VID: Cherry [La Femme Nikita]

[abby82]

Title: Cherry
Artist: Lana Del Rey
Vidder: abby82
Source: La Femme Nikita (TV Series)
Download: AO3 | Tumblr | YouTube | Download (151 MB, .mov)
Length: 3:13 minutes
Summary: Who seduces the seducer?
Notes: Featuring liberal use of Michael loving Nikita, the love slinky, and Michael's poor broken heart.

Click to view

Additional Notes: Okay, hear me out. This both is and isn’t a Michael/Nikita HR shipper vid. The initial concept for the vid was based off of the total heart eyes that Michael starts giving Nikita towards the end of the season 3 and throughout season 4. That man had it BAD. When he told Nikita back at the beginning of season 2 that they couldn’t be together because “They’ll see it in our eyes when we look at each other,” he wasn’t kidding. So yeah, I loved that version of Michael so much that I wanted to preserve him in vid format. Things got bumpy throughout season 4 and then Nikita pulled the rug out from everyone, Michael included, by revealing that she was working undercover for Center since season 2. Hearts were broken, blood tears were shed, and Michael and Nikita went their separate ways, The last two episodes of season 5 were able to salvage the love story and things were finally set right for my shipper heart.

Buuuuut, I’d be lying if I didn’t say that the idea of Nikita pulling a fast one on Michael, the ultimate Section Operative, a man who will engage in manipulation and seduction if it helps achieve Section objectives, wasn’t intriguing. Michael, who had closed himself emotionally to survive the traumas of Section, ended up slowly allowing himself to love and ended up falling victim to the very thing that he brought upon his own targets in the name of Section. Ouch.

Now Nikita, for all her talk about wanting to escape Section and find freedom, was in some way using that as a smokescreen after she returned to Section. At the end of season 4, she doesn't escape with Michael. He asks Nikita to come with him because he loves her, even after the betrayal. Instead Nikita refuses.  She doesn’t bargain for her own freedom. She gives Michael his and chooses to return to Center and theoretically reform Section from there. Her goal is to make Section, an entity that has done a lot of good but that ultimately lost its way, much more humane. Season 1 Nikita wanted out of Section and freedom. Season 4 Nikita wants to reform Section One from within, namely Center.

Does she love Michael? Yes, the Nikita of season 1 still happened. Michael got under her skin, but she chose to sacrifice her heart for a greater cause. A cause that would impact the lives of innocents around the world. That was an integral part of her character. Nikita values the lives of innocents. She always fought tooth and nail to spare the innocent people who crossed Section's path from unnecessary pain. That was the more truthful part of NIkita's ruse.

I feel like it’s almost as if TPTB remembered what the name of the show was and the show’s original promotional campaign-Nikita as a femme fatale who seduces her targets only to make a scantily clad escape guns blazing. There was no scantily clad exit thankfully, but she did seduce and deceive everyone at Section. Section went up against the woman Nikita and lost. Yeah, I know, it's not perfect. For the most part I'm trying to make sense of a story line that was executed rather abruptly when they got word of their impending cancellation at the end of season 4.

So now back to the vid itself. It did take a different bent from what I originally intended.  Youtube vidder BlueBell did a great season one Michael/Nikita vid set to Lana Del Rey's "Pretty When You Cry" I thought it was great and the lyrics fit the relationship beautifully. She then announced that she was working on a season two Michael/Nikita vid. I've really enjoyed Lana Del Rey's music and I wanted to attempt my own LFN vid to her music. In my opinion her song "Cherry" fit Michael's POV really well during the rollercoaster that was late season 3 and season 4. Michael finally lets himself love Nikita and he goes all in 100 percent. He is completely invested in he and Nikita being together. Section demanding that they end their relationship only intensifies their love story. Then comes the heartbreak of the Gelman arc and Nikita's emotional conditioning. The scene of Michael with Nikita in her apartment as he's trying to comprehend what happened to her is devastating. Peta and Roy did such beautiful and subtle work in that scene. It's a series highlight. You could see his heart breaking and when I threw those scenes on the timeline, they just worked so well. Towards the end of the song there are a few backup vocals saying, "Bitch" and then ultimately at the end, "Fuck." I had originally intended to include scenes from the course correction that the last two episodes of season 5 brought. However, the song and those backup vocals really did demand that the vid take the turn it did and become a Nikita seduces the seducer vid. I’m sorry Michael.  My next vid will definitely be much kinder to you and your badass ways. The last third of the song also had some really great atmospheric vocalizations and they worked beautifully with the abstract and dream like way the "love slinky" scene was shot. It was so intensely erotic and my only regret is that I couldn't get more of that sequence in. I kept going back to see if I could sneak in one more shot or perhaps swap an existing scene out. Unfortunately, that didn't pan out but hey that's what future vids are for right?

In the end I'm extremely happy with the way this vid turned out. It was so much fun to put together. It also came together pretty quickly. I haven't made a vid since 2016. I'd had a couple of attempts but nothing that got finished or made it past the clipping stage. All my early vids were on a PC and I eventually moved to a Mac. This is the first vid I've done with Final Cut Pro. I'm in no way a fancy vidder so it's more software than I'll ever use. However, I found the ability to just throw entire episodes into a project and then make smaller clips right there and then extremely helpful. In the past I'd lose so much time clipping before I even opened up my editing software. I sure hope this leads to my rediscovering the enthusiasm I used to have for vidding.

I'm also extremely happy that I can contribute one thing to the La Femme Nikita fandom. It may not be as old as my Forever Knight fandom but unlike FK, it doesn't really have a place where fans can converse. It's always nice to stumble across old conversations between the show's original fans and those that are discovering it anew like myself.

Come chat with me if you're out there!

Lyrics

Love

I said real love, it's like feeling no fear

When you're standing in the face of danger

'Cause you just want it so much

A touch

From your real love

It's like heaven taking the place of something evil

And lettin' it burn off from the rush

Yeah, yeah

(Fuck)

Darlin', darlin', darlin'

I fall to pieces when I'm with you, I fall to pieces

My cherries and wine, rosemary and thyme

And all of my peaches (are ruined)

Love, is it real love?

It's like smiling when the firing squad's against you.

And you just stay lined up

Yeah

(Fuck)

Darlin', darlin', darlin'

I fall to pieces when I'm with you, I fall to pieces (bitch)

My cherries and wine, rosemary and thyme

And all of my peaches (are ruined, bitch)

My rose garden dreams, set on fire by fiends

And all my black beaches (are ruined)

My celluloid scenes are torn at the seams

And I fall to pieces (bitch)

I fall to pieces when I'm with you

(Why)

'Cause I love you so much, I fall to pieces

My cherries and wine, rosemary and thyme

And all of my peaches (are ruined, bitch)

Are ruined (bitch)

Are ruined (fuck)

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