Nov. 5th, 2010

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Just finished watching last night's Grey's Anatomy which I loved to pieces. It's been very good this year, and apparently I'm not the only one who thinks so - EW even put it on it's must watch list and it's been climbing steadily in the Nielsen ratings. I'm at a point in my life in which stories with emotional themes resonate for me far more than one's that do not. Political allegory, philosophical/metaphysical theme, or dysfunctional themes about bad parents...are starting to slowly grate on my nerves. There are however a few exceptions, for political allergory and feminism - nobody does it better than The Good Wife, for metaphysics, religion and parental dysfunction - the prematurely canceled Caprica rocks the proverbial boat. True Blood does both political and religious satire quite well. For raw emotion? There's Supernatural (bro-romance and father/son, brother/brother issues like whoa! Plus a deft examination of raw right-wing Christian mythos) and Vampire Diaries (the angst of being alone) and the angst of wanting love and to be loved.

But Grey's...sigh, it really captures how people react to a traumatic event in different ways. No one does it the same. And it avoids stereotypes. Each character is uniquely drawn and often goes against what you might expect. I find myself rewinding during it, rewatching bits, and well, falling in love.

To fall in love with a piece of art is a rare thing...a special thing. Just as falling out of love with it can be a painful and grating thing, which is separate post. In tonight's Grey's - each character was explored and furthered...in detail. Plus Amber Bensen had a small and rather interesting part - as a patient's long lost daughter. Amber, who once played Tara, looks different, thinner in the face, older, her hair shorter. But she plays that warm insecurity very well. Not only were the character's explored through their workplace duties, but also through their relationships. Admittedly the reason hospital/medical dramas work so well for me is that
I know next to nothing about medicine, avoid hospitals like the plague, and hated biology (ew).
Being a doctor or nurse was never an ambition. Candy stripper was bad enough. Hospitals tend to make me nervous and scare me. Don't like them. Which is why I love medical dramas. Legal and criminal procedural dramas on the other hand bug the beegesus out of me - because I actually did pursue a career in both fields and actually do know quite a bit about both, more than I want to.
I'm weird, I like to watch tv shows about things I don't know much about...

Was a bit surprised by this week's episode...spoilers )
shadowkat: (Default)
Difficult weekend ahead. personal stuff )

Also...I've got a question for you all, it's rather general and I'm not even sure you've read this far or at all - so may not get any answers or just one or two.

What do you do when you realize that you are starting to, ahem, dislike a writer and a story thread/verse, characters that you loved to pieces? I'm not talking about something you casually like or a tv show you loved but never wrote about. I mean something that you invested in emotionally. Wrote meta on. Fanfic. Joined a fandom. Discussed to death. Drew pictures of.
Collected all the DVD's and stories about. Something you really loved. And then, wham...an episode, a comic, a novelization - something that the "original creator" - the writer you loved, creates or does with that story - makes you see it in a light...that well, causes you to feel
a sense of deep dissatisfaction and disappointment. And as time wears on...much like water and wind slowly eroding at rocks...you find your love for the characters, the verse and the writer eroding...until you wake up one day and think, I don't love this writer or his work any longer.
I don't even like it. It offends me. And you find yourself struggling with the feeling, because you don't want to dislike it, you want to like it, damn it! You want to...to hold on to what it felt like. But the more you try...it just doesn't quite work. And you think, uhm, okay, maybe I'll change my mind with the next episode or issue...maybe this is a passing phase, a mood...but it isn't. And well, you have this fandom you've joined. And they post comments to you only when you write about that show or that comic or that book. But you realize what you are writing is getting increasingly negative, increasingly ranty and snarky...and you feel like you might be alienating folks, losing friends, and you don't want to. You want to hold on to the fun. But...you really really hate have issues with what the writer is doing...to such a degree that you want to kick the writer or slap him upside the head and say, why? Why are you doing this to the characters I fell in love with? WHY!!! And you want to hurt this writer. You want this writer to feel your pain and your frustration. And you feel incredibly guilty for feeling this way, and think...life is too short and maybe I should just not ever read anything by this silly writer again. But you want to know the end of the story or tv show...so you hang in there...but it gets worse.

Has this ever happened to you? If so, what did you do? Did you go find another fandom? Or just ignore everything that soured you on the writer and focus on the things you loved? Or shrug and move away from it all, after engaging a bit of private grief?

Now that I've written all of the above, odd as it may sound? I'm not sure I want to know the answers? Or perhaps I do, just without any advice attached? Like "you should do this or that", or "I don't get invested in such and such..." or "maybe you are just looking at it the wrong way". I think what I want tonight, in my cool apartment, is comfort. Hugs. A blanket. Or a touch. Such as..."yes, feel that way too, totally". Or "I have felt that way. And you are not an idiot for falling in love with a fictional piece of work only to become disappointed and disillusioned in it, regardless of what that work is or was, or minor it may seem to the world. It meant something to you, and that's all that is important."

The problem with life sometimes I think is regardless of what we do, we are always navigating around pot-holes, shit, quick-sand, and mosquitos, to get to the rainbows and sunshine.

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