#i have to be smarter than this but I'm also a [slur] that can't ever ever live on her own

[lightnersdream]

WHY are these people so insistent on me never leaving. i am an adult! leave me the fuck alone!!!!

[bicon-crange]

Alright, let’s hear it

HI SORRY I'M LATE!!

I know this is about this post I made because I got it like. not even a day after.. so.. for context!

SO like I said, I think Dr. Horrible is actually pretty solid writing wise.

I think you could make it an actual (maybe off-broadway budget lvl) musical with a toooouch of rewrites. I think literally just removing the use of slurs (there's like, two, in the whole musical. which sucks but its also like…10+ years old) would make it really palatable for a modern day audience.

Lots of songs like A Man's Gotta Do touch on subjects waay ahead of the public discussion on them like toxic masculinity (again the movies like 14 years old), and I also think it's interesting that in THAT song in particular, the one who espouses these toxic ideals is not the super macho sterotype Captain Hammer, but the our nerdy, underdog, 'relatable' main character.

I also think that it would be greatly improved as a script if Penny didn't die at the end. Now THIS is where it gets lengthy and where I bring in the read more…

I think it would be much more interesting if Penny didn't die. I also really hate it because from the moment she dies on, she's instantly weirdly dehumanized by both the narrative and the literal lyrics, where she is refferred to as "everything you ever…" It's weird to me and I never really liked it.

I think it would be much more interesting if she wound up, as a result of the freeze ray, gaining powers and going against Dr. Horrible. Or something similar.

Now Penny, in real early 2000s girl fashion, is not written to be as in depth or 3 dimensional as the other male characters in the movie ( which is fine to me, as the movie is clearly satirical and very tongue-in-cheek, ALL the characters are more or less stereotypes ).

But what we do know about her is that she is already established to be both very altruistic and a weird parallel to Dr. Horrible.

Her first song, "Caring Hands" is her literally trying to get help for a local homeless shelter that she's dedicated to, and in her third song "Pennys Song," she explains WHY she cares about her town specifically and WHY she is so dedicated to help.

It reads to me as very superhero-y! There are lots of superheros (Spiderman,Batman, you KNOW THEM) who are very dedicated to one specific town or city because something of relevance happened to them there or there's a deep emotional connection (i.e. this need to "fix" a town). So in that way, it still works as a sort of parody of already established superhero characters.

I also think she's someone who idolizes heroism in general, as getting saved by Captain Hammer is what draws her to be interested in him in the first place.

Now, where she works as a sort of narrative foil/mirror really kicks in in the song "My Eyes", where her and Dr. Horrible sing about their completely different points of view (simplified, it's optimism v. pessimism, altruism v. anarchy) … but once in a while in this duet (which they sing on opposite ends of town)…. their words overlap!

And they both wind up saying the same word, or similar phrases, though in completely different contexts.

I think this could totally have been a set up for a fantastic dynamic where they work as dynamic opposites of each other!! Especially if Dr. Horrible stays pining for her long after she becomes a hero? Ough! The drama! The intrigue!

It especially works for me because Dr. Horrible doesn't really care for Penny? Outside of the idealized version of her he's conjured in his mind. Which we know he's been doing since the start of the movie by the way.

He KNOWS she's altruistic and he KNOWS she cares about people, and she has told him this to his FACE, but he keeps on with his antagonistic plans anyways because he thinks he's smarter than her. At his core, he thinks he's better than her and that she can't make decisions for herself.

He even says in one song that he knows she'll cry over what he's going to do but resolves to still do it. He wants power over her,essentially. He wants her the way you want a shiny new toy.

Yet he still wants to try to impress her. Her opinion means EVERYTHING to him because in his mind she's still deified.

During his big villain moment towards the end of the movie one of his ONLY concerns is her seeing him, even now worried that her opinion of him will be tainted.

He even,tellingly, in this moment- calls himself by her nickname for him to soothe himself.

TELL ME THAT DOESN'T JUST SMACK OF A CRAZY INTERESTING HERO/VILLAIN DYNAMIC!!! Especially if Penny, knowing her big heart, continues to not give up on him. But MAN is it hard.