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Life on Mars mostly-nonspoilery squee post
That sound you hear is my fangirl soul being sucked down into another black hole. :D
We've just mainlined the first season of Life on Mars (thank you, Derry!) and it's awesome. It's like CSI: David Lynch with a nigh-impenetrable Manchester accent.
I have fallen completely and utterly for Sam and Gene. I keep telling myself that I really should not like Gene as much as I do. He's an ass in pretty much every way: a violent, crude, mysogynist thug. But he's, uh. A very likable thug? And then there's Sam, with his woobiness and his constant struggle to do the right thing in the face of ubiquitous corruption and betrayal. And together, they're ♥ ♥ ♥.
Gene: I think you've forgotten who you're talking to.
Sam: An overweight, over-the-hill, nicotine-stained, borderline alcoholic homophobe with a superiority complex and an unhealthy obsession with male bonding.
Gene: (slight pause) You make that sound like a bad thing.
I love how they handle 1973 as a real place with its own issues and a cultural climate that's very different from what Sam's used to in 2006, in all its little details: the way everyone is smoking all the time, the way that Sam is the only one who treats Annie like a person and listens to her ideas, since he's internalized the idea of working as equal partners with female co-workers in a way that no one around him has. I also love the way that death, corruption and violence are a normal part of their lives, and yet the show doesn't cheapen or trivialize it. You aren't allowed to forget that the murder victims, drug dealers and domestic terrorists that they deal with are real human beings, with families. The main characters themselves are so flawed -- when you have an episode about a cop on the take, or one who accidentally caused the death of a suspect in custody, it's not some random guest star who was brought on so that the lily-white main characters could find them out; it's people we know and (mostly) care about who are doing these things, struggling with their own consciences, dragging each other down or lifting each other up. I love their messy, dark, hilarious, tragic world.
I'm currently avoiding fan sites so as not to be spoiled for season 2 until we get done with that (which, at the rate we're going, shouldn't take very long), but if any LoM fans on my flist could point me to good fic or vids that are safe from S2 spoilers, that would be lovely!
Edit: And this probably goes without saying, but I thought I'd mention it because I have had to enforce my "no spoilers" policy lately -- please don't spoil me for S2 in the comments if you can help it. I won't kick you out, but I'll be very unhappy. I'm sure I'll be done with it very soon and we can talk about it then. :D
We've just mainlined the first season of Life on Mars (thank you, Derry!) and it's awesome. It's like CSI: David Lynch with a nigh-impenetrable Manchester accent.
I have fallen completely and utterly for Sam and Gene. I keep telling myself that I really should not like Gene as much as I do. He's an ass in pretty much every way: a violent, crude, mysogynist thug. But he's, uh. A very likable thug? And then there's Sam, with his woobiness and his constant struggle to do the right thing in the face of ubiquitous corruption and betrayal. And together, they're ♥ ♥ ♥.
Gene: I think you've forgotten who you're talking to.
Sam: An overweight, over-the-hill, nicotine-stained, borderline alcoholic homophobe with a superiority complex and an unhealthy obsession with male bonding.
Gene: (slight pause) You make that sound like a bad thing.
I love how they handle 1973 as a real place with its own issues and a cultural climate that's very different from what Sam's used to in 2006, in all its little details: the way everyone is smoking all the time, the way that Sam is the only one who treats Annie like a person and listens to her ideas, since he's internalized the idea of working as equal partners with female co-workers in a way that no one around him has. I also love the way that death, corruption and violence are a normal part of their lives, and yet the show doesn't cheapen or trivialize it. You aren't allowed to forget that the murder victims, drug dealers and domestic terrorists that they deal with are real human beings, with families. The main characters themselves are so flawed -- when you have an episode about a cop on the take, or one who accidentally caused the death of a suspect in custody, it's not some random guest star who was brought on so that the lily-white main characters could find them out; it's people we know and (mostly) care about who are doing these things, struggling with their own consciences, dragging each other down or lifting each other up. I love their messy, dark, hilarious, tragic world.
I'm currently avoiding fan sites so as not to be spoiled for season 2 until we get done with that (which, at the rate we're going, shouldn't take very long), but if any LoM fans on my flist could point me to good fic or vids that are safe from S2 spoilers, that would be lovely!
Edit: And this probably goes without saying, but I thought I'd mention it because I have had to enforce my "no spoilers" policy lately -- please don't spoil me for S2 in the comments if you can help it. I won't kick you out, but I'll be very unhappy. I'm sure I'll be done with it very soon and we can talk about it then. :D
Only had time to make the one icon...
Yes! And then the ep I just watched proved that Sam hasn't just been changing the people around him - he's changing, too. And it's not as simple as changing for the better or changing for the worse. I love that, too - that nothing is easy for them, that nobody, not even Sam, is black or white. It's all about - people. Regular people doing a damn difficult job. And how they all hold up under pressure.
And yet, when he's not caught completely off guard by culture shock and hallucinations, he's almost scarily competent.
Yes! With his head screwed on straight, he's very, very good at what he does. I mean, he was DCI (Detective Chief Inspector?) back in 2006, so it makes sense, but... yeah. Almost a little scary.
Despite being a skinny little thing *g* he can totally hold his own in a fight.
Hee! I love that he's so little and scrawny. ♥ I mean, he's not tiny or delicate or anything, but - not your typical action hero. And I was almost a little surprised that he's not a judo champion or something - they didn't go the easy way and give him future!powers. He's just too stubborn to lose a fight. *g*
And he's not afraid to talk back to Gene, which is really fun to watch. No one else seems to do that
Oh! At the pace I've been going, I hadn't even realized that that was going on, but - of course! You're right. That's an absolutely compelling part of their relationship. And Sam enables Gene to do the right thing, like with what happened with Warren. At the same time, Gene's there to keep Sam from becoming his job, from separating himself from the human side of all the cases. Yay for best rivals who need each other more than they realize. ♥
I thought they did a fantastic job with luring us in (just like Sam was lured in) with Vic's nice-guy act, only to have it turn out to be an act.
I smelled a rat at the same time Gene did, but - oh, I didn't want to believe it. It's just - it made sense, dramatically, to have it be something like that. But it was so horribly cruel and evil and... wow, Sam has enough traumas with the whole not knowing which reality he's in without adding major, MAJOR daddy issues to the whole thing.
I was absolutely blown away with how they handled having Sam, a grown man, deal with the abandonment issues of a 4-year old. Of having him be both a police officer and the doting son of a man he remembers with the intense love of a tiny child. (I mean - the amount of stuff he remembers about his dad... he must've horded those memories, treasured them like he always treasured the cigarette card his dad gave him. Because at least I don't have that many clear memories from before the age of six. But for Sam - his dad's been present through his absence all through the series...)
But the psychopath angle - oh, yeah. And Vic's wife is very young and pretty, and having a little son makes for an excellent excuse when he's justifying the things he does, so... I wonder if he ever felt anything real for Ruth or Sam. Which I'm sure Sam wonders too, now, and isn't that a fun realization. And I almost need to re-watch the ep to be sure, but to me it felt like Vic had picked up Sam's weird dad-fixation, and was playing along with it, even though it made no sense that he'd be the father when Sam was the older of them. Mmm.
The show also does a lot with music and lighting that I like - the first season, it's cool how most of Sam's scary visions or dreams are accompanied by the room getting lighter. Obviously not things like getting trapped in the hospital room with lights going out around him, but when he wakes up - the light he usually sees is warm. It's not creepy midnight spooky lights, it's deceptively friendly, happy lights - and for some reason that just makes the whole thing that much more frightening to me.
The show does such a wonderful job of keeping you guessing, because he really does act certifiably insane at times.
YES! Especially when other people pick up on it! Um. Yeah. Oh, Sam. His life is really spectacularly complicated and crappy. *pets him*
Re: Only had time to make the one icon...
And then the ep I just watched proved that Sam hasn't just been changing the people around him - he's changing, too. And it's not as simple as changing for the better or changing for the worse.
Oh yes! I love that! They're just so real. Re-watching the first episode, I was really struck by how different Sam was in his own time -- his breakup with Maya, and her capture by the serial killer, was basically because she was following her instincts and Sam refused to acknowledge his own emotions, either his emotions for the case itself or for her. He's changed a lot, and it hasn't necessarily been 100% positive, but he's definitely a different kind of cop than he was at the beginning. Like you pointed out elsewhere in the comment, Gene has basically humanized Sam's policing -- Sam acts as Gene's conscience in some ways, but without Gene, he's a lot colder.
And I was almost a little surprised that he's not a judo champion or something - they didn't go the easy way and give him future!powers. He's just too stubborn to lose a fight.
I hadn't quite thought about it in those terms, but you're right! :D And I think that's perhaps Sam's most appealing quality - the way he absolutely will not give up, even when the deck is completely stacked against him, even when he has every reason to give in. It's really what makes his relationship with Gene work, because Gene would have completely dominated him if Sam had let him, but Sam's just too much of a plucky, stubborn little bastard to allow it. ♥
I was absolutely blown away with how they handled having Sam, a grown man, deal with the abandonment issues of a 4-year old. Of having him be both a police officer and the doting son of a man he remembers with the intense love of a tiny child.
That was just amazingly done. His emotions were so well played, and even though there was a lot of "Oh, Sam, no!" you never thought "Why is he doing that?" or "I don't believe that!" -- the way that all of his suppressed emotion and trauma came spilling out.
And I almost need to re-watch the ep to be sure, but to me it felt like Vic had picked up Sam's weird dad-fixation, and was playing along with it,
He was definitely playing on Sam's emotions, even though I don't think he quite understood why Sam had that emotional attachment to him. But he recognized that the attachment was there, and he was totally using that (IMHO).
It's not creepy midnight spooky lights, it's deceptively friendly, happy lights - and for some reason that just makes the whole thing that much more frightening to me.
I actually hadn't picked up on that! *goes back to look at show* It is a really lovely show to look at, though. It's an incredibly viddable show -- there are so many dramatic shots and they do so much with camera angles and lighting and so forth. By the way, speaking of vids, this is a really nice one with season 1 footage (no S2 spoilers).
The show does such a wonderful job of keeping you guessing, because he really does act certifiably insane at times.
YES! Especially when other people pick up on it!
... which, actually, says a lot about how much his co-workers in 1973 obviously do value Sam, because in spite of the fact that his behavior must seem completely lunatic to them at times, they don't seem to hold it against him. Even having a total breakdown in 1x08 and pulling a gun on Gene -- at the end, it was basically back to business as usual.
no subject
Re-watching the first episode, I was really struck by how different Sam was in his own time...
It's definitely there, that whole thing, but they manage to do it so that 1973 doesn't feel like an Important Lesson Sam Tyler Must Learn. It's more... that's who he was, and here's what he's got to work with, and this is who he is now. And then one can enjoy the process, painful as it may be for poor Sam. But it's not like you can see a definite goal of "this is how Sam should be", because... well, that's not what it's about.
Hee~! Gene and Sam's relationship - thinking about them is making me grin. Oh, I've got it bad! But how could I resist, when you've got that kind of... partnership? In that they're probably the last person the other would have picked to work with, but now that they're forced together, they're so good for each other. I mean, they even have the co-punch! It always amuses me greatly when they do that.
It is a really lovely show to look at, though. It's an incredibly viddable show -- there are so many dramatic shots and they do so much with camera angles and lighting and so forth.
Oh, is it ever! It's almost impossible to make icons for, because once you start looking for interesting shots, you've got them coming in hard and fast and you can't really take a cap every ten seconds for an hour. But you want to! Um. I might be speaking from experience, here. *g*
But! I can't even describe how amazing it is, it's just - I'll have to be weird and to a comment picspam of LoM caps to show you what I mean.
Here - the scene with Sam and Annie on the roof. The climactic moment is shot from three different POVs, and they're all so interesting.
It's dynamic and it's there, focused on the most important things, and not just recording the character's faces or bodies. It's got the long drop and the sky high above and the sun and the hands meeting and just that speaks volumes, even before the actors have done anything.
And then there's stuff like - hello, symbolism!
The next time we see Sam's bathroom mirror, it's not cracked anymore. INTERESTING.
There's lots and lots of angst going on here, but - look how the camera is placed as if it were a spectator. Not a camera, recording objectively - it makes you feel like you're actually there. It's so immediate and... and raw, even though you don't have a close-up of Sam's face here:
More angst, and everything is a little skewed, isn't it? Sam is breaking down, and the camera sees him - but the camera seems a little shaken by what's going on, too, the way it gives the impression of the whole world listing to the side a bit:
This shot, I just like. So much. Because of Sam and the light and the way we can't see his face, but it's so clear that he's dealing with a whole bunch of emotions, and... And I think I'm running out of comment space now. *g*
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The next time we see Sam's bathroom mirror, it's not cracked anymore. INTERESTING.
Was that his bathroom? I assumed it was the bathroom at the gym or pool or wherever they were trying to catch the mostly naked guy.
It's definitely there, that whole thing, but they manage to do it so that 1973 doesn't feel like an Important Lesson Sam Tyler Must Learn. It's more... that's who he was, and here's what he's got to work with, and this is who he is now.
Yes! I love that! It's nothing so simplistic as "Sam must learn to care" or "Sam must teach the boorish cops of 1973 a lesson" or anything like that. It's more that they're all trying to survive the best way they know how, and incidentally becoming slightly better people along the way (with a lot of backsliding, yet).
no subject
Was that his bathroom? I assumed it was the bathroom at the gym or pool or wherever they were trying to catch the mostly naked guy.
Went back to check, and - yep, it's his mirror! He wakes up and goes in there to shave. So~. I say it means something. Or else it's just a very cool shot? With this show, it's hard to tell, and that's all part of the fun.
It's more that they're all trying to survive the best way they know how, and incidentally becoming slightly better people along the way (with a lot of backsliding, yet).
Nobody's perfect, everyone's human, and it's not always easy to tell what the right thing is. If there is a right thing. And Sam has to deal with the whole time-travel thing on top of the general issues of framing people who are guilty in general but innocent of this particular crime and such.
Ahh, it's making me really curious - things like how he interacts with the guy who goes on to become his mentor. Is it a time loop? Did Glenn Fletcher take Sam under his wing because he remembered this weird Taylor guy back in the early seventies, or... or is it all in his head? Because there are so many ways it could all be in his head (he has a hooligan related case to solve when the nurses have left the TV on the big game playing in his room; he's got a hostage crisis where someone will die at 2 PM when he thinks they'll shut off his life support at 2 PM), and there are so many ways it could all be real.
Things like - the very first ep, with the little kid who might grow up to be a copycat serial killer, and meeting Glenn, and how he let Vic run away, never to return... but in that particular case it can't be a loop, because adult Sam in 1973 still has the memories of being kid!Sam and seeing his dad assault a woman in a red dress - something that didn't happen the way Sam remembers it, now that Annie was fine and Sam went back inside. At the same time - Sam told Ruth what to tell kid!Sam, and what she says is word for word what he remembers...! Ahh, it's so smart and twisty, with so many layers!
no subject
Oh, the show really does vid beautifully.