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shadowkatAlmost lunch time. Slept in, ate a nice breakfast of poached eggs, bacon, and gluten-free English Muffins (which actually taste and look like real English Muffins) - they are a multi-seed brown rice and flax concoction that I get from Food For Life, courtesy of my local health food store. Also watched my cheesy/soapy gothic serials - Vampire Diaries and Supernatural - which are both highly entertaining, sort of taking the place of Buffy and Angel (even if Buffy and Angel were better written and crafted shows - by better written, I mean riskier and more experimental with the format, as well as with far more layered characters and a lot better actors - and clever/sharper dialogue - few people write television dialogue better than Whedon. Plot-wise, the other two are admittedly tighter, but also a tad more predictable - that's the downside of a tight plot - it tends to be easier to predict, because let's face it there aren't that many ways the thing can go and if you figure out the pattern, the mythos, and the genre, plus the fact that it is a tv show and they want to keep going - you pretty much know where it's headed. This was true to an extent with Buffy and Angel too, actually.)
Supernatural - once you get past the at times increasingly sexist and misogynistic storylines, which unfortunately are an integral part of this genre, is rather interesting and entertaining. The fact that they are an integral part of the genre is why I give Supernatural the pass that I may not give someone else - who is intentionally writing a feminist narrative and accomplishing the exact opposite. For me? It's always been about intent or motivation. Although, to be honest, I don't think anything is really that black and white or clear cut. However much we all would like it to be. Supernatural is down and dirty, American, Western, white male mythos horror pop noir. Violent, and crass. I like the genre, always have. But I like all genres. Even literary. Yes, I know, shocking.
In this week's episode - we get to see Sam with a soul, a nice contrast to Sam without. (Although I'm not sure I see that great a difference...this is apparently harder to act than one might think, Ed Norton these guys aren't, but whatever.) We also have an odd storyline that reminds me of the Persephone myth - commented on in post by yuki_onna earlier this week, albeit not in any way shape or form in reference to Supernatural (I seriously doubt she watches it - due to what I stated above about the genre, could be wrong about that though). Dragons in the form of male humans, grab female virgins to open a door to purgatory in order to pull the "mother of us all" out. Apparently she needs a "pure" and "un-scarred" vessel to inhabit. She flies up and out of the earth, red hot, brunette.
A counter to the blond haired medievalist with her sword in the stone, and pristine castle - that provides the gang with the info they need. The manual on how to do this - is written on human skin.
And purgatory is considered the land that monsters go, neither hell nor heaven, made up of the souls of all things nasty. The girls are held underground, and used to pull the mother up from underground - Persephone raped from the earth. They are viriginal. And thrown to the earth for her to rise up.
Watching it - it strikes me how violent our "culture" is. Our society isn't necessarily - well not for everyone. But our "culture" is. The dragon and virgin bit is also a nice metaphor for Sam, who is once again innocent, yet inside him dwells knowledge of hell.
Vampire Diaries - less to talk about. It's not as steeped in metaphor and mythos as Supernatural is, but it is also just in it's second season and it has different intent. Damon continues to be the most interesting character, next to possibly Caroline, Tyler, and Elena's Daddy. Elena continues to be the least interesting. This is a huge weakness and what makes Vampire Diaries a tad formulaic in its approach. Will state that the werewolf storyline, clearly borrowed from the Underworld movie series, is far more interesting than usual. Usually werewolves are depicted as pathetic things, unable to control their power or urgings. Here, they are shown as a bit well more organized. I think Tyler has a problem - he cares about Caroline, genuinely. He didn't appear to know what to do in this episode.
She's right - he did nothing to help them. But he did nothing to hurt them either, he could have left Caroline in the cage. He hung back to see what was going on, having just gotten blind-sided on two levels, can't say I blame him.
The John, Isabelle, and Katherine (Elena's biological family)'s tryst is intriguing me. I like all three characters. And remain uncertain what their goal is exactly. It's not to keep Elena safe.
So what exactly is it? They keep doing weird things. You'd think John would want Katherine dead after she tried to and almost succeeded in killing him. And he apparently has his fingers back on.
So why are they working on getting her out of the tomb? What are they up to? Guessing it probably has something to do with Elijah and Klaus.
Damon...'s conflict appears to be about Elena. He is in love with her but can't have her. Something he's managed to realize and accept, even though it rips at him. His distraction, the woman who understood and he cared for - was killed by a werewolf attempting to kill him. So now, he distracts himself with random women and kills them - thinking that will help, yet weirded out by the guilt that crops up afterwards. While generally speaking this storyline has been done before and better elsewhere, I do find it interesting here. Mostly because the fight seems to be against being good, to try and stay bad, to deny the goodness or the guilt, but it's not working. He wants to go back to what he was - the homicidial manic, he doesn't want to change. And he can't have Elena. So why bother.
It's sort of the Spike tale in S6. But not quite. What I find interesting is that he wants to be bad, not that he wants to be good. Because being bad was freeing. It references the conversation with Rose - who said she didn't want to be bad, she was made bad. Here, Damon...just wants to give into being bad, to turn away from the good - because the good hurts.
Outside of that...eh.
Off to make lunch and go to Doctor appointment at 2:30.
Supernatural - once you get past the at times increasingly sexist and misogynistic storylines, which unfortunately are an integral part of this genre, is rather interesting and entertaining. The fact that they are an integral part of the genre is why I give Supernatural the pass that I may not give someone else - who is intentionally writing a feminist narrative and accomplishing the exact opposite. For me? It's always been about intent or motivation. Although, to be honest, I don't think anything is really that black and white or clear cut. However much we all would like it to be. Supernatural is down and dirty, American, Western, white male mythos horror pop noir. Violent, and crass. I like the genre, always have. But I like all genres. Even literary. Yes, I know, shocking.
In this week's episode - we get to see Sam with a soul, a nice contrast to Sam without. (Although I'm not sure I see that great a difference...this is apparently harder to act than one might think, Ed Norton these guys aren't, but whatever.) We also have an odd storyline that reminds me of the Persephone myth - commented on in post by yuki_onna earlier this week, albeit not in any way shape or form in reference to Supernatural (I seriously doubt she watches it - due to what I stated above about the genre, could be wrong about that though). Dragons in the form of male humans, grab female virgins to open a door to purgatory in order to pull the "mother of us all" out. Apparently she needs a "pure" and "un-scarred" vessel to inhabit. She flies up and out of the earth, red hot, brunette.
A counter to the blond haired medievalist with her sword in the stone, and pristine castle - that provides the gang with the info they need. The manual on how to do this - is written on human skin.
And purgatory is considered the land that monsters go, neither hell nor heaven, made up of the souls of all things nasty. The girls are held underground, and used to pull the mother up from underground - Persephone raped from the earth. They are viriginal. And thrown to the earth for her to rise up.
Watching it - it strikes me how violent our "culture" is. Our society isn't necessarily - well not for everyone. But our "culture" is. The dragon and virgin bit is also a nice metaphor for Sam, who is once again innocent, yet inside him dwells knowledge of hell.
Vampire Diaries - less to talk about. It's not as steeped in metaphor and mythos as Supernatural is, but it is also just in it's second season and it has different intent. Damon continues to be the most interesting character, next to possibly Caroline, Tyler, and Elena's Daddy. Elena continues to be the least interesting. This is a huge weakness and what makes Vampire Diaries a tad formulaic in its approach. Will state that the werewolf storyline, clearly borrowed from the Underworld movie series, is far more interesting than usual. Usually werewolves are depicted as pathetic things, unable to control their power or urgings. Here, they are shown as a bit well more organized. I think Tyler has a problem - he cares about Caroline, genuinely. He didn't appear to know what to do in this episode.
She's right - he did nothing to help them. But he did nothing to hurt them either, he could have left Caroline in the cage. He hung back to see what was going on, having just gotten blind-sided on two levels, can't say I blame him.
The John, Isabelle, and Katherine (Elena's biological family)'s tryst is intriguing me. I like all three characters. And remain uncertain what their goal is exactly. It's not to keep Elena safe.
So what exactly is it? They keep doing weird things. You'd think John would want Katherine dead after she tried to and almost succeeded in killing him. And he apparently has his fingers back on.
So why are they working on getting her out of the tomb? What are they up to? Guessing it probably has something to do with Elijah and Klaus.
Damon...'s conflict appears to be about Elena. He is in love with her but can't have her. Something he's managed to realize and accept, even though it rips at him. His distraction, the woman who understood and he cared for - was killed by a werewolf attempting to kill him. So now, he distracts himself with random women and kills them - thinking that will help, yet weirded out by the guilt that crops up afterwards. While generally speaking this storyline has been done before and better elsewhere, I do find it interesting here. Mostly because the fight seems to be against being good, to try and stay bad, to deny the goodness or the guilt, but it's not working. He wants to go back to what he was - the homicidial manic, he doesn't want to change. And he can't have Elena. So why bother.
It's sort of the Spike tale in S6. But not quite. What I find interesting is that he wants to be bad, not that he wants to be good. Because being bad was freeing. It references the conversation with Rose - who said she didn't want to be bad, she was made bad. Here, Damon...just wants to give into being bad, to turn away from the good - because the good hurts.
Outside of that...eh.
Off to make lunch and go to Doctor appointment at 2:30.
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I'd have kicked him with the stare of death by now
Date: 2011-02-06 12:41 am (UTC)I'd like to think I would... but damn it, that grin! The grin makes me weak kneed.
Re: I'd have kicked him with the stare of death by now
Date: 2011-02-06 01:51 am (UTC)