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Supernatural Season 3: Is this just me, or ...?
I haven't really posted much about Supernatural lately. Overall, I'm enjoying this season, and "Bad Day at Black Rock" was one of my favorite episodes to date; I loved getting an episode that was, for the most part, just fun for the sake of being fun, very much a throwback to the aspects of the show that made me fall for it back in Season 1.
However, I'm starting to have a problem with SPN that is threatening to overcome my enjoyment of the show. I'm not in SPN fandom, and I poked around idly on LJ trying to figure out if this is just me or if other people are having this problem too. Basically, all I'm seeing is squee for last night's episode, so maybe it is just me, which is a discomfort-inducing thought all by itself. And I did have squee for the episode, really I did; it's just that I also had ... issues.
*takes stick, pokes beehive*
Okay, here's my problem. The way that SPN deals with race is starting to make me squirm.
I'm generally pretty "easy" when it comes to genre TV. I mean, I'm not unaware of the ongoing problems with the way that these sorts of shows typically handle race and gender; it's just that I can tune in and out of the part of my brain that notices this stuff, and go ahead and enjoy it anyway. Not that it doesn't enhance my enjoyment when shows do it right, or at least try -- and I honestly think quite a lot of the shows I've been watching lately are at least making a good-faith stab at it. (Not that some of the criticisms aren't justified, but still.) SPN seemed to be doing so, too, in the beginning.
But lately ... like I said, it's making me squirm. It's not just one thing, it's a whole lot of little things. It first started bothering me at the end of last season when Jake (that was his name, right? stupid swiss-cheese brain) turned out to be the one to go psycho, and the way that the show lovingly dwelt on his psycho-ness, with lingering closeups on every little detail of him stalking and killing Sam, then the Winchesters basically having to put him down. It did make me uncomfortable and I wished they'd gone a different route with the allocating of the powers and roles between the YED's chosen children. But it was really just one, well, two episodes, and Jake was a fairly complex character, and we saw the YED seducing him over to the dark side, using his family against him -- at the end of the arc, I was a little uncomfortable but reasonably okay with how it had been handled.
But then, coming rapidly on the heels of that, we had Isaac's particularly horrible death in the season premiere, and then Gordon's storyline which basically played out the whole thing with Jake again -- psycho stalker trying to kill Sam, with lavish camera closeups, eventually dying in a particularly gruesome and graphic way (and horrifically lynching-reminiscent, to boot). What made "Fresh Blood" extra-creepy to me was the boys walking away bantering in their blood-splattered clothes when Sam just tore off someone's head with his bare hands. I couldn't really get into the brother moment at the end because I was too busy being deeply, deeply skeeved out.
The thing is, it does make sense in terms of Gordon's characterization that he'd act the way he did. He sees vampires as unredeemable monsters, so when he becomes the beast, he acts like the beast -- and that's a logical outcome. But it's the show, its writers, that set him up that way and put him in that position, that took a character who could have been fascinating and complex and sympathetic (and in fact, used to be) and made him a one-note psychopath. It's the show that converted him, the show that stuck him in a roomful of tied-up, blond white women and then had him dismember them, the show that let his psycho-ness play out in an almost pornographic way.
And, honestly, it's also true that the lifestyle the Winchester brothers lead is a bloody and violent one. Dean, at the start of "Fresh Blood", hacking up a woman with a machete while she pleads for mercy, or Sam ripping off someone's head -- in their brutal world outside the law, where everything is trying to kill them, these aren't entirely unjustified actions. But they're the actions of anti-heroes, not heroes -- and I don't feel at all comfortable going from scenes like that, to scenes of humor and pathos where we're supposed to be 100% on the Winchesters' side. I'm not at all comfortable with the idea that the show is encouraging me to cheer on Sam as he strangles someone to death, especially when the casting in that scene is uncomfortably reminiscent of some of the more horrible historical baggage that we're carrying around in this country.
And I want to believe that I shouldn't be paying attention to this stuff, that it really shouldn't matter that Jake and Isaac and Gordon are all non-white -- I mean, certainly the show ought to have non-white villains and victims too, and most of the guest stars end up being one or the other. But it's just ... the way it's done, the roles they get, the fact that, as far as I can remember, Jake and Isaac and Gordon are the only non-white guest stars (aside from Tamara, obviously) that we've had lately, and two of the three have been super-strong, bloodthirsty psychopaths, while the third had one of the most appalling death scenes in a more violent-than-usual season. I just want balance. I don't want the show to stop casting characters of color; I want them to cast more of them, and bring Tamara into the recurring stable of guest stars and bring back Hendrickson (who makes a really fun antagonist because he's got a lot of "right" on his side, too) and just generally give us more to work with, not less, so that every time we see a person on the show who isn't white they don't turn out to be a psycho.
I certainly don't think the writers are playing it the way they are on purpose. However, at best, I feel like they're completely ignoring all of this unpleasant historical baggage that we're stuck with -- the problem is, we are stuck with it, and it has to be taken into account, and trying to ignore it and go on with the show as a happy-go-lucky road trip story is ... discomfort-inducing, to say the least. I suppose I'm throwing this out there to see what other people think, if I'm over-thinking this and making a mountain out of a molehill, or if other people are having similar problems to mine.
However, I'm starting to have a problem with SPN that is threatening to overcome my enjoyment of the show. I'm not in SPN fandom, and I poked around idly on LJ trying to figure out if this is just me or if other people are having this problem too. Basically, all I'm seeing is squee for last night's episode, so maybe it is just me, which is a discomfort-inducing thought all by itself. And I did have squee for the episode, really I did; it's just that I also had ... issues.
*takes stick, pokes beehive*
Okay, here's my problem. The way that SPN deals with race is starting to make me squirm.
I'm generally pretty "easy" when it comes to genre TV. I mean, I'm not unaware of the ongoing problems with the way that these sorts of shows typically handle race and gender; it's just that I can tune in and out of the part of my brain that notices this stuff, and go ahead and enjoy it anyway. Not that it doesn't enhance my enjoyment when shows do it right, or at least try -- and I honestly think quite a lot of the shows I've been watching lately are at least making a good-faith stab at it. (Not that some of the criticisms aren't justified, but still.) SPN seemed to be doing so, too, in the beginning.
But lately ... like I said, it's making me squirm. It's not just one thing, it's a whole lot of little things. It first started bothering me at the end of last season when Jake (that was his name, right? stupid swiss-cheese brain) turned out to be the one to go psycho, and the way that the show lovingly dwelt on his psycho-ness, with lingering closeups on every little detail of him stalking and killing Sam, then the Winchesters basically having to put him down. It did make me uncomfortable and I wished they'd gone a different route with the allocating of the powers and roles between the YED's chosen children. But it was really just one, well, two episodes, and Jake was a fairly complex character, and we saw the YED seducing him over to the dark side, using his family against him -- at the end of the arc, I was a little uncomfortable but reasonably okay with how it had been handled.
But then, coming rapidly on the heels of that, we had Isaac's particularly horrible death in the season premiere, and then Gordon's storyline which basically played out the whole thing with Jake again -- psycho stalker trying to kill Sam, with lavish camera closeups, eventually dying in a particularly gruesome and graphic way (and horrifically lynching-reminiscent, to boot). What made "Fresh Blood" extra-creepy to me was the boys walking away bantering in their blood-splattered clothes when Sam just tore off someone's head with his bare hands. I couldn't really get into the brother moment at the end because I was too busy being deeply, deeply skeeved out.
The thing is, it does make sense in terms of Gordon's characterization that he'd act the way he did. He sees vampires as unredeemable monsters, so when he becomes the beast, he acts like the beast -- and that's a logical outcome. But it's the show, its writers, that set him up that way and put him in that position, that took a character who could have been fascinating and complex and sympathetic (and in fact, used to be) and made him a one-note psychopath. It's the show that converted him, the show that stuck him in a roomful of tied-up, blond white women and then had him dismember them, the show that let his psycho-ness play out in an almost pornographic way.
And, honestly, it's also true that the lifestyle the Winchester brothers lead is a bloody and violent one. Dean, at the start of "Fresh Blood", hacking up a woman with a machete while she pleads for mercy, or Sam ripping off someone's head -- in their brutal world outside the law, where everything is trying to kill them, these aren't entirely unjustified actions. But they're the actions of anti-heroes, not heroes -- and I don't feel at all comfortable going from scenes like that, to scenes of humor and pathos where we're supposed to be 100% on the Winchesters' side. I'm not at all comfortable with the idea that the show is encouraging me to cheer on Sam as he strangles someone to death, especially when the casting in that scene is uncomfortably reminiscent of some of the more horrible historical baggage that we're carrying around in this country.
And I want to believe that I shouldn't be paying attention to this stuff, that it really shouldn't matter that Jake and Isaac and Gordon are all non-white -- I mean, certainly the show ought to have non-white villains and victims too, and most of the guest stars end up being one or the other. But it's just ... the way it's done, the roles they get, the fact that, as far as I can remember, Jake and Isaac and Gordon are the only non-white guest stars (aside from Tamara, obviously) that we've had lately, and two of the three have been super-strong, bloodthirsty psychopaths, while the third had one of the most appalling death scenes in a more violent-than-usual season. I just want balance. I don't want the show to stop casting characters of color; I want them to cast more of them, and bring Tamara into the recurring stable of guest stars and bring back Hendrickson (who makes a really fun antagonist because he's got a lot of "right" on his side, too) and just generally give us more to work with, not less, so that every time we see a person on the show who isn't white they don't turn out to be a psycho.
I certainly don't think the writers are playing it the way they are on purpose. However, at best, I feel like they're completely ignoring all of this unpleasant historical baggage that we're stuck with -- the problem is, we are stuck with it, and it has to be taken into account, and trying to ignore it and go on with the show as a happy-go-lucky road trip story is ... discomfort-inducing, to say the least. I suppose I'm throwing this out there to see what other people think, if I'm over-thinking this and making a mountain out of a molehill, or if other people are having similar problems to mine.
no subject
Regarding Dr Who.. again, not something that had ever occured to me - I would never have thought to relate Martha's race to her development/portrayal on the show. I can certainly see your point now you've explained it (below) but, as Friendshipper says, I see the issue being Rose, not Martha's skin colour. If anything, I would have looked at it from the opposite perspective - compared to Rose, Martha is better educated, has a better job/career, her family are better educated and move within a higher social circle (seriously, can you imagine Jackie or Mickey being invited to, never mind fitting in at, a black tie event?). I would even say Martha is more intelligent that Rose. The way she and her family are portrayed is, in this way, positive. The issue with her mooning over the Dr is one a lot of fans have and I feel is nothing to do with her colour, and the suggestion that she is inferior to Rose is entirely about the Dr's deep feelings for and difficulty in letting go of Rose.