Ugh I wrote a novel on television, good.
OKAY SO I'M GOING TO ACTUALLY POST ONCE IN AWHILE YOU GUYS. Let's talk about teevee.
So, 30 Rock. The episode last week annoyed me a lot, for the following reasons:
1) It seemed like it was clearly responding to some sort of internet criticism of the show and/or events regarding women and comedy, but I do not know what criticism exactly (something about Jezebel? something about some girl on SNL? or so I understand from vague posts on the internet about it that I did not care about enough to follow up on), which made me feel like I didn't have the context to understand the episode. It was basically exactly like when someone on your flist posts about wank in a fandom that you're not in, where you're like, wow, something is going on, but I have no idea what it is! Which, to be honest, I actually love when it happens on my flist, because if I'm super bored then I get to go read up on some delightful wank that's not upsetting because I'm completely uninvolved, and if I'm not super bored, at least gives me the warm and fuzzy feeling that someone is upset about something on the internet and the fandom world turns on as it always has and ever shall. HOWEVER, I DO NOT WANT THIS FEELING WHEN I AM WATCHING TELEVISION, I just want to laugh at some jokes, whereas this made me feel like the jokes were uncomfortably pointed at someone, but I didn't know who and I didn't know if they deserved it and then I just felt weird.
2) Responding to criticism on the internet with an episode of your NETWORK TELEVISION SHOW is so unclassy and so Aaron Sorkin. (Hey, remember that time Sorkin was an asshole and got banned from TWoP and then he wrote an episode about Josh Lyman being persecuted by bitches on the internet and it was the biggest eyeroll ever? YEAH THAT WAS DUMB. However, remember that other time that The Good Wife wrote an episode where a person who was clearly a thinly veiled Sorkin was questioned by, hilariously, Josh Charles of all people, about how he wrote The Social Network to get back at bitches on the internet who were mean about his drug addiction and it was THE MOST DELIGHTFUL KARMA EVER? Good times, TV, good times. Haha, however that is a whole other ball of wax.) Also the difference in audience and influence between, say, Jezebel and 30 Rock is such that it's like Tina Fey got punched lightly on the arm and she thought an appropriate counterstrike was machine gun fire. THIS IS NOT A PROPORTIONATE RESPONSE, even if you do sort of end up coming down on the side of the criticism, I guess, ish.
3) Responding to meta with fiction is just completely ridiculous anyway. If someone on the internet says your show is bad about women (which, to be frank, it is), the appropriate reaction is to consider this, and if they are wrong, to forget it, and if they are right, to take steps to make your show less bad about women. If you want to discuss it, write an article for the New Yorker or something. However, the appropriate reaction is NOT to write a fictional episode about how people say you're not feminist, that's so mean, except they're sort of right, ahhh! And then continue to have your show the same as it has always been. META =/= SMART. META =/= INTERESTING. (Uh, yeah, whatever Dan Harmon, I AM also looking in your direction. Stop it. I like that fourth wall where it is, thank you.) FICTION IS NOT A GOOD PLACE TO HAVE A DEBATE ABOUT THIS, especially when again, you're the one with all the power and audience.
4) This is especially the case because the thing that bothers me the most about 30 Rock and women is 1) how Liz Lemon has zero female friends, 2) how the show is constantly bagging on Liz Lemon. I feel like in the first couple seasons, the show was great because it had this character I could identify with in certain ways, and then it's spent the time after that being all, GOD, LIZ IS A FAILURE WITH MEN AND THEREFORE IN LIFE, WHAT A SPITEFUL BITTER OLD SPINSTER WHO WILL NEVER GET MARRIED OR HAVE BABIES WHICH MEANS HER LIFE HAS NO PURPOSE OR VALUE. So then to have an episode that basically rags on Liz Lemon for not being very feminist doesn't make me feel like the show has seen the error of its ways, it feels like, oh good, now they've found YET ANOTHER WAY to judge Liz Lemon, while not fixing the things that make me hate the way the show treats women.
Ugh, anyway obvs YMMV and also tl;dr, but I haaaaated that whole plotline so much. And re: 30 Rock and feminism, I really like this article about Liz Lemon vs. Leslie Knope, which basically sums up my feelings about the two of them and 30 Rock's problematic elements. And also how awesome Leslie Knope is, which segues nicely into...
Parks and Rec
THIS SHOW IS MADE OF MAGIC. I LEGIT DO NOT KNOW HOW I AM GOING TO GET THROUGH THE NEXT TWO WEEKS WITHOUT IT TO LOOK FORWARD TO. (Thank God it is Fandom March Madness these two weeks, maybe that is how.) I don't have anything too intelligent to say except that I am shipping Leslie/Ben so goddamn hard (and how much do I love that Leslie's romantic interests always like her BECAUSE of her awesomeness and competence and assertiveness instead of in spite of it? And how the show admires her for all those things?), and I am also shipping Leslie/Ron still sometimes (how married were they on their road trip?) and obvs April/Ron (HE CAN'T LOSE APRIL. HE CAN'T LOSE APRIL.) and I'm glad April/Andy was back to being the cutest this week and it was back to April having feelings against her will and trying to hide it adorably, because that's what I like about that ship and I was completely uninterested when it was just Andy trying to win her back, because of course Andy has feelings, WHO CARES. Also thank God Ann and Leslie actually interacted again. That's my one complaint, that in 21 minutes a week they can't have everyone interact that I want to, LET'S MAKE THIS SHOW AN HOUR OKAY GUYS. OKAY.
Okay, enough of that. Oh, except to say that I've had an exciting exploration of Adam Scott's back catalogue due to this show, and Seven and a Match was shockingly enjoyable, and in it he makes out with Webster from Band of Brothers, SO CHECK THAT OUT, while The Killer Next Door (aka Ronnie) was so gross and disturbing it made me actively feel disgusting for days and after I watched it I wanted to go bury the DVD in the backyard so it wouldn't be in my house anymore because PUTTING IT IN THE FREEZER WAS NOT EVEN SUFFICIENT. Ugh.
Also I can tell you everything about every guest spot Nick Offerman has ever had.
Also Poehler's back catalogue has made me start shipping her/Seth Meyers pretty hard, so if anybody knows anything about fic for THAT, send it my way.
Oh, speaking of which, you guys, nbc_rpf!! If you build it, they will come, right? I WANT FIC FOR EVERYTHING, someone start writing some, please and thank you. Please write fic where every Weekend Update pairing ever does it, and where Aubrey Plaza, Mindy Kaling, and Ellie Kemper are all in a girl band. That's all I want. It's all I've ever wanted.
Fringe
So I just started marathoning this show on a whim because throughadoor told me it'd make me nostalgic for Vancouver-era X-Files, WHICH IT TOTALLY DOES. Haha, I'm watching it like a freak, though, because I watched the first four eps of season 1, then jumped to, like, episode 14 or 16 of that season because someone on the internet said that's where it gets good, and then have watched through 3x07 or so. I totally love all the parallel universe stuff LIKE CRAZY, though I have heard from multiple people on my flist that it abruptly gets terrible pretty soon so I'm not giving it my heart or anything. Also I tend to watch it while I'm doing other things so I haven't been giving it my whole attention, so I may have missed stuff, so take anything I say with a grain of salt.
Anyway, but here is my question re: Fringe -- maybe it's just me, but I kind of can't get past the whole thing where Walter EXPERIMENTED ON CHILDREN AND DOES NOT SEEM VERY REMORSEFUL? I feel like the show thinks it's not that big a deal, so I'm supposed to find him charming when he wants to make salt water taffy or whatever, but... I am really not cool with it. The funny thing is that the show makes SUCH A BIG DEAL over him kidnapping Peter and how regretful he is and how Peter can't forgive him, etc, etc, but I feel like that is not NEARLY as bad as the experiments he did on Olivia so wtf. Like, at least he had a motivation for the kidnapping and he didn't know that it was going to ruin the other universe, unlike the experimenting on children thing for which his only motivation was ENDS JUSTIFY THE MEANS, LET'S SACRIFICE THESE KIDS TO SCIENCE. Anyway, in season 3 Walter seems much more to regret his mad scientist past than he did in the first couple seasons, so it doesn't bother me as much, but sometimes I feel like a crazy person for feeling like that is KIND OF AN ISSUE. Uh, is anyone else with me, I guess is what I'm asking?
MOVING ON. Nation, the greatest time of year is upon us: FANDOM MARCH MADNESS. GO VOTE. The exciting thing for me this year is that fandom is VOTING FOR LADIES without us even campaigning for year of the woman like last year! HAS FANDOM BEEN REFORMED? DO WE REGRET OUR MISOGYNIST PAST OF DEAN WINCHESTER, GREGORY HOUSE, SPIKE, AND BARNEY STINSON? I mean, whatever, Barney and Sheldon are still winning, which is a bummer, but Liz Lemon and Leslie Knope and Olivia Dunham and tons of other ladies are winning in landslides! Well done, people! Also I feel like this year is better about characters of color than usual, though that's a general impression since I didn't go through and actually look at stats on that.
HOWEVER, you should totally go vote for Robin Scherbatsky and Penny to try to take down Barney and Sheldon. (WHY DO THOSE WRETCHES HAVE TO WIN EVERY SINGLE YEAR??) ALSO, Kelly Kapoor is making a shocking run to win The Office over wretched Halpert!! PLEASE GO VOTE FOR KELLY YOU GUYS. IF KELLY KAPOOR WINS AS OFFICE REPRESENTATIVE IT WILL MAKE MY LIFE.
Also people are starting to say Leslie Knope for the whole thing, which I don't have high hopes of but would be my ULTIMATE FANTASY so if you feel like chipping in on that, pleaaaaaase do.
So, 30 Rock. The episode last week annoyed me a lot, for the following reasons:
1) It seemed like it was clearly responding to some sort of internet criticism of the show and/or events regarding women and comedy, but I do not know what criticism exactly (something about Jezebel? something about some girl on SNL? or so I understand from vague posts on the internet about it that I did not care about enough to follow up on), which made me feel like I didn't have the context to understand the episode. It was basically exactly like when someone on your flist posts about wank in a fandom that you're not in, where you're like, wow, something is going on, but I have no idea what it is! Which, to be honest, I actually love when it happens on my flist, because if I'm super bored then I get to go read up on some delightful wank that's not upsetting because I'm completely uninvolved, and if I'm not super bored, at least gives me the warm and fuzzy feeling that someone is upset about something on the internet and the fandom world turns on as it always has and ever shall. HOWEVER, I DO NOT WANT THIS FEELING WHEN I AM WATCHING TELEVISION, I just want to laugh at some jokes, whereas this made me feel like the jokes were uncomfortably pointed at someone, but I didn't know who and I didn't know if they deserved it and then I just felt weird.
2) Responding to criticism on the internet with an episode of your NETWORK TELEVISION SHOW is so unclassy and so Aaron Sorkin. (Hey, remember that time Sorkin was an asshole and got banned from TWoP and then he wrote an episode about Josh Lyman being persecuted by bitches on the internet and it was the biggest eyeroll ever? YEAH THAT WAS DUMB. However, remember that other time that The Good Wife wrote an episode where a person who was clearly a thinly veiled Sorkin was questioned by, hilariously, Josh Charles of all people, about how he wrote The Social Network to get back at bitches on the internet who were mean about his drug addiction and it was THE MOST DELIGHTFUL KARMA EVER? Good times, TV, good times. Haha, however that is a whole other ball of wax.) Also the difference in audience and influence between, say, Jezebel and 30 Rock is such that it's like Tina Fey got punched lightly on the arm and she thought an appropriate counterstrike was machine gun fire. THIS IS NOT A PROPORTIONATE RESPONSE, even if you do sort of end up coming down on the side of the criticism, I guess, ish.
3) Responding to meta with fiction is just completely ridiculous anyway. If someone on the internet says your show is bad about women (which, to be frank, it is), the appropriate reaction is to consider this, and if they are wrong, to forget it, and if they are right, to take steps to make your show less bad about women. If you want to discuss it, write an article for the New Yorker or something. However, the appropriate reaction is NOT to write a fictional episode about how people say you're not feminist, that's so mean, except they're sort of right, ahhh! And then continue to have your show the same as it has always been. META =/= SMART. META =/= INTERESTING. (Uh, yeah, whatever Dan Harmon, I AM also looking in your direction. Stop it. I like that fourth wall where it is, thank you.) FICTION IS NOT A GOOD PLACE TO HAVE A DEBATE ABOUT THIS, especially when again, you're the one with all the power and audience.
4) This is especially the case because the thing that bothers me the most about 30 Rock and women is 1) how Liz Lemon has zero female friends, 2) how the show is constantly bagging on Liz Lemon. I feel like in the first couple seasons, the show was great because it had this character I could identify with in certain ways, and then it's spent the time after that being all, GOD, LIZ IS A FAILURE WITH MEN AND THEREFORE IN LIFE, WHAT A SPITEFUL BITTER OLD SPINSTER WHO WILL NEVER GET MARRIED OR HAVE BABIES WHICH MEANS HER LIFE HAS NO PURPOSE OR VALUE. So then to have an episode that basically rags on Liz Lemon for not being very feminist doesn't make me feel like the show has seen the error of its ways, it feels like, oh good, now they've found YET ANOTHER WAY to judge Liz Lemon, while not fixing the things that make me hate the way the show treats women.
Ugh, anyway obvs YMMV and also tl;dr, but I haaaaated that whole plotline so much. And re: 30 Rock and feminism, I really like this article about Liz Lemon vs. Leslie Knope, which basically sums up my feelings about the two of them and 30 Rock's problematic elements. And also how awesome Leslie Knope is, which segues nicely into...
Parks and Rec
THIS SHOW IS MADE OF MAGIC. I LEGIT DO NOT KNOW HOW I AM GOING TO GET THROUGH THE NEXT TWO WEEKS WITHOUT IT TO LOOK FORWARD TO. (Thank God it is Fandom March Madness these two weeks, maybe that is how.) I don't have anything too intelligent to say except that I am shipping Leslie/Ben so goddamn hard (and how much do I love that Leslie's romantic interests always like her BECAUSE of her awesomeness and competence and assertiveness instead of in spite of it? And how the show admires her for all those things?), and I am also shipping Leslie/Ron still sometimes (how married were they on their road trip?) and obvs April/Ron (HE CAN'T LOSE APRIL. HE CAN'T LOSE APRIL.) and I'm glad April/Andy was back to being the cutest this week and it was back to April having feelings against her will and trying to hide it adorably, because that's what I like about that ship and I was completely uninterested when it was just Andy trying to win her back, because of course Andy has feelings, WHO CARES. Also thank God Ann and Leslie actually interacted again. That's my one complaint, that in 21 minutes a week they can't have everyone interact that I want to, LET'S MAKE THIS SHOW AN HOUR OKAY GUYS. OKAY.
Okay, enough of that. Oh, except to say that I've had an exciting exploration of Adam Scott's back catalogue due to this show, and Seven and a Match was shockingly enjoyable, and in it he makes out with Webster from Band of Brothers, SO CHECK THAT OUT, while The Killer Next Door (aka Ronnie) was so gross and disturbing it made me actively feel disgusting for days and after I watched it I wanted to go bury the DVD in the backyard so it wouldn't be in my house anymore because PUTTING IT IN THE FREEZER WAS NOT EVEN SUFFICIENT. Ugh.
Also I can tell you everything about every guest spot Nick Offerman has ever had.
Also Poehler's back catalogue has made me start shipping her/Seth Meyers pretty hard, so if anybody knows anything about fic for THAT, send it my way.
Oh, speaking of which, you guys, nbc_rpf!! If you build it, they will come, right? I WANT FIC FOR EVERYTHING, someone start writing some, please and thank you. Please write fic where every Weekend Update pairing ever does it, and where Aubrey Plaza, Mindy Kaling, and Ellie Kemper are all in a girl band. That's all I want. It's all I've ever wanted.
Fringe
So I just started marathoning this show on a whim because throughadoor told me it'd make me nostalgic for Vancouver-era X-Files, WHICH IT TOTALLY DOES. Haha, I'm watching it like a freak, though, because I watched the first four eps of season 1, then jumped to, like, episode 14 or 16 of that season because someone on the internet said that's where it gets good, and then have watched through 3x07 or so. I totally love all the parallel universe stuff LIKE CRAZY, though I have heard from multiple people on my flist that it abruptly gets terrible pretty soon so I'm not giving it my heart or anything. Also I tend to watch it while I'm doing other things so I haven't been giving it my whole attention, so I may have missed stuff, so take anything I say with a grain of salt.
Anyway, but here is my question re: Fringe -- maybe it's just me, but I kind of can't get past the whole thing where Walter EXPERIMENTED ON CHILDREN AND DOES NOT SEEM VERY REMORSEFUL? I feel like the show thinks it's not that big a deal, so I'm supposed to find him charming when he wants to make salt water taffy or whatever, but... I am really not cool with it. The funny thing is that the show makes SUCH A BIG DEAL over him kidnapping Peter and how regretful he is and how Peter can't forgive him, etc, etc, but I feel like that is not NEARLY as bad as the experiments he did on Olivia so wtf. Like, at least he had a motivation for the kidnapping and he didn't know that it was going to ruin the other universe, unlike the experimenting on children thing for which his only motivation was ENDS JUSTIFY THE MEANS, LET'S SACRIFICE THESE KIDS TO SCIENCE. Anyway, in season 3 Walter seems much more to regret his mad scientist past than he did in the first couple seasons, so it doesn't bother me as much, but sometimes I feel like a crazy person for feeling like that is KIND OF AN ISSUE. Uh, is anyone else with me, I guess is what I'm asking?
MOVING ON. Nation, the greatest time of year is upon us: FANDOM MARCH MADNESS. GO VOTE. The exciting thing for me this year is that fandom is VOTING FOR LADIES without us even campaigning for year of the woman like last year! HAS FANDOM BEEN REFORMED? DO WE REGRET OUR MISOGYNIST PAST OF DEAN WINCHESTER, GREGORY HOUSE, SPIKE, AND BARNEY STINSON? I mean, whatever, Barney and Sheldon are still winning, which is a bummer, but Liz Lemon and Leslie Knope and Olivia Dunham and tons of other ladies are winning in landslides! Well done, people! Also I feel like this year is better about characters of color than usual, though that's a general impression since I didn't go through and actually look at stats on that.
HOWEVER, you should totally go vote for Robin Scherbatsky and Penny to try to take down Barney and Sheldon. (WHY DO THOSE WRETCHES HAVE TO WIN EVERY SINGLE YEAR??) ALSO, Kelly Kapoor is making a shocking run to win The Office over wretched Halpert!! PLEASE GO VOTE FOR KELLY YOU GUYS. IF KELLY KAPOOR WINS AS OFFICE REPRESENTATIVE IT WILL MAKE MY LIFE.
Also people are starting to say Leslie Knope for the whole thing, which I don't have high hopes of but would be my ULTIMATE FANTASY so if you feel like chipping in on that, pleaaaaaase do.