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shadowkatA. Finally got around to watching The Abominable Bride - Sherlock Special which aired in the New York area this past Sunday, about two weeks after it aired everywhere else. So, I'm late to the party.
I liked it better than most people did. Or rather the people who posted about it on livejournal. Was a bit different for Moffat, who of late - has been mainly focused on plot gymnastics. Losing some of the poetry, character, and emotion as a result. This episode felt very much like a character piece - examining Sherlock's psychological issues, and his addiction. Also, lately, Moffat appears to be critiquing the sexist nature of not one but two of Britian's iconic and male dominated story tropes - first Doctor Who in the Husbands of River Song, and then Sherlock Holmes in Abominable Bride. He gets a bit preachy in Sherlock, while I found him to a little more subtle in Doctor Who. (Half-curious to see what his take on James Bond would be. Who's the most obviously sexist of the three.) Considering Moffat has been accused of being sexist, I find the commentary on it from the writer rather intriguing.
Anyhow, the story is not easy to follow. Quite poetical in places.
It jumps and skips back and forth in time - and it's not clear which Sherlock is dreaming it in a drug induced haze, modern day Sherlock or the Victorian version. (The first time, I think, that Moffat and company have examined Sherlock's drug addiction in any sort of depth.) The Modern Day version has taken heroine. While the 19th Century Version took his notorious 7 percent solution of Cocaine. The mystery is a hallucinatory ghost story - where women pose as a ghostly bride to take out vengeance on the male misogynists in their lives.
The story is being told, or appears to be told by John Watson, as one of his stories --- but we are firmly in Sherlock's perspective, as if he's read the story by Watson and is commenting on it as both its hero and its reader. Which I haven't seen done before and is an interesting narrative trick to pull off. It's hard to trust any of the narrators in this story - we have three - Watson, modern day Sherlock and Victorian Sherlock, and none are reliable. Sherlock, for one thing, is revealed at the end to be on a drug trip or high. While Watson doesn't notice certain things and embellishes the story to put Sherlock in the best possible light.
So at the end, it's not clear if the mystery of the Abominable Bride is real or a dream created by either Sherlock or Watson. And the homicidal corpse bride appears to be a metaphor for the drugs Sherlock is on, as well as his guilt over Moriarity and possibly the loss of Irene Adler. Not to mention how he has treated women throughout the series. (She reminded me a bit of Tim Burton's film Corpse Bride or Wilkie Collins the Woman in White.)
There's a lot of metaphors in this, which may also explain why I liked it better than most. It felt a bit like watching a narrative poem. Here Moriarity may well be a metaphor for Sherlock's addiction. It's fitting that when he's wrestling with Moriarity on the Falls, where both famously fell, it's John Watson who pushes Moriarity off the falls, not Sherlock. But Sherlock jumps after Moriarity, flying. Until he wakes in modern day, from a drug induced haze. Then falls again, to way in Victorian Times from the same haze. In both time lines - Moriarity is clearly dead. But Sherlock fears he's not.
Just as his addiction is allegedly dead, but it's not. As he falls under the lure of the drugs, which he is under the delusion - focus and quicken his mind - Moriarity springs whole from his mind, tormenting him with visions. And it's clear he falls under the spell of the drugs, when he's consumed with guilt over Moriarity's demise. Locked in an eternal battle over the falls, that he can't quite escape from in his own mind. This - I think is the writer's metaphor for addiction. How the addicted are locked in an eternal battle with their own darker impulses - in Sherlock's case, this is Moriarity.
Moffat does a bit of a homage to the Victorian version of Holmes, but he also comments on the sexism of that period. The flip back and forth in time via the drug induced dreams...both examine Holmes character, in particular his flaws (drug addiction and the insecurity that drives it), while at the same time the two versions of the story - the Victorian and Modern and what they had in common.
John Watson does not come across well in either version, as an irritant, and a self-congragulatory one at that, but keep in mind we are entirely in Sherlock's perspective.
Interesting take on the Sherlock character. Enjoyed it more than I'd expected after the mixed reviews.
B. Here we go again....I like to do this every so often just to see if the length of time between viewings changes my mind. (ie. When I'm less emotionally attached or obsessed with specific characters...right now, I'm not attached at all. So this may be the most of objective of my takes on the series or the most detached.) Top 10 Buffy Episodes...or rather most notable episodes, after not having seen the series since roughly 2010. So that's what? Six years? (I was going to do 20, but I got tired after 5.)
1. Once More with Feeling (S6) - first time anyone tried a musical episode and it worked. A meta-narrative on the musical. Without this episode, there most likely wouldn't be a Glee, Galavant, Crazy-Ex Girlfriend, or half a million other takes on the television musical. In the episode - Whedon uses music to pull out what the character's are really feeling, the undisclosed thoughts, often to themselves. When they burst out in song, they are as astonished by their actions as the audience. The episode not only furthers the plot of the story - from a character perspective, it evolves the characters and their relationships, and serves as a humorous meta-narrative on the movie/television musical video, where people sign for no apparent reason. They walk down the street - and all of sudden start singing and dancing. At one point, the characters even look at the camera and state "okay, enough of that, move it along."
2. The Body (S5) -- an episode with no music, very little supernatural stuff, it was just about losing someone. The grief of a loss. And how nothing really helps. Taking the idea of negative space or the absence...and expanding on it both visually and through dialogue.
3. Hush (S4) --- a dark made-up fairy tale, complete with a princess. But it subverts the trope.
And it has no sound but eerie music. And the princess saves the day by screaming. A homage to silent horror films and fairy tales wrapped in a box.
4. Dopplegangland (S3) --- a vampire version of Willow is accidently yanked by Anya from an alternate universe. This version is everything Willow is not, or so we think. Besides being an interesting commentary on sexuality, exclusion, bullying, and using vampirism as a metaphor for detachment and disconnection, it also examines identity. How we see ourselves, how other's see us, our dark and light sides. Buffy more than any other series at this time delved into the dark parts of the human soul, yet in a light almost quippy manner, and this episode is a perfect example of that. Must viewing for Willow fans.
5. Surprise/Innocence (S2) - - two episodes which should be seen together, or the second episode makes no sense. It subverts and flips the star-crossed lover trope. Buffy and her alleged one true love Angel finally sleep together, only to wake up and discover that Angel in having achieved a moment of bliss - no longer has a soul. He couldn't be happier. Now, he can destroy the world, be the villain, no pain, no guilt. But Buffy's world is shaken to its core. The metaphor goes deeper than that of course. For one thing it's Buffy's 17th Birthday - she's come of age, and lost her innocence in both the emotional and physical senses of the word. It's a cynical take on romantic love, in particular the Romeo and Juliet trope of romantic love. And it plays with the high school nightmare of sleeping with the hot older guy, only to have him treat you like shit the next day. (Which is a common nightmare for most women. )
6. This Year's Girl/Who are You (S2) - Two episodes that work better if seen together. Faith and Buffy do a body switch. And discover they know nothing of what the other is going through. Plays with what it would be like to live in another person's skin. Faith has high old time -- until she shares an intimate moment with Riley, and is thrown by it. Interesting take on the different types of sexual intimacy. Faith as Buffy launches herself sexually at various people, amongst them Spike, but when she has a deep and true sexually intimate moment it turns her world upside down and brings her self-loathing to the surface.
7. Fool for Love (S5) -- Spike spins Buffy a tale about his past and the slayers that he killed, when she comes to him for info on how he killed two slayers. Spike isn't the most reliable of narrators and it's not quite clear how much of what he tells her is the truth and embellished. The flashbacks we see, however, appear to be the truth. And it becomes clear upon watching them that Spike is a bit of a chameleon. He trades coats and personas. Redefining himself as required. And he has serious issues with women. Half-poet and half assassin, he charms Buffy almost as much as he does the audience...all the while, smiling with sharp teeth and a devil's grin. Then, the story flips in on itself. Spike, who appears to have all the power here, is cruelly rejected by Buffy. So he flips to assassin mode and decides to kill her - no matter the pain. (His typical routine and what he's done for decades.) Only to find her sitting alone, on her step crying, because she just discovered that her mother has cancer. Struck dumb by this news, Spike does an about face, and instead of killing her. Puts the shot-gun down, and comforts her instead. Like Doppelgangland - this episode is another example of how deeply the series explored identity and the battle of dark and light inside us all.
8. Lies My Parents Told Me(S7) -- a disturbing episode about male/female parental relationship tropes. Both Spike and Wood either idolize or romanticize their mothers. It's revealed that Spike killed his in hopes that he could save her. (Which is an idea that was stolen from Anne Rice, but it doesn't matter.) He also killed Wood's Mother -- mainly as a reaction to killing his one. He's basically been either killing or screwing his mother over and over again - in an attempt to assuage guilt and understand the complicated relationship between the two. Wood meanwhile resents his mother for abandoning him to kill vampires and at the same time aspires to be her, but can't quite get there. He's all about vengeance. (It's all very Freudian.) Off on the side, is Buffy and Giles, and her Daddy issues. Giles after abandoning her to her own devices, pops up again, and is telling her to kill Spike. Her discussion with Giles, and the later one with Wood and Spike, shines a light on her relationship with men - which like Spike's with women, is about her father - who abandoned her. She's either slaying him or screwing him or trying to please him over and over.
9. Becoming I & II (S2) --Episodes that need to be seen together to be truly appreciated. Angelus decides to destroy the world. Spike and Buffy team up to stop him. The story explains who Angel is, and why he does what he does. Turns out it's all about pleasing Daddy, who is long dead. It also goes into depth on Buffy - who thinks she saves the world on her own, yet in the background are her friends fighting along beside her. Her focus on Angel almost to the exclusion of all else - almost dooms them both. Interesting take on the traps of romantic love and how it isolates us from others.
10. Beneath You & Conversations with Dead People (S7) & Dead Things(S6) - these episode also work better if you've seen all of them. Since they each comment on each other and give a full picture of the theme. Various medleys on male and female sexual violence, guilt, remorse, and death. All brought together by a haunting song written by the writer in Conversations with Dead People - about being alone, even in the midst of sexual intimacy. Of how a good-night kiss can be the kiss of death. Or a lust can become violently confused with love. There's moments of violent poetry and striking metaphor in each. Beneath You - the last ten minutes twists the entire episode on its head. Up until that point - it's about the evil male worm, after that point, you see it's not that simple. The women, Nancy, Buffy and to a degree Anya, have demonized the men in their lives. Turned them into worms. Pull the curtain back - they discover while the men's actions were horrible, people are more than their acts. And demonizing them did not resolve the problem or provide satisfying closure. Dead Things - shines a light on those actions and how sexual relations can turn horrific, and relationships become violent mockeries of themselves...love and lust are not the same. It also talks about the war between light and dark inside use all. Then we jump to Conversations with Dead People - about the craving for closure with those we lost and seeing what we want to see...hearing what we want to hear, to feel no pain.
ETA: What are yours?
I liked it better than most people did. Or rather the people who posted about it on livejournal. Was a bit different for Moffat, who of late - has been mainly focused on plot gymnastics. Losing some of the poetry, character, and emotion as a result. This episode felt very much like a character piece - examining Sherlock's psychological issues, and his addiction. Also, lately, Moffat appears to be critiquing the sexist nature of not one but two of Britian's iconic and male dominated story tropes - first Doctor Who in the Husbands of River Song, and then Sherlock Holmes in Abominable Bride. He gets a bit preachy in Sherlock, while I found him to a little more subtle in Doctor Who. (Half-curious to see what his take on James Bond would be. Who's the most obviously sexist of the three.) Considering Moffat has been accused of being sexist, I find the commentary on it from the writer rather intriguing.
Anyhow, the story is not easy to follow. Quite poetical in places.
It jumps and skips back and forth in time - and it's not clear which Sherlock is dreaming it in a drug induced haze, modern day Sherlock or the Victorian version. (The first time, I think, that Moffat and company have examined Sherlock's drug addiction in any sort of depth.) The Modern Day version has taken heroine. While the 19th Century Version took his notorious 7 percent solution of Cocaine. The mystery is a hallucinatory ghost story - where women pose as a ghostly bride to take out vengeance on the male misogynists in their lives.
The story is being told, or appears to be told by John Watson, as one of his stories --- but we are firmly in Sherlock's perspective, as if he's read the story by Watson and is commenting on it as both its hero and its reader. Which I haven't seen done before and is an interesting narrative trick to pull off. It's hard to trust any of the narrators in this story - we have three - Watson, modern day Sherlock and Victorian Sherlock, and none are reliable. Sherlock, for one thing, is revealed at the end to be on a drug trip or high. While Watson doesn't notice certain things and embellishes the story to put Sherlock in the best possible light.
So at the end, it's not clear if the mystery of the Abominable Bride is real or a dream created by either Sherlock or Watson. And the homicidal corpse bride appears to be a metaphor for the drugs Sherlock is on, as well as his guilt over Moriarity and possibly the loss of Irene Adler. Not to mention how he has treated women throughout the series. (She reminded me a bit of Tim Burton's film Corpse Bride or Wilkie Collins the Woman in White.)
There's a lot of metaphors in this, which may also explain why I liked it better than most. It felt a bit like watching a narrative poem. Here Moriarity may well be a metaphor for Sherlock's addiction. It's fitting that when he's wrestling with Moriarity on the Falls, where both famously fell, it's John Watson who pushes Moriarity off the falls, not Sherlock. But Sherlock jumps after Moriarity, flying. Until he wakes in modern day, from a drug induced haze. Then falls again, to way in Victorian Times from the same haze. In both time lines - Moriarity is clearly dead. But Sherlock fears he's not.
Just as his addiction is allegedly dead, but it's not. As he falls under the lure of the drugs, which he is under the delusion - focus and quicken his mind - Moriarity springs whole from his mind, tormenting him with visions. And it's clear he falls under the spell of the drugs, when he's consumed with guilt over Moriarity's demise. Locked in an eternal battle over the falls, that he can't quite escape from in his own mind. This - I think is the writer's metaphor for addiction. How the addicted are locked in an eternal battle with their own darker impulses - in Sherlock's case, this is Moriarity.
Moffat does a bit of a homage to the Victorian version of Holmes, but he also comments on the sexism of that period. The flip back and forth in time via the drug induced dreams...both examine Holmes character, in particular his flaws (drug addiction and the insecurity that drives it), while at the same time the two versions of the story - the Victorian and Modern and what they had in common.
John Watson does not come across well in either version, as an irritant, and a self-congragulatory one at that, but keep in mind we are entirely in Sherlock's perspective.
Interesting take on the Sherlock character. Enjoyed it more than I'd expected after the mixed reviews.
B. Here we go again....I like to do this every so often just to see if the length of time between viewings changes my mind. (ie. When I'm less emotionally attached or obsessed with specific characters...right now, I'm not attached at all. So this may be the most of objective of my takes on the series or the most detached.) Top 10 Buffy Episodes...or rather most notable episodes, after not having seen the series since roughly 2010. So that's what? Six years? (I was going to do 20, but I got tired after 5.)
1. Once More with Feeling (S6) - first time anyone tried a musical episode and it worked. A meta-narrative on the musical. Without this episode, there most likely wouldn't be a Glee, Galavant, Crazy-Ex Girlfriend, or half a million other takes on the television musical. In the episode - Whedon uses music to pull out what the character's are really feeling, the undisclosed thoughts, often to themselves. When they burst out in song, they are as astonished by their actions as the audience. The episode not only furthers the plot of the story - from a character perspective, it evolves the characters and their relationships, and serves as a humorous meta-narrative on the movie/television musical video, where people sign for no apparent reason. They walk down the street - and all of sudden start singing and dancing. At one point, the characters even look at the camera and state "okay, enough of that, move it along."
2. The Body (S5) -- an episode with no music, very little supernatural stuff, it was just about losing someone. The grief of a loss. And how nothing really helps. Taking the idea of negative space or the absence...and expanding on it both visually and through dialogue.
3. Hush (S4) --- a dark made-up fairy tale, complete with a princess. But it subverts the trope.
And it has no sound but eerie music. And the princess saves the day by screaming. A homage to silent horror films and fairy tales wrapped in a box.
4. Dopplegangland (S3) --- a vampire version of Willow is accidently yanked by Anya from an alternate universe. This version is everything Willow is not, or so we think. Besides being an interesting commentary on sexuality, exclusion, bullying, and using vampirism as a metaphor for detachment and disconnection, it also examines identity. How we see ourselves, how other's see us, our dark and light sides. Buffy more than any other series at this time delved into the dark parts of the human soul, yet in a light almost quippy manner, and this episode is a perfect example of that. Must viewing for Willow fans.
5. Surprise/Innocence (S2) - - two episodes which should be seen together, or the second episode makes no sense. It subverts and flips the star-crossed lover trope. Buffy and her alleged one true love Angel finally sleep together, only to wake up and discover that Angel in having achieved a moment of bliss - no longer has a soul. He couldn't be happier. Now, he can destroy the world, be the villain, no pain, no guilt. But Buffy's world is shaken to its core. The metaphor goes deeper than that of course. For one thing it's Buffy's 17th Birthday - she's come of age, and lost her innocence in both the emotional and physical senses of the word. It's a cynical take on romantic love, in particular the Romeo and Juliet trope of romantic love. And it plays with the high school nightmare of sleeping with the hot older guy, only to have him treat you like shit the next day. (Which is a common nightmare for most women. )
6. This Year's Girl/Who are You (S2) - Two episodes that work better if seen together. Faith and Buffy do a body switch. And discover they know nothing of what the other is going through. Plays with what it would be like to live in another person's skin. Faith has high old time -- until she shares an intimate moment with Riley, and is thrown by it. Interesting take on the different types of sexual intimacy. Faith as Buffy launches herself sexually at various people, amongst them Spike, but when she has a deep and true sexually intimate moment it turns her world upside down and brings her self-loathing to the surface.
7. Fool for Love (S5) -- Spike spins Buffy a tale about his past and the slayers that he killed, when she comes to him for info on how he killed two slayers. Spike isn't the most reliable of narrators and it's not quite clear how much of what he tells her is the truth and embellished. The flashbacks we see, however, appear to be the truth. And it becomes clear upon watching them that Spike is a bit of a chameleon. He trades coats and personas. Redefining himself as required. And he has serious issues with women. Half-poet and half assassin, he charms Buffy almost as much as he does the audience...all the while, smiling with sharp teeth and a devil's grin. Then, the story flips in on itself. Spike, who appears to have all the power here, is cruelly rejected by Buffy. So he flips to assassin mode and decides to kill her - no matter the pain. (His typical routine and what he's done for decades.) Only to find her sitting alone, on her step crying, because she just discovered that her mother has cancer. Struck dumb by this news, Spike does an about face, and instead of killing her. Puts the shot-gun down, and comforts her instead. Like Doppelgangland - this episode is another example of how deeply the series explored identity and the battle of dark and light inside us all.
8. Lies My Parents Told Me(S7) -- a disturbing episode about male/female parental relationship tropes. Both Spike and Wood either idolize or romanticize their mothers. It's revealed that Spike killed his in hopes that he could save her. (Which is an idea that was stolen from Anne Rice, but it doesn't matter.) He also killed Wood's Mother -- mainly as a reaction to killing his one. He's basically been either killing or screwing his mother over and over again - in an attempt to assuage guilt and understand the complicated relationship between the two. Wood meanwhile resents his mother for abandoning him to kill vampires and at the same time aspires to be her, but can't quite get there. He's all about vengeance. (It's all very Freudian.) Off on the side, is Buffy and Giles, and her Daddy issues. Giles after abandoning her to her own devices, pops up again, and is telling her to kill Spike. Her discussion with Giles, and the later one with Wood and Spike, shines a light on her relationship with men - which like Spike's with women, is about her father - who abandoned her. She's either slaying him or screwing him or trying to please him over and over.
9. Becoming I & II (S2) --Episodes that need to be seen together to be truly appreciated. Angelus decides to destroy the world. Spike and Buffy team up to stop him. The story explains who Angel is, and why he does what he does. Turns out it's all about pleasing Daddy, who is long dead. It also goes into depth on Buffy - who thinks she saves the world on her own, yet in the background are her friends fighting along beside her. Her focus on Angel almost to the exclusion of all else - almost dooms them both. Interesting take on the traps of romantic love and how it isolates us from others.
10. Beneath You & Conversations with Dead People (S7) & Dead Things(S6) - these episode also work better if you've seen all of them. Since they each comment on each other and give a full picture of the theme. Various medleys on male and female sexual violence, guilt, remorse, and death. All brought together by a haunting song written by the writer in Conversations with Dead People - about being alone, even in the midst of sexual intimacy. Of how a good-night kiss can be the kiss of death. Or a lust can become violently confused with love. There's moments of violent poetry and striking metaphor in each. Beneath You - the last ten minutes twists the entire episode on its head. Up until that point - it's about the evil male worm, after that point, you see it's not that simple. The women, Nancy, Buffy and to a degree Anya, have demonized the men in their lives. Turned them into worms. Pull the curtain back - they discover while the men's actions were horrible, people are more than their acts. And demonizing them did not resolve the problem or provide satisfying closure. Dead Things - shines a light on those actions and how sexual relations can turn horrific, and relationships become violent mockeries of themselves...love and lust are not the same. It also talks about the war between light and dark inside use all. Then we jump to Conversations with Dead People - about the craving for closure with those we lost and seeing what we want to see...hearing what we want to hear, to feel no pain.
ETA: What are yours?