30 Days of TV Meme -- Day 15 and Day 16

[gehayi]

Day 15 - Favorite female character.

Again, a tough one, because I have a lot of favorite female characters--most, I note, in science fiction and fantasy shows. Listing them in alphabetical order:

1) Abby Sciuto, from NCIS.
2) Buffy Summers from BtVS.
3) Nyota Uhura from Star Trek.
4) Sam Carter from Stargate SG-1.
5) Sarah Jane Smith from

Comments

[gehayi]

When Elisabeth Sladen was scheduled to leave Doctor Who, the writer came up with a story involving Sarah Jane's death and the Foreign Legion--and Sladen refused point blank. She said she did NOT want her exit to involve marriage or death. She wanted Sarah Jane to slip away at the end very quietly and NOT make the entire story about her departure.

So that was how Sarah Jane ended up getting dropped off in what the Doctor thought was South Croydon and was really Aberdeen, Scotland (about nine hundred kilometres away). Not because that was what the writers or directors thought of. Because Sladen fought to have her character go back to a normal life without the Doctor.

I wish to God that Vandernoot had done that.

Also, the writers and directors of Highlander made another mistake. They had Duncan having sex with an Immortal terrorist named Annie Devlin in the episode directly after Tessa's death. This...did not go over well. Neither did Duncan having sex with Amanda in the episode after that.

The problem was that the audience was still in mourning--and the episodes were taking place in something close to real time. Weeks had passed for Duncan, not years; much of the audience simply didn't buy that he'd loved Tessa if he was screwing other women a few weeks after she'd been killed. A fair number of people stopped watching right there.

I don't think the writers and directors understand to this day why Duncan screwing around was a bad move. They talked about sex being a common response to death, that people will reach out and grab anyone to make a connection, and yes--that's correct. But the audience didn't believe it. Would not believe it. The only regular human on the show had been killed off (Joe Dawson not having been introduced at the time of Tessa's death). And they HATED Tessa not only dying but being murdered. And they weren't going to cut Duncan any slack. If his true love had just been killed, then by God, he had better ACT like it.

[lee_rowan]

I'm tired of "kill the woman" being the default program. It's part and parcel of the mysogyny in human culture, and it's damned poor writing.

[gehayi]

I agree. It is. It happens far too often in fiction, too.

Frankly, I think that walking away from Duncan makes a LOT more sense. They even set up the situation to make that possible; it was emphasized time and again that Tessa was in a tenuous position as far as physical safety and emotional security went. I don't doubt that she loved him, but love doesn't always fix everything. Sometimes it just complicates matters. I would have no trouble believing that Tessa loved Duncan deeply, couldn't take the danger to both of them, the stress and the fear any longer, and decided, "I love you, but I just can't live with you." And walked out.

[lee_rowan]

That's what AU fanfic is for!