(no subject)

[shadowkat]

1. Ugh, I meant to work on my novel tonight and got distracted by social media (Twitter and FB). And then got irritated by it. I need to take a hiatus from it (well except for the GH fan board which is a lovely place). Also I really do not like Twitter. It's basically people yelling at each other twenty-four/seven. Outside of the Dali Lama, I don't really like anyone. I feel like I'm back in high school.
(As an aside, really glad this wasn't available when I was in high school - I'm not sure I'd have survived. My niece is on snapchat, apparently no one in college or high school does Twitter or FB any longer - they all do snapchat. That's hilarious.

2. Stumptown

Eh, they appear to still be pushing the Dex/Grey ship, and have killed the Hoffman/Dex ship. I'm annoyed. I preferred the Hoffman/Dex to Grey/Dex, although not fond of either.

I did however like tonight's episode in spite of myself. A little disappointed...the story thread feels a bit...cliche. But, I like Dex and found her interactions with both the guy from Afghanistan and Sue Lynn Blackbird interesting.

The rest of it felt rather boilerplate to me, unfortunately.

Comments

[cjlasky7]

The braintrust at Stumptown has no intention of putting Dex and Grey together right now, but they don't want to alienate the shippers completely. So it's "Well, they could have... but it's not going to happen because they have other stuff going on."

I'm of two or three minds about the Afghanistan plotline. It did feel like the "network TV drama" version of the war, but they did show how Dex's mental agility made her valuable as an interrogator. I don't really like the idea of a big military conspiracy saving Dex from the moral consequences of her decision; OTOH, the prospect of Dex and Sue Lynn teaming up to take down the bad guys is very appealing.

The one part of the episode that worked perfectly was Ansel. He completed his list; he's got the new girlfriend. He's proven he can be independent, so now he can move back in and take care of his sister. I love how our assumptions about Ansel and Dex's relationship have been turned upside down. (The writers followed through on this one beautifully.)

The one part of this ep that got on my nerves was the pop music cues for the heavy emotional beats. Very distracting and irritating. It's cute when pop tunes come out of Dex's magic rustmobile; but sometimes you gotta let the actors and the script carry you. (I love love love XTC--but when "Dear God" queued up, I said, "Enough already!"

[shadowkat]

It's funny, I didn't notice or remember the pop tunes in the episode. I think this is a result of watching too many television shows that screw it up, so over time...I'm kind of oblivious? Or don't notice?

I just saw the film Emma today - Autumn de Wilde's new adaptation. And it had jarring musical interludes. Out of seemingly nowhere a tune would pop into the story. The first time I thought for a moment it was coming from another theater -- because the first song popped into the movie without warning and popped out again before completing the song. (IT was Country Life by the Watersons. They did it a lot with various songs. The songs were appropriate - but the timing wasn't. I wasn't alone, the audience jumped with me.

Also, I've been watching Grey's Anatomy for years - and...well, they feel the need to throw in fairly loud songs over dialogue and voice over. So, you have the song, the dialogue, and the voice over narration competing for time. I have to turn on the close captioning sometimes to figure out what the heck they are saying. Not to mention all these other relationship dramas and paranormal soaps that they think they music videos every once and a while. Honestly I think Joss Whedon's Buffy and Angel were the only series that handled that well - the song numbers were always sung by a band live at the Bronze. That's the smart way to do it.

After that? I don't notice a few pop songs inappropriately placed. (Yes, television has deadened me to this.)

Diagetic vs. Non-Diagetic

[cjlasky7]

I'm hyper sensitive about pop music cues in movies and TV. (I was a music and film critic for my college newspaper.)

As I said, I usually don't mind the way Stumptown uses pop music cues. Coming out of Dex's car stereo, the music is diagetic (occurs within the narrative), so the characters hear it, they are aware of how it connects to the narrative, and kind of roll their eyes at it. It's a cute bit of commentary on the trope.

Last night was different. There were three heavy emotional scenes, each linked to a non-diagetic pop music cue. It was overkill for me. I felt Stumptown didn't trust the audience to respond to the content of the scenes without help.

Re: Diagetic vs. Non-Diagetic

[shadowkat]

I vaguely remember being annoyed by it - but kind of hand-waved it, because well, I'd watched Grey's Anatomy first.

Most people wouldn't notice it. Of course I'm not that sensitive to audio clues generally speaking and I took courses in film, music and television analysis/criticism in college, visual yes, audio no. Unless of course it is truly overkill - like Grey's Anatomy (which no one minds obviously since it's still at the top of the ratings) or jarring like Emma - which no one minded either.

That's the problematic nature of film, book, music, and art criticism - it's well subjective and personal. What bothers one person another loves. Often times the critic will tell us more about themselves than the work -- so as a result, I've no clue if I want to actually experience the work or not - that's the other problematic nature of reviewing.

I mean I may hate what they are doing, but obviously other's don't. I'm still confused that Last Jedi got an Oscar nomination for best film editing.

[shadowkat]

Agree on the plot. Also the Dex/Grey ship. It's a dumb move, but alas, typical.
Although I thought Grey's statement about not wanting to deal with Dex's baggage and fighting her ghosts, made sense. And was sensible of him. He has his own problems. Ansel can help her better than he can, which he realized when she said if Ansel was here - it would never have gotten this far. Having responsibility for Ansel is what keeps her from going off the rails. It grounds her.

I'm of two or three minds about the Afghanistan plotline. It did feel like the "network TV drama" version of the war, but they did show how Dex's mental agility made her valuable as an interrogator. I don't really like the idea of a big military conspiracy saving Dex from the moral consequences of her decision; OTOH, the prospect of Dex and Sue Lynn teaming up to take down the bad guys is very appealing.

Yeah, that's pretty much my take on it as well. I'm waiting to see how it plays out. But, I'd have preferred that they didn't let Dex off the hook that easily. I get that they want to make her sympathetic, but it felt like a cop out. I honestly thought she tortured the woman, but she stopped them from doing it - and believes that resulted in her OTP's death?

The other things in the episode worked for me - the Ansel story, the Hoffman/partner bonding, and the Sue Lynn discussion. And I'm not quite sure what they are doing with the Afghanistan story...yet.