Forsyte Saga Meta Time
Okay, I've finally gotten to see the end of series 1 of The Forsyte Saga, and OMG, IT WAS BETTER THAN ANYTHING I COULD HAVE EVER IMAGINED!!! Seriously folks, RENT THIS SERIES! It is so incredibly good, especially if you enjoy complicated villains who are so terribly pathetic that they aren't really villains. In fact, Soames Forsyte really reminds me of a red-headed, pale version of Guy of Gisborne, so all you folks on my f-list who are touting the wonders of Guy's social ineptitude and undying love of Marian, check out Soames! He's missing the leather, but he's the definition of social ineptitude, and his love for Irene forever torments him. There are differences, of course. Like Soames' love brings out the devil in him, while Guy's love brings out his sensitive side...
Anyway, the ending to series 1 was so much more than I could have hoped for. I'm actually kind of bummed that there's a series 2, because this ending was SO PERFECT! I was really expecting a happy ending for all, because that seems to be the typical ending for these BBC productions, but instead they gave me the bittersweet ending that I had been hoping for. Not exactly happy, but not tragic either, and just with one facial expression at the very end, Soames basically redeems himself for everything that he did (and this is ALL due to DAMIAN!!!). HE BROUGHT ME TO TEARS, THAT'S HOW MUCH HE TOUCHED MY SOUL! OMG! Pictures will be included at the end of this post, so that you all can see why he made me cry. It was so sweet! But of course, I plan to do a huge picspam of this ep later complete with my own inserted dialog and commentary, but not until after I do eps 3-5 ( Eps 1 and 2 picspams, for your viewing pleasure). But I want to get my thoughts down about the series as a whole.
For me, the most interesting story was definitely the Soames/Irene relationship, because it was just so... tragic. Here is a man who is the definition of prim and proper and he prides himself on living by society's rules, anyone who goes against these rules he holds in contempt, and he keeps his emotions hidden away, which makes him very passionless... until he meets Irene, and we see just how much passion is simmering under his quiet exterior. Unfortunately, he doesn't seem to know how to relate to people, especially when there's emotion involved. Irene, on the other hand, is very straight forward, she feels confined by the rules of society, and she has no problem figuring out how to relate to people (in fact... she figures people out far too easily, and sometimes comes across as manipulative). Soames fell in love with Irene for all the wrong reasons. She was his definition of ultimate beauty, so he HAD to have her. She HAD to be his, and he wasn't going to give up. But... I also think that he fell in love with her spirit. He thought her to be a little whimsical, but to him, it was charming, and he saw in her things that he himself could never be, and he thought that if he possessed her, then he could be complete. He just created this fantasy of her that turned into an incredibly deep love because he had never felt so much emotion before. She became his entire reason for living. Sadly, he had no idea how to communicate this to her, and he ended up doing all the wrong things. He got obsessed with her being his property, and instead of expressing to her all the love that he had in his heart, he would repeatedly remind her that she belonged to him, and for some twisted reason he thought that this would make her love him back. Just... gah, I wanted to strangle Soames SO MANY TIMES! Granted, Irene didn't give him much of a chance, but they could have truly had a wonderful love if he had just known how to express all that he was feeling. If only she had known what a romantic soul he really had. But her idea of romance was so far off from his own.
My heart hurt for Soames throughout the whole series, particularly the night after the ball. Irene was so incredibly selfish and cold that she paraded her affair with Bosinney in front of everyone, making sure that Soames saw, and Soames just watches as they dance, a mixture of rage and envy on his face. He's angry that someone is trying to take his property, but he's envious of Bosinney because Irene is looking at him with love, something that Soames has never been fortunate enough to receive from her (and it's all he's ever really wanted from her). And then in the carriage, he has all these emotions running through him and all he wants is for Irene to love him, and all he's trying to do here is to understand why she doesn't love him, but then she tells him that she wants to leave him, and when he's threatened with the possibility of losing her the emotion that overtakes him is fear, and this brings out the bully in him. This man who is usually so quiet and calm and the voice of reason, turns into a growling, teeth-baring beast who wants to beat her into submission, because he doesn't know what else to do, and then when she tries to jump out of the moving carriage he instantly turns back into his pathetic self, begging for forgiveness and absolutely spent. At that point, that had been the most passion that he ever let out, and it was almost like a sexual experience, with the way that they were in an angry frenzy, and then he pulls her to him and is speaking softly, breathing hard, emotionally spent. This is such a stark contrast to their first sex scene. Anyway, when she runs up to her room and locks him out, and all he wants is for her to sleep in his bed, to at least pretend to be his, that's when my heart really breaks for him. He sits in his bed in a darkened room, completely alone, publicly humiliated, heartbroken, and he knows that he's lost her for good. He realizes that he truly lost her when he attacked her in the carriage, but he just can't let her go. She's his whole world. :'(
Irene is incredibly cold to Soames pretty much from the art gallery onwards. I can't say that she won my sympathies at all. She was so cruel to Soames, and a little saintly angel to everyone else. Her angel act came across as so not her because we saw how cruel she really is deep down. With Soames, we saw how cruel he could be, but we also saw how much he could love. His cruelty came from constant rejection by the woman that he loved more than anything in the world, while Irene's cruelty came from pure hatred. She never gave him a chance, no matter how hard he tried, and he reached a breaking point. She was cold and emotionless to him, so he decided to treat her the same way, and in fact treated her like an object and took what he felt was rightfully his. The rape scene is by far the cruelest moment that we see from Soames. This was him asserting his power over her. At this point he was aware that she had been sleeping with Bosinney, and he was bitter that she gave her love to Bosinney instead of her husband, and he was feeling completely powerless and rejected and alone. He wanted a family. He wanted her. But most of all, he wanted her to know that she was his possession. The fact that this sex scene is so full of passion is just... wrong. He's getting so much satisfaction out of overpowering her and all of his emotions are spilling out of him, and sexually, it was probably his best performance (especially when compared to the first sex scene, which was consentual, where both are close to fully clothed and neither one shows any passion whatsoever, neither shows any sign of orgasming, whereas with this one he's completely naked and the passion from him is coming out wildly and he very vocally orgasms, while she's screaming for her life and trying to get away from him). Just... bad, bad, bad Soames. This is the one time where I sympathized with Irene, but at the same time, I couldn't bring myself to hate Soames at all. I knew why he was doing it, and it just made him even more pathetic. There is no justification for what he did, but somehow, some way, after that scene, I felt worse for Soames than for Irene. What is up with that??? How did this show manage to evoke that feeling? When Bosinney died, I felt absolutely nothing, was in fact kind of happy that Irene got to suffer since she made Soames suffer. What is wrong with me? OMG! Seriously though, I just couldn't root for the happiness of Irene and Bosinney, because I hated them both with a passion for hurting my favorite characters (Soames and June). Plus... their love was completely selfish. I had no problem with Jolyon and Irene finding happiness together, was in fact rooting for them, since their love was born of understanding, friendship, and protectiveness, rather than some crazy, childish passion that came out of nowhere.
Another Soames moment that ripped my heart out and stomped all over it? The part where he just gives up on life and stays in his bed, completely unkempt, after Irene leaves him for good. He refused to believe that she would never come back, until June confronted him and pointed out everything that was wrong with him. He lost faith in himself after that. :'( I absolutely adore the June/Soames confrontation though. June is the only person who really gets through to Soames and makes him see reality, oddly enough. They hate each other, but at the same time, they seem to really understand each other without trying. I think the reason why June knows Soames so well without having much interaction with him is because she is him, in a way. June loved Bosinney with a passion that he could never feel for her, and he was probably marrying her for the money. Soames loved Irene with a passion that she could never feel for him, and she did marry him for the money. They both want to completely possess the objects of their love. Neither one can give up on their love after they've been betrayed. The difference is, June could let Bosinney go because all she wanted for him was happiness, even though she couldn't let go of her love for him, while Soames refused to let Irene go, ended up suffocating her with his possessiveness, and even after 12 years of being separated from her, he still thought that if he had another chance with her, he could make her happy. *sigh* Oh, Soames. The scene where he dances with her dress? So, so pathetic, and yet it brought tears to my eyes, because I could feel his pain, I could feel his last flutterings of hope being crushed, I could feel him finally giving up and how much it killed him to do that. GAH! DAMIAN, YOU DID THAT TO ME! Man, I don't know how he does it, but he always makes me feel what he's feeling. Always. His face when he saw Irene pregnant? Ouch. Here he is, finally moving on with the French girl, having a very light-hearted, pleasant interaction with her (something that he never had with Irene), and then Irene unintentionally floats back into his life to torment him yet again, and remind him that she's the one he wants, she's the one that he'll always want, no matter how bad they treat each other. And like always, she brings out the absolute devil in him. When he holds his emotions in check, he's actually a pleasant guy to be around, but with Irene, he can't control anything, and that makes him absolutely insane. But that dress scene, where he lies with it on the bed and hugs it as he weeps, clutching the necklace in his hand, begging for one more chance and not being able to have it... oh, my heart! :'( And then he kills me again when he finds out that Irene and Jolyon had a son. That was supposed to be his son.
Now, the scene where he has to choose between saving Annette and saving the baby, this is our old unemotionless Soames once again. He's back to being practical and having only his own interests in mind. He wants a son, and he's willing to lose his wife in order to get it. He really doesn't care about her at all, actually, which is so incredibly sad. Of course, she doesn't love him either, so really, they were made for each other. No surprise that he chooses the baby, but I really wonder what he would have chosen had that been Irene. I'm pretty positive he'd choose Irene no matter what. Anyway, when he finds out she gave birth to a daughter and can't have anymore kids, the look on Soames' face says, "Oh great, now I'm stuck with her and she didn't even give me what she promised." He was ready to get rid of her and find someone else. But when he comes back home? And she goes on and on about how she's happy that she can't get pregnant again? And he looks more and more miserable by the minute? And she asks if he wants to see their daughter? And he approaches with this face?
Completely ready to hate her just for being a girl, but then he does this:
And he starts crying:
And suddenly, Irene isn't the love of his life anymore:
OMG!!!! SOAMES IS SHOWING PURE, UNCONDITIONAL, UNSELFISH LOVE! HE IS WEEPING WITH HAPPINESS! HE'S A FATHER! And even though it ends with him just kind of giving Annette a look, like, "Oh, you're still here?" and he didn't get the life that he wanted, we're left with the image of Soames having hope. He has a new world, a new beginning, a new love. IT'S JUST SO DAMN BEAUTIFUL!!! *sniff*
My love for Damian and his absolute brilliance grows more and more every day.
Anyway, the ending to series 1 was so much more than I could have hoped for. I'm actually kind of bummed that there's a series 2, because this ending was SO PERFECT! I was really expecting a happy ending for all, because that seems to be the typical ending for these BBC productions, but instead they gave me the bittersweet ending that I had been hoping for. Not exactly happy, but not tragic either, and just with one facial expression at the very end, Soames basically redeems himself for everything that he did (and this is ALL due to DAMIAN!!!). HE BROUGHT ME TO TEARS, THAT'S HOW MUCH HE TOUCHED MY SOUL! OMG! Pictures will be included at the end of this post, so that you all can see why he made me cry. It was so sweet! But of course, I plan to do a huge picspam of this ep later complete with my own inserted dialog and commentary, but not until after I do eps 3-5 ( Eps 1 and 2 picspams, for your viewing pleasure). But I want to get my thoughts down about the series as a whole.
For me, the most interesting story was definitely the Soames/Irene relationship, because it was just so... tragic. Here is a man who is the definition of prim and proper and he prides himself on living by society's rules, anyone who goes against these rules he holds in contempt, and he keeps his emotions hidden away, which makes him very passionless... until he meets Irene, and we see just how much passion is simmering under his quiet exterior. Unfortunately, he doesn't seem to know how to relate to people, especially when there's emotion involved. Irene, on the other hand, is very straight forward, she feels confined by the rules of society, and she has no problem figuring out how to relate to people (in fact... she figures people out far too easily, and sometimes comes across as manipulative). Soames fell in love with Irene for all the wrong reasons. She was his definition of ultimate beauty, so he HAD to have her. She HAD to be his, and he wasn't going to give up. But... I also think that he fell in love with her spirit. He thought her to be a little whimsical, but to him, it was charming, and he saw in her things that he himself could never be, and he thought that if he possessed her, then he could be complete. He just created this fantasy of her that turned into an incredibly deep love because he had never felt so much emotion before. She became his entire reason for living. Sadly, he had no idea how to communicate this to her, and he ended up doing all the wrong things. He got obsessed with her being his property, and instead of expressing to her all the love that he had in his heart, he would repeatedly remind her that she belonged to him, and for some twisted reason he thought that this would make her love him back. Just... gah, I wanted to strangle Soames SO MANY TIMES! Granted, Irene didn't give him much of a chance, but they could have truly had a wonderful love if he had just known how to express all that he was feeling. If only she had known what a romantic soul he really had. But her idea of romance was so far off from his own.
My heart hurt for Soames throughout the whole series, particularly the night after the ball. Irene was so incredibly selfish and cold that she paraded her affair with Bosinney in front of everyone, making sure that Soames saw, and Soames just watches as they dance, a mixture of rage and envy on his face. He's angry that someone is trying to take his property, but he's envious of Bosinney because Irene is looking at him with love, something that Soames has never been fortunate enough to receive from her (and it's all he's ever really wanted from her). And then in the carriage, he has all these emotions running through him and all he wants is for Irene to love him, and all he's trying to do here is to understand why she doesn't love him, but then she tells him that she wants to leave him, and when he's threatened with the possibility of losing her the emotion that overtakes him is fear, and this brings out the bully in him. This man who is usually so quiet and calm and the voice of reason, turns into a growling, teeth-baring beast who wants to beat her into submission, because he doesn't know what else to do, and then when she tries to jump out of the moving carriage he instantly turns back into his pathetic self, begging for forgiveness and absolutely spent. At that point, that had been the most passion that he ever let out, and it was almost like a sexual experience, with the way that they were in an angry frenzy, and then he pulls her to him and is speaking softly, breathing hard, emotionally spent. This is such a stark contrast to their first sex scene. Anyway, when she runs up to her room and locks him out, and all he wants is for her to sleep in his bed, to at least pretend to be his, that's when my heart really breaks for him. He sits in his bed in a darkened room, completely alone, publicly humiliated, heartbroken, and he knows that he's lost her for good. He realizes that he truly lost her when he attacked her in the carriage, but he just can't let her go. She's his whole world. :'(
Irene is incredibly cold to Soames pretty much from the art gallery onwards. I can't say that she won my sympathies at all. She was so cruel to Soames, and a little saintly angel to everyone else. Her angel act came across as so not her because we saw how cruel she really is deep down. With Soames, we saw how cruel he could be, but we also saw how much he could love. His cruelty came from constant rejection by the woman that he loved more than anything in the world, while Irene's cruelty came from pure hatred. She never gave him a chance, no matter how hard he tried, and he reached a breaking point. She was cold and emotionless to him, so he decided to treat her the same way, and in fact treated her like an object and took what he felt was rightfully his. The rape scene is by far the cruelest moment that we see from Soames. This was him asserting his power over her. At this point he was aware that she had been sleeping with Bosinney, and he was bitter that she gave her love to Bosinney instead of her husband, and he was feeling completely powerless and rejected and alone. He wanted a family. He wanted her. But most of all, he wanted her to know that she was his possession. The fact that this sex scene is so full of passion is just... wrong. He's getting so much satisfaction out of overpowering her and all of his emotions are spilling out of him, and sexually, it was probably his best performance (especially when compared to the first sex scene, which was consentual, where both are close to fully clothed and neither one shows any passion whatsoever, neither shows any sign of orgasming, whereas with this one he's completely naked and the passion from him is coming out wildly and he very vocally orgasms, while she's screaming for her life and trying to get away from him). Just... bad, bad, bad Soames. This is the one time where I sympathized with Irene, but at the same time, I couldn't bring myself to hate Soames at all. I knew why he was doing it, and it just made him even more pathetic. There is no justification for what he did, but somehow, some way, after that scene, I felt worse for Soames than for Irene. What is up with that??? How did this show manage to evoke that feeling? When Bosinney died, I felt absolutely nothing, was in fact kind of happy that Irene got to suffer since she made Soames suffer. What is wrong with me? OMG! Seriously though, I just couldn't root for the happiness of Irene and Bosinney, because I hated them both with a passion for hurting my favorite characters (Soames and June). Plus... their love was completely selfish. I had no problem with Jolyon and Irene finding happiness together, was in fact rooting for them, since their love was born of understanding, friendship, and protectiveness, rather than some crazy, childish passion that came out of nowhere.
Another Soames moment that ripped my heart out and stomped all over it? The part where he just gives up on life and stays in his bed, completely unkempt, after Irene leaves him for good. He refused to believe that she would never come back, until June confronted him and pointed out everything that was wrong with him. He lost faith in himself after that. :'( I absolutely adore the June/Soames confrontation though. June is the only person who really gets through to Soames and makes him see reality, oddly enough. They hate each other, but at the same time, they seem to really understand each other without trying. I think the reason why June knows Soames so well without having much interaction with him is because she is him, in a way. June loved Bosinney with a passion that he could never feel for her, and he was probably marrying her for the money. Soames loved Irene with a passion that she could never feel for him, and she did marry him for the money. They both want to completely possess the objects of their love. Neither one can give up on their love after they've been betrayed. The difference is, June could let Bosinney go because all she wanted for him was happiness, even though she couldn't let go of her love for him, while Soames refused to let Irene go, ended up suffocating her with his possessiveness, and even after 12 years of being separated from her, he still thought that if he had another chance with her, he could make her happy. *sigh* Oh, Soames. The scene where he dances with her dress? So, so pathetic, and yet it brought tears to my eyes, because I could feel his pain, I could feel his last flutterings of hope being crushed, I could feel him finally giving up and how much it killed him to do that. GAH! DAMIAN, YOU DID THAT TO ME! Man, I don't know how he does it, but he always makes me feel what he's feeling. Always. His face when he saw Irene pregnant? Ouch. Here he is, finally moving on with the French girl, having a very light-hearted, pleasant interaction with her (something that he never had with Irene), and then Irene unintentionally floats back into his life to torment him yet again, and remind him that she's the one he wants, she's the one that he'll always want, no matter how bad they treat each other. And like always, she brings out the absolute devil in him. When he holds his emotions in check, he's actually a pleasant guy to be around, but with Irene, he can't control anything, and that makes him absolutely insane. But that dress scene, where he lies with it on the bed and hugs it as he weeps, clutching the necklace in his hand, begging for one more chance and not being able to have it... oh, my heart! :'( And then he kills me again when he finds out that Irene and Jolyon had a son. That was supposed to be his son.
Now, the scene where he has to choose between saving Annette and saving the baby, this is our old unemotionless Soames once again. He's back to being practical and having only his own interests in mind. He wants a son, and he's willing to lose his wife in order to get it. He really doesn't care about her at all, actually, which is so incredibly sad. Of course, she doesn't love him either, so really, they were made for each other. No surprise that he chooses the baby, but I really wonder what he would have chosen had that been Irene. I'm pretty positive he'd choose Irene no matter what. Anyway, when he finds out she gave birth to a daughter and can't have anymore kids, the look on Soames' face says, "Oh great, now I'm stuck with her and she didn't even give me what she promised." He was ready to get rid of her and find someone else. But when he comes back home? And she goes on and on about how she's happy that she can't get pregnant again? And he looks more and more miserable by the minute? And she asks if he wants to see their daughter? And he approaches with this face?
Completely ready to hate her just for being a girl, but then he does this:
And he starts crying:
And suddenly, Irene isn't the love of his life anymore:
OMG!!!! SOAMES IS SHOWING PURE, UNCONDITIONAL, UNSELFISH LOVE! HE IS WEEPING WITH HAPPINESS! HE'S A FATHER! And even though it ends with him just kind of giving Annette a look, like, "Oh, you're still here?" and he didn't get the life that he wanted, we're left with the image of Soames having hope. He has a new world, a new beginning, a new love. IT'S JUST SO DAMN BEAUTIFUL!!! *sniff*
My love for Damian and his absolute brilliance grows more and more every day.