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Now with more squee! Dammit. XD
I'm noticing a pattern here. Venting to my LJ about trivial and transient unhappiness (see: my previous post) -- as opposed to ACTUAL problems -- tends to have a vicious circle effect on me. I obtain temporary relief by venting, then just end up unhappier when the comments lead to me wallowing in whatever was making me unhappy and reinforcing it. Ironically it's worst when people agree with me. (Me: "The world sucks and it's horrible!" Flist: "Yes, it is! So horrible! You are very right!" Me: "OH MY GOD I KNEW IT. I'M NEVER GETTING OUT OF BED AGAIN." Or alternatively - Flist: "No, it's actually not that bad!" Me: "YES IT IS! Why do you people hate me?! /o\" Really, you can't possibly win.)
SO LET'S TRY THE OPPOSITE TACTIC. I'm leaving the previous post unlocked for context, just turning off comments to stall out that discussion -- by no means do you have to read the post, and I'd rather not resurrect it here, please! The one-sentence summary is that some things about the latest White Collar episode made me unhappy; end message. I'd rather not dwell on it. Dear flist: I don't want to be unhappy about my happy place. MAKE ME HAPPY! JOIN ME IN BEING HAPPY!
Please talk to me about things you like about Peter. Especially things you like about Peter in 4x01. (Also Neal! And Peter'n'Neal! And everyone else for the that matter.) My brain, which spends a lot of time not actually being depressed but teetering on the brink of it, has this nasty tendency to fixate on something unhappy and then drown out all the good messages with bad ones, until I end up in a puddle of woe, and I can definitely feel myself in one of those stupid downhill slides. Tonight I am fighting fire with fire, by golly -- I am going to drown out the unhappy with SQUEE. Give me plausible explanations for plotholes, and tell me why Peter and Neal and Elizabeth and Mozzie and everyone are awesome. Visual references are welcome too! HALP.
Oh, but please don't say anything about next week's episode; I know NOTHING and hope to keep it that way!
SO LET'S TRY THE OPPOSITE TACTIC. I'm leaving the previous post unlocked for context, just turning off comments to stall out that discussion -- by no means do you have to read the post, and I'd rather not resurrect it here, please! The one-sentence summary is that some things about the latest White Collar episode made me unhappy; end message. I'd rather not dwell on it. Dear flist: I don't want to be unhappy about my happy place. MAKE ME HAPPY! JOIN ME IN BEING HAPPY!
Please talk to me about things you like about Peter. Especially things you like about Peter in 4x01. (Also Neal! And Peter'n'Neal! And everyone else for the that matter.) My brain, which spends a lot of time not actually being depressed but teetering on the brink of it, has this nasty tendency to fixate on something unhappy and then drown out all the good messages with bad ones, until I end up in a puddle of woe, and I can definitely feel myself in one of those stupid downhill slides. Tonight I am fighting fire with fire, by golly -- I am going to drown out the unhappy with SQUEE. Give me plausible explanations for plotholes, and tell me why Peter and Neal and Elizabeth and Mozzie and everyone are awesome. Visual references are welcome too! HALP.
Oh, but please don't say anything about next week's episode; I know NOTHING and hope to keep it that way!
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~~~~
So, yes, while Peter was doing his own investigation to find Neal, he wasn't really going gangbusters until he feared for Neal's life. And it turns out the fear was very real once he checked Collins out. That's when he contacted Ellen. That's when he made the phone call. And even though he warned Neal on the phone, he knew how good Collins was at his job and he knew Neal was cocky enough to take that warning with a grain of sand and feels he can outsmart these people. He even told Peter that on the phone. Since Peter said he wasn't the one they were sending, Neal stated suredly that he wasn't worried.
Peter knew he had to get there to help Neal or the next time he saw Neal and Mozzie would be at the morgue. And he couldn't let that happen. So the phone call wasn't going to be enough. So he taped the conversation. Not to work against Neal, but to help him. He knew if Neal had any chance of surviving Collins he had to get there to help him.
The only thing that set my teeth on edge a bit was how careless Peter was to not destroy that map. Because that's what gave Collins the information he really needed to find Neal. But Peter still wasn't thinking in terms of a con man, not when he's thinking of covering his tracks with his people who are supposed to be on the same side of the law he is. So he made a mistake. A stupid mistake, but, still, just a mistake.
Even if Peter never showed up, Neal and Moz would still had to run. And, look at the mistake Neal and Moz made by trusting the guy on the island. Even I was suspicious of the guy when they were paying him. I knew he was a jerk who would turn them in in a heartbeat. But Neal walked right into the trap. I was disappointed in him because usually both Neal and Moz are smarter than that.
I love the interaction between Peter and Elizabeth in this episode. She is smart and a very awesome wife. I also felt it was ironic that Peter used the Prom picture to take to the island.
And I agree with everyone who said Neal wasn't happy. He had been there six weeks and he seemed to be bored out of his mind. I also wondered about Neal telling people there that he was from New York. How easy he could have made it for someone to investigate him and check him out. He could have told them he was from anywhere: California, Washington - easily a dozen other places where he wouldn't have to use an accent. But he told them he was from New York.
He also looked very sad. He was in an island paradise with more money than any one human could ever need (as Mozzie pointed out to him) and I've never seen anyone look that sad under those circumstances. The Neal I was used to loved where he lived, and even though he was under arrest (basically), he was always smiling and he still loved his life. I didn't see that with this Neal.
Generally, I loved the episode. It made me squee quite happily.
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And yeah, he was totally bored. Neal is not the sort of person who can just let his brain rot and be happy.
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Anyway, yes, good points all -- and Operation Squee Overload is working nicely, so yay. \o/
Even when I was being annoyed with him, there is no doubt that Peter loves Neal and is working himself to near exhaustion (and, now, putting himself in danger) trying to make sure Neal is safe. And I feel a lot better about his poor decisions now. He screwed up ... but so did Neal and Mozzie. None of them are perfect and all of them are just trying to do the best they can under bad circumstances.
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1. I think Peter would have behaved similarly if it had been Elizabeth, Jones, or Diana in Neal's place. One of the things I love best about Peter is his sense of protective responsibility. And while, as I said, I think he would done much the same for anyone he cared about, with Neal that protectiveness is in overdrive, because he has extra power over Neal, which to Peter also means more responsibility.
Is any of that necessarily a good thing? Obviously not. Peter's urge to protect Neal prevented him from realizing that Neal is highly intelligent and used to evading law enforcement. Peter couldn't imagine that Neal didn't need his protection. But I think that has more to do with Peter's conception of himself than his view of Neal. (The other time Peter's protectiveness gets the better of him is in 1x14 when he punches Fowler for harassing Elizabeth. Which was exactly what Fowler wanted.)
2. I think that just about everyone, both characters and fans, tend to forget just how resilient Neal is. My guess is that Peter thought what most fans thought: that Neal's first thought would be coming back to New York. And while I think Neal does want that, everyone forgot that he's very used to building new lives on the pieces of old dreams. So, yeah, I guess I have a hard time faulting Peter for making the same assumptions most of fandom made.
3. Peter was totally out of his depth in 4x01, and I find it interesting how it affected the choices he made. Because I think his intentions were good: he wanted to protect Neal, and he wanted to find a way to bring Neal home. But he managed to make bad decision after bad decision: betraying Neal and Ellen's trust by recording the conversation, leaving the maps where they could be found, etc. And it amuses me, because there's a White Collar character who's known for doing all the wrong things for all the right reasons, but it's not Peter.
And here's some squee for other characters. Oh my, Elizabeth was brilliant in this episode. In fact the real tragedy of this episode is that Neal wasn't around to hear his deviled ham hatred vindicated. And even though I guessed that she would be the one to convince Ellen to hear them out, it was still a delight to see. Speaking of which, I love Ellen and her DENIED! moment with Peter near the beginning.
And Mozzie! While I know that the friendship between Peter and Neal is the backbone of the show, Neal and Mozzie's friendship always hits me in the heart. Neal gives Mozzie the chance to live safely alone! Mozzie refuses to take it!
Maybe that's why I'm not particularly angry at Peter. I loved Mozzie all the way through season 3.0 largely because I saw him making mistakes out of fear, desperation, and loneliness. And those are the emotions I see Peter acting from, to a degree.
So, uh, yeah. I'm really curious about what will happen next week. (Mozzie and Peter working together to save Neal, right? I mean, it's got to be. Please, yes.)
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Oh, I think this is a really good point! :D Peter approaches all the important relationships in his life that way; in fact, his protectiveness is one of his defining character traits. (Which I think is one reason why El's kidnapping in "Checkmate" hit him SO hard. He would've been devastated if anything had happened to her, but this is specifically due to -- in his own eyes, I think -- a failure to protect her; it was about the worst possible way for something like that to have happened.)
Anyway, yes, I think this really has the resonance of truth for me. It's not treating Neal like a child; it's just that Peter tries to protect everybody. It's who he is. And the people that he's around are used to this aspect of his personality (when it matters, both El and Neal seem to do just fine at pushing back against Peter's tendency to come on too strong; neither one of them is a doormat).
And now that I've gained a bit of perspective, I can't be too hard on Peter for making mistakes, when Neal makes mistakes all the time! It's just that Peter is not usually the one in that position ...
So yes, thank you, this helps a lot. <3
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One of the things I love about this show is that Peter isn't perfect, that both the leads make mistakes and bad decisions and need to forgive each other. It would be boring and unsatisfying if it was always Neal messing up and Peter always having to forgive, you know? (Luckily, neither of them are natural grudge holders.)
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Sometimes they frustrate me, but that just makes them feel like real people.
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*pets them all*
Operation Squee Overload is totally working here. \o/
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