year old guy with a ford mustang 2004?

What is the insurance cost for a 16 year old guy with a ford mustang 2004?

What is the average cost of car insurance?

What is the average insurance cost for a 19 year old male with a early 90s sedan?

I drive a 1984 chevy 2500 and i want to know how much for basic insurance would cost?

1984 chevy 2500 clean title 120,000 miles""

I am looking for affordable car insurance?

husband has restricted licence. neither of us have had tickets or accidents.

Insurance for ninja 250 estimate?

what would insurance be like for a ninja 250? i am 17 and would be on my own insurance and will have my license.

How much would a insurance cost for a 2013 Mercedes c300?

Around how much a year

How much will the Insurance cost me for A 1999 Mitsubishi Eclipse ?

I am 17, and I was thinking about my first car, and I've been doing some research and I love the Mitsubishi Eclipse and I can afford to buy one since $1000-9000 is in my price range, I found a perfect 1999 Black Mitsubishi Eclipse is great condition for $6,999, but since I'm a new driver insurance will not be easy but I don't want to take full coverage I just want PiP. Anyone that works at an insurance company that could help or anyone who knows how insurance works answer my question.""

Health Insurance Now and Later?

I am married going on 2 years. We have decided that we do want children. I am looking at health insurance for myself and I was wondering if I just get health insurance including dental or do I need to go ahead and apply for pregnancy insurance before we even start trying to get pregnant? Are there any insurance companies who are better than others?

Is this considered Expensive Health Insurance????

This is my firsft full time job with insurance out of college now. I was wondering if you thought it was expensive since I am new to this. It is 186 a month and I make 2200 a month. It does seem pretty good though, is this decent insurance?... No deductible. Doctors visits: 100% paid after a $30 dollar co-pay for physicians and $45 for a specialist 100% paid rehab services (phys. therapy, chiropractic visits) after 30 dollar co-pay, for a max of 60 visits a year 1 eye exam every 2 years, 100% paid after a 30 dollar co pay Dental: no deductible or co-pay, 100% paid for preventative services (exam, xrays, fluoride). 90% paid for basic services (filiings). The max they pay per year is 1,000""

Double Health Insurance Coverage?

I was recently laid off and offered a severance package that included continuation of full health insurance coverage for 6 months for me and my spouse; I will begin another job which offers health insurance; can I be enrolled in both plans under my name? and What happens with pre-existing conditions?

Would it be cheaper for me to go on my parents insurance or get my own insurance plan?

I am 16 and go for my license on the 19th of Nov, im paying for it myself. My parents have geico, i called Allstate today to get a quotes and they said about 210, please help!(:""

Can my mom insure my car she does not own (California)?

So I am 21 and have a car with a learners permit and I wont get a license until Jan. Can my mom insure the car even though her name is not on the registration until I get my license and will then be the primary driver? In this case I would only be driving with her under the learners permit guidelines. My mom would be driving the car on a daily basis to take my little sister to school and stuff because right now it's our family's only car. In Jan. I would have the insurance put under my name and have her added as a driver.

Hillside New Jersey Cheap car insurance quotes zip 7205

Hillside New Jersey Cheap car insurance quotes zip 7205

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/classic-muscle-car-good-choice-daily-driver-chevelle-jose-finley/"

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Latest story from https://movietvtechgeeks.com/nick-viall-not-feeling-vanessa-grimaldi-donald-trump-low-blows-mika/

Nick Viall not feeling Vanessa Grimaldi and Donald Trump low blows Mika

Rumors have recently come to light, claiming that things are rocky between Bachelor couple Nick Viall and Vanessa Grimaldi. As you may know, Nick and Vanessa got engaged at the end of the last season of The Bachelor, in which Nick presented the Montreal-native with the final rose. While the two have been together for several months now, sources close to the pair say that things may not end up working out for the reality show lovebirds. Just last weekend, both Nick and Vanessa were spotted in Puerto Vallarta, as they attended fellow Bachelor stars Carly Waddell and Evan Bass’s wedding. Despite being in such a romantic setting, according to insiders, Vanessa and Nick looked quite “miserable” while at the ceremony. One source that was on the same flight as the duo coming back from Mexico told media publication US Weekly, “[Nick and Vanessa] didn’t exchange five words the entire flight [from Mexico back to Los Angeles]. They were angled completely away from each other.” The same source went on to spill, “Nick grabbed his bag and ran ahead of Vanessa…they really don’t seem to like each other.” Ever since they wrapped up Nick’s season of The Bachelor, both Vanessa and Nick have been bombarded with wedding-related questions. However, the reality show couple has been adamant that they are looking to take things “slow” and let their relationship naturally evolve. Insiders have been telling the media that the two stars are constantly bickering with each other. One Bachelor insider claimed, “It’s not a solid relationship, and it won’t last.” Unfortunately, the success rate of Bachelor couples is extremely low. In fact, the Bachelor star before Nick, Ben Higgins, just recently split from the winner of his season, Lauren Bushnell. We will just have to wait and see if Nick and Vanessa are able to make it past this rocky patch in their relationship or if Nick will return to the franchise for the fourth time… President Donald Trump ridiculed the looks and temperament of a female cable television host whose show he says he has stopped watching. In a series of tweets Thursday morning, the president went after Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough, who have criticized Trump on their MSNBC show "Morning Joe." https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/880408582310776832 "I heard poorly rated @Morning Joe speaks badly of me (don't watch anymore). Then how come low I.Q. Crazy Mika, along with Psycho Joe, came ... to Mar-a-Lago 3 nights in a row around New Year's Eve, and insisted on joining me. She was bleeding badly from a face-lift. I said no!" https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/880410114456465411 Brzezinski responded on Twitter by posting a photograph of a Cheerios box that has the phrase "made for little hands." Critics looking to get under the president's skin have long suggested that his hands appear smaller than usual for his frame. https://twitter.com/morningmika/status/880415526371176448 "It's a sad day for America when the president spends his time bullying, lying and spewing petty personal attacks instead of doing his job," NBC News spokeswoman Lorie Acio said in a statement. The White House did not immediately respond to questions about the tweets, including what it was that set the president off. About two hours before the president's tweets, Brzezinski said on the show that "it's not normal behavior" for any leader to be tweeting about people's appearances, bullying, lying, undermining managers and throwing people under the bus. Saying that if any business executive behaved the way Trump does, "There would be concern that perhaps the person who runs the company is out of his mind." On their Wednesday show, Brzezinski and Scarborough roundly mocked Trump for displaying in several of his golf resorts a fake Time Magazine cover featuring himself. "That's needy," Brzezinski said on the show. About 15 minutes before the president himself tweeted, White House social media director Dan Scavino similarly attacked the hosts. "#DumbAsARockMika and lover #JealousJoe are lost, confused & saddened since @POTUS @realDonaldTrump stopped returning their calls! Unhinged," Scavino wrote on his personal account. Trump was correct that the MSNBC hosts spent time at the president's Florida resort, a visit that Scarborough said was to arrange a Trump interview. The hosts confirmed they are engaged to be married earlier this month. Is it actually the Hello, Goodbye tour for Adele? Pop superstar Adele has hinted that her current tour for Grammy-winning album "25" will be her last. The 29-year-old included a signed, handwritten note in the program for her Wednesday night show at Wembley Stadium in London stating, "I don't know if I'll ever tour again and so I want my last time to be at home." Her announcement comes at the end of a 15-month tour throughout Europe, the US, Australia and New Zealand. "Touring is a peculiar thing, it doesn't suit me particularly well," she said. The "Hello" singer will perform three more shows in London, finishing her tour on Sunday after a total of 123 performances. Rob Lowe says he thought he was going to be killed during an encounter with a bigfoot creature while filming his new A&E docuseries. Lowe tells Entertainment Weekly the encounter took place in the Ozark Mountains, which stretch between Arkansas, Missouri, and Oklahoma. Lowe says he and his sons were camping there to investigate a Bigfoot-like creature known to locals as a "wood ape" during a shoot for "The Lowe Files" when something began to approach their camp. Lowe says he was lying on the ground thinking he was going to be killed. He adds that he's "fully aware" the story makes him sound like "a crazy, Hollywood kook." "The Lowe Files" follows the actor and sons Matthew and John Owen as they explore mysterious phenomena across the country. Michelle Rodriguez is threatening to leave "The Fast and the Furious" franchise unless its female characters are treated differently. Rodriguez wrote on Instagram on Tuesday that she hopes filmmakers decide "to show some love to the women of the franchise" in its next installment. If not, she says, she "just might have to say goodbye."

Gary Gray directed the eighth film in the series, "The Fate of the Furious," and is defending the treatment of women in that movie.

He tells Business Insider he "thought the combination of female characters was pretty strong." Gray notes that Charlize Theron played the antagonist in the film and Helen Mirren made a cameo. The ninth film in the franchise is due out in 2019. MTV says it doesn't condone driving under the influence after a cast member was shown nodding off behind the wheel during the most recent episode of "Teen Mom OG." Monday's episode of the reality series shows Ryan Edwards nodding off while driving fiancee Mackenzie Standifer to their elopement. Standifer eventually turned the dashboard cameras off and questioned Edwards on whether he took Xanax. Edwards denied doing so. An MTV representative says Edwards' "erratic behavior was due to actions that he took without anyone's prior knowledge." No production members were in the vehicle during the shoot. The couple got married during the episode. Edwards says he entered rehab facility more than 30 days ago. He says he is at home now and "life could not be better." Forest fires affect hundreds, if not thousands, of Americans every year. This year is no different, as forest fires continue to pop up across the country. Unfortunately, Big Bang Theory star Johnny Galecki’s home got caught up in one of these fires earlier this week. According to numerous reports, Johnny’s Californian home was completely destroyed, as it found itself in the path of a massive forest fire. The actor’s home, which was situated in the Santa Margarita area, fell victim to a 1200-acre fire that devastated the surrounding area. As of Tuesday, Johnny had yet to see the damage. However, sources claim that the star was planning to return to his destroyed home once he got the all clear from local firefighters. In a statement made to TMZ, Johnny addressed the tragic situation, saying, “My heart goes out to all in the area who are also experiencing loss from this vicious fire, the threat of which we live with constantly, which may seem crazy to some but we do so because living in a beautiful, rural area makes it worthwhile.” The 42-year-old actor went on to say, “Endless thanks to CalFire and the Sheriff’s Office. I know you guys are fighting the good fight to keep us safe. So very relieved no one has been hurt.” Tennis superstar Serena Williams is the latest female celebrity to bare it all while pregnant. On the latest issue of Vanity Fair, Serena shows off her beautiful bump while posing fiercely for the cover. Serena’s longtime friend, famous photographer Annie Leibovitz, took the photo, which showcases Serena’s incredible-as-ever shape. In addition to starring on the cover of VF, Serena also gave an exclusive interview to the magazine; in which, she spoke candidly about her pregnancy. When asked about how she felt when she first learned she was pregnant, Serena revealed, “I did a double take, and my heart dropped. Like literally it dropped, ‘Oh my god, this can’t be - I’ve got to play a tournament. How am I going to play the Australian Open? I had planned on winning Wimbledon (her third straight) this year.’” Now, even though she is a number of months along in her pregnancy, Serena told Vanity Fair that she continues to be stunned by the fact that she’ll soon be a mother. The tennis athlete gushed, “It just doesn’t seem real. I don’t know why ‘Am I having a baby?’ I don’t know what to do with a baby. I have nothing...I’ve done absolutely nothing for the baby room.’” Fortunately, Serena has her fiancé Alexis Ohanian by her side, who surprised her a few months back with a proposal. When asked about her fiancée’s proposal, Serena admitted that she did [somewhat] see it coming. She told Vanity Fair, “I knew it was coming. I was like ‘Serena, you’re 35, you’re ready. This is what you want.’” You can see more of Serena in the August issue of Vanity Fair.

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