(no subject)

[shadowkat]

Well, tornado warnings are all called off now. New York is hilarious when it comes to tornado warnings. They aren't quite sure what to make of them. LIRR suspended service. Let's face it if a Tornado hit - we'd be dead. This was a weird ass storm....haven't seen anything like it.

Read this blurb in an interview with Brian Lynch regarding the Spike mini-series which more or less captures in a nutshell what I look for in leading male character or hero:

CBR asked Lynch about the dynamics of having Spike in the lead rather than as a supporting character, however prominent. "Having Spike headline a comic definitely makes for a different story than if Angel or Buffy took the lead," Lynch said. "He handles things differently, he's got a great, dark sense of humor about most situations, but above and beyond all that, he leads with his heart. He's emotional, and that can either pay off great for him, or blow up in his face. Now that he's taking the lead, he has this huge responsibility on his hands: not only to deal with the big threats but to look out for the core group he's assembled. So there are some growing pains. It's much easier to be part of a team than to lead it. And his solutions to things aren't always clean or easy.

Now here's the thing - why do so many heroic characters on tv, comics and books lack a sense of humor? Also why are villains gifted with a dark sense of humor (and a smoking habit) while the heroes don't? It's unrealistic. I have a dark sense of humor, most of my family does, and
I know or have met more than a few horrific nasty people who don't.

It's poor writing. I give Whedon a lot of credit for giving Buffy, Wash and Mal a dark quippy sense of humor, as well as Xander. Not to mention Willow. Angel and Riley would have been more interesting to me if they were a bit less stiff and had a bit more wit - both characters take themselves far too seriously. I kept wanting to say, lighten up! Have the same problems with Vampire Diaries, Lost, Smallville, and Being Human. Humor is important. Characters with no sense of humor aren't fun to watch or read...at least for me. Life is tough enough, I need to laugh, people! Supernatural - at least has wit. Dean is snarky as all get out. Is there like an unwritten rule that good guys shouldn't have a sense of humor?

Comments

[eilowyn.livejournal.com]

I completely agree with you on the necessity of a sense of humor. It's why I adore Buffy and Mal and despise Angel: Angel needs to get over himself and laugh every now and then. It's probably one of the main reasons why I'm always drawn to the secondary snarky guy instead of the primary broody guy (BtVS, Lost, The Vampire Diaries, even Eric of True Blood has more of a sense of humor than Bill!) because the snarky guy makes me laugh while the broody guy makes me yawn. So you're cursed with a soul/have daddy issues/hate being a vampire/think being a southern gentleman means having a stick up your ass? So what! Get yourselves some antidepressants and shut it with the woe-is-me angsting already!

I have a lot of thoughts on the subjects of the broody guys, but that's the gist of it. And I will always love Spike for the reasons Brian mentions: his sense of humor and his heart.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

What strikes me as odd regarding the writing of Angel - is the main difference between Angelus and Angel, appears to be a snarky sense of humor. As if "sarcasm" is evil. LOL! I guess I'm evil then. (shrugs).
Granted, I don't consider Angel a hero, nor do I think Whedon ever intended him to be one - he appears to be written more as an anti-hero actually. But that said - in Buffy, as nice-guy brooding Angel, he barely cracks a smile and is all sturm and drang. But as Angelus, he's gleeful,
witty, and laughs.

Same deal on Vampire Diaries - Katherine is sarcastic, snarky and witty, Elena - not so much. Same with Anna and Vicky vs. Caroline. Or Aunt Jenna vs. Isobel. True Blood - has similar issues...although I will give Tara credit for her wise-cracks, along with Lafayette. True Blood is a tad more diverse in its casting choices than any of the other vamp shows out there. But you are right nice guy Bill is far too serious, and bad boy Eric is hilarious.

What's up with that? Can't the writers figure out how to make someone who is brooding funny? Marvel actually did figure it out - in one of the X-men arcs - where broody Scott Summers (Cyclops of the X-men)- started cracking jokes, very dry witty jokes. But it took them ten-fifteen years to get there. And it didn't last.

[rebcake.livejournal.com]

I could not agree more with the necessity for the funny. There are whole swaths of shows I do not watch because they are so self-serious, and others that I would like a whole lot more with a little more levity. On the other hand, it's a rare sitcom that has enough weight to interest me...picky, picky, picky.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Have similar issues with sitcoms. I admittedly have an odd sense of humor.
I often find dramas funnier than sitcoms. I like absurdist humor or
dry wit. Vampire Diaries for example makes me laugh my head off. (And I don't think it is necessarily intentional). But I rarely laugh at 30 Rock.
I'm incredibly picky. And if I do find the sitcom funny, it's not consistent, it will be funny one week, and not funny the next two...

[harsens-rob.livejournal.com]

I'm not ordering the Spike mini, but would like to know what happens in it, in case it is referred to later in Angel or BTVS. If you are going to collect, do you think you could do a summary - maybe even reviewage for those of us who won't be spending money on it (I already feel guilty enough on the amount I'm spending on S&H with the two main Buffyverse titles).

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

You don't have to read or know what is going on in the Spike mini to read the other books. From what I've read - they will have it lead into the Buffy books, and it does to a degree sprout from the Angel ones, but...if you haven't read the Buffy or Angel books, you'll be fine and vice versa. In other words - they aren't true cross-overs.

It's not like the tv series, in which you sort of had to watch both to understand what was going on with Faith and why Angel popped up in Sunnydale with an amulet out of the blue. Here, I can pretty much guarantee you that Lynch's arc is not going to explain Angel or Spike's actions in the other comics, because I don't think Lynch understands their actions in the other comics.

That said? I'll most likely review, but not so sure about the recapping.

[beer-good-foamy.livejournal.com]

Now here's the thing - why do so many heroic characters on tv, comics and books lack a sense of humor?

That's actually a very good question (though I think there are quite a few who do). Here's one possible meta-ish answer: The hero of the story is also the one to whom things happen. A sense of humour is not only about being funny, but also about subverting expectations - for instance, coming up with new exciting challenges for our protagonist to overcome. In other words, the hero is often the butt of the big cosmic joke, rather than the teller of it. (Of course, as Buffy and Mal and the Doctor and John McClane etc etc etc show, that shouldn't mean they can't have a sense of humour of their own about it.)

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

True, there are quite a few who do. But...there's so many writers who seem to think that the good guy can't be sarcastic or snarky, because snarky equals evil. See this a lot in vampire shows and vampire books, particularly vampire romances. Buffy was amongst the few exceptions to the rule. It also happens a lot in the super-hero trope. DC Comics in particular. Marvel - has a better sense of humor. (Compare Iron Man movies to Batman movies, generally speaking.)

And the best way of dealing with a lot bad stuff being piled on top of your head is to well laugh or poke fun at it.

I've been reading George RR Martin's fantasy opus, and it struck me as I was reading that the characters I enjoyed the most were these two brothers, who were sort of nasty, yet have a wonderfully snarky sense of humor. They make fun of their insane family, their horrible situations, etc. And I thought, okay, while I like the more heroic and noble characters, they aren't as entertaining - why? Because they lack a sense of humor and are, sort of, whiny. Granted they have plenty of reasons to be whiny, but...

Why is this? Mark Twain used to poke fun at Henry James for taking himself too seriously, and Sir Walter Scott - who wrote about oh so noble Ivanhoe. I can't say I blame him. Shakespeare at least gave his heroes wit - Hamlet is actually quite witty at times. As is Macbeth.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Okay, maybe Macbeth isn't exactly a hero, more of an anti-hero...so he doesn't count. And Romeo and Juliet certainly weren't witty...which may explain why doomed lovers are always so serious?

[local-max.livejournal.com]

Agree generally. Though I actually really like Riley's understated sense of humour. "Yes, I am a lesbian." "It's not petroleum fun, but it passes the time." "I have to recharge these every few hours or they'll go out" (referring to Xander's clown-pants). Since Riley (especially!) was a commentary on the square-jawed hero type, I liked that his jokes were less frequent and less biting.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

True, Riley did at times express a dead-pan wit - very similar to heroes of that particular trope. I forgot about that. It was done rarely though.
Here and there.