(no subject)
* "Iranian Couples Are Increasingly Living Together Outside of Marriage:" https://globalvoices.org/2016/02/09/iranian-couples-are-increasingly-living-together-outside-of-marriage/
* "New e-mails paint Snyder into corner on Flint crisis:"
* "Pony dressed as unicorn leads Calif. authorities on wild chase:" http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2016/02/26/pony-unicorn-police-chase-california-highway-patrol/80975608/
* I had a bit of hastily scheduled RL today and still not enough sleep. (Saturday and Sunday were basically 18 hour commitments that ate all the spoons). I am above average behind on all sorts of commitments not immediately related to Dolphin Festival. I will do my best to get things sorted dependent on how the spoon count runs. Apologies on dropped threads.
* I really do think the overarching theme of Black Sails as a series is that the stories people tell shape reality.
* Black Sails XXIV
* They are juxtaposing Mr. Scott's belly wound and the preparations around his expected demise with Silver's rotting leg. I don't know how I feel about that. I do like that they are framing the wounds and their consequences politically as well as personally.
* The rough joining between the pirates and the village are shown in both contexts one after the other: the political implications of Silver's absence immediately segues into an argument between pirate crew and recruits. I really like the position Flint took on the dispute. The masked political aspect (we need them as much as they need us) merges beautifully with the publicly expressed rationale (If he tied it wrong, you instructed him wrong). That is very much his command style too, very classically navy. The ethic of the man in charge being responsible for the actions of the men under him is very Flint.
Watching it, I thought of the beach scene back during the careening. Billy going round checking the men, but not thinking to check back to see if they actually followed the order to retie the ropes. A more experienced man would have rechecked. I'm betting season three Billy would have rechecked. So that seaman is meant to be teaching the new men how things are done. I get the feeling it's being done resentfully and I'm suspecting the teaching was slipshod. To do it right, you'd have to be exact and patient and thorough. Show it slowly multiple times. make the new sailors do it over and over multiple times. Check and recheck. You'd definitely want to come back and recheck lashings before hoisting. I bet that sailor showed them once or twice impatiently and then left them to it. Flint's assigning of responsibility to the experienced man and not the guy who'd never done the job before and only learned "10 minutes ago" makes it very clear that this sort of half assed work is squarely on the shoulders of the man in charge. It makes him responsible for the success of the trainees and for the safety of anyone harmed. Suddenly it's his ass, not the newcomers. Yes, it has a political angle, showing he's being fair to the ex-slaves, but it's also good crew management. I am now wishing I had access to earlier seasons so I could check if it's one of the sailors from the careening scene who caused the accident, because that would perfect.
* I liked Billy doing the physical enforcing, while flint stepped in with his command voice and face of authority.
* For the first time this season Billy is communicating his doubts directly to the Captain instead of going through Silver. Suddenly there is no mediation, no one trying to manipulate them towards Silver's agenda for good or ill. I stand by my belief that Billy is grappling with pretty massive internal tension around his feelings for Flint. I stand by my belief that this is why he's been coming at things so indirectly by trying to manipulate Silver into manipulating Flint. I still don't think he knows what he wants or what to do with all the intense, often contradictory feelings their messy, messy history has generated. The face acting during their conversation fascinates me. So much is going on there, a whole second conversation.
* "A few hours’ time, assuming he’s there, I’m going to begin a discussion in which I’m going to ask him for something that he can’t possibly give. And the success or failure of this war will depend upon the outcome. In a few hours’ time, there’s a good chance you’re going to look awfully smart." Ouch. So much ouch. It's such a Flint sort of plan. *facepalm* He's not as actively suicidal as he was, but his not actually caring if he lives or dies is fundamental to the sort of risks he takes.
* So know we've got a better idea of Blackbeard's agenda with Charles.
* Mrs. Hudson's story is so cliche it makes me suspicious, which doesn't mean it's not true, It's just Black Sails is more likely to make things not what they appear, so we'll see. My money is on either a lie or a partial lie. She's not in a lot odf scenes yet, but she's too...vivid? In the foreground of scenes she is in? For me not to suspect her of being complex. Is she betraying the Spanish to them, or just pretending to? Is she playing them off each other for her own or some third party purpose? I really like her from that first scene aboard ship with Eleanor, but I don't trust her even a little.
* Woodes acknowledged his interest mid-political conversation. Was that out of character badly acted or was it in character badly acted? I can't tell.
* "Now, I believe Nassau's best chance at survival is with me guiding it." Woodes sounds so much like Flint here, or Vane, or eleanor Guthrie. I think it is very deliberate.
* It's nice of them to orient us to the current state of Nassau politics early on this episode to set us up for Jack.
* Poor Jack seeing how what was monumental for him is snap of the fingers for Woodes. It makes a person wonder whether the issue is if Nassau is worth saving or not, or if the issue is Jack's shittastic commend skills. It could be either or both. I did enjoy the face acting either way.
* Civilization symbolized by the wearing of a cravat!
* Featherstone's reaction to Jack being an idiot is a sensible one.
* Now we get to the heart of Silver's gut clenching terror, one I very much sympathize and identify with. One I've dealt with most of my life. This feels real to me as hard and ugly as it is to watch. "I cannot look weak. I cannot feel weak. I cannot be weak. Not in front of my men. Not in front of your men. Not at all. For some time now, I have been holding my entire world together with both hands, keeping my men in line, seeing to their needs, and the only way that endures is if I look the part. And I cannot look the part while being poked and prodded or while drooling through an opium haze saying who the f*ck knows what. So I will endure this the way I have been enduring it." The appearance of strength and confidence is and very likely always has been a survival skill for him. We don't have his backstory, but I have some guesses as to what makes a man like him. To have something so fundamental be out of his control... Yeah, I do get that well enough. I know it was and likely always will be a struggle for me. I was an athlete, after all. Before. I was used to being able to demand and achieve all sorts of things from my body. It was an incredibly useful tool right up until it wasn't. It is incredibly hard for a control freak like Silver, used to relying utterly and only on himself to suddenly need other people. Trust me, I know what that's like. Asking for is still like knives under my skin and a little part of me dies every single time I must do it. I think it is ten times worse for Silver. Given what made me as I am, given the incredibly disproportionately horrible consequences of even the tiniest hint of weakness, given the costs and the way I learned to protect myself as a child and young adult, I've an idea what it means to Silver and the desperation behind his pretense that everything is all right in front of other people. I think he's significantly worse at trust than I am. I've had a couple of decades to unpick some of the defenses that he hasn't got and I suspect he is worse than I was, even though he expressed it in some different ways. Watching this hurts. It is raw, and painful and close to home.
* I guess I identify with Silver now. Who'd have fucking thought? I'm so much more of a Flint generally.
* "No one prepared you for this, did they? For as long as I can remember, I have been prepared for the day I would take my mother's place. To know that from that day forth, I would forever be the one who tends as opposed to the one who is tended to. You're frustrated. You're angry. You're tired. Perhaps no one else knows why. I believe that not even you know why. But I know why. The crown is always a burden... but it cannot be borne if you cannot stand." - Madi
* I think Madi is ready to become a Captain. For those who have not read my other commentaries, I think that the political structures in Nassau and now this village work similarly to the command structures on the various ships, reflecting and commenting on similar themes and each other. Just as they show us a variety of command styles that are more or less effective at sea in Flint, Vane, Low, Rackham, Blackbeard, etc., you get both Guthries, Max, the Queen, etc. on land, with some figures passing back and forth (Rackham, Hornigold, Scott, Rogers). It is clever and deliberate and I think there is an excellent thesis in it for some grad student. Madi reads to me like a Quartermaster ready to move up, and unlike just about everyone we've seen do that (I'm looking at you Dufresne, but also Max, Jack, etc.), she is fully trained and ready for it, instead of playing catch up. In the other cases, with the possible exception of Mr. Scott (and possibly Flint and Vane in the backstory), people were partially trained (Silver, Billy, Eleanor, Jack), self trained (Max), or flat out not even close to ready (I'm looking at you again, Dufresne) I've a suspicion the free village is the first time we've seen someone with full training, talent, and inclination to lead. (Mr. Gates had training and talent, but he pretty obviously did NOT want to be a Captain, hence him building one to fit his needs). Realistically, training, talent, and inclination need experience and seasoning. The command structure of a ship is meant give a person that as best as possible, but there are certain things that can only be learned by doing. Ex: Billy not rechecking that they followed the order during careening. Strong Captains, Quartermasters, Boatswains, etc. still need time to improve and continue to build a bigger toolbox of tricks and knowledge as they go, but the adjustment is smoother with the right set up. When Madi moves up, there will likely be missteps and adjustments, but she's better set up than most and she's got a handle on the psychological aspects in advance, something Silver and Max have both been struggling with despite them doing very well at it given the givens.
* So we get to the Pirate summit, planned to fail. "Nearly dismasted in a storm… a storm you chased after. Nearly starved to death in the doldrums. Nearly executed by them. Either you are unkillable, friend, or way overdue." -Blackbeard to Flint I'm basically quoting it as it's a lovely summary and amusing both. Blackbeard, quite sensibly doesn't drink Flint's Koolaid. I think he's of of a very few immune to it since he stopped being McGraw. But the pitch isn't aimed at Blackbeard at all. It's intended as a seduction of Charles Vane back to Vane's original cause. The thing Flint says to Billy just before they landed shows that Flint doesn't expect the pitch to Blackbeard to work. I contend this was always the plan: to make Charles choose between his Stab Dad and Nassau. I think the face acting, shot composition, blocking, and the way the close ups are cut in this scene back me up on this. There is this beautiful shot where Charles is framed between Flint and Blackbeard in the bit where they are arguing about whether or not Nassau is worth saving starting at "Was past it's time." He's seated on Blackbeard's side of the table and so slightly closer to him, but he is leaning a little towards Flint physically, and his chair is pulled away giving a sense of distance to them both. He has his listening face on, the one that tells you he's thinking and weighing words, but not what he is thinking about them, if that makes sense. Charles is the judge, silent for the moment, but he's the one they are arguing for, not each other. Their conflict is fixed, but Charles has conflicting loyalties here and in that situation has swung on a dime before, to Blackbeard's cost. I think the conversation between Flint and Vane right before the duel back this theory that it was all about Vane as well from the start. "Forget me, forget Teach, forget loyalty, compacts, honor, debts, all of it. The only question that matters is this. Who are you?" Flint is so GOOD at this.
* I think the question "Who are you?" is the best question in the episode, and I also think this is the episode's theme. It's not just Charles grappling with it. It's Billy, Silver, and Jack. I think to a certain extent it's Blackbeard, though that's mostly under the surface, and possibly Woodes Rogers.
* I think for Charles, Nassau's betrayal of him strikes as deep and painful as Eleanor's betrayal of him. He loves the few things and people he loves so incredibly deeply and passionately: Freedom, Nassau, Eleanor, Blackbeard. He's proved he'll do just about anything for them including seriously imperiling himself and betraying his ideals, and it tears him to ribbons when those loves conflict. I think for all his protests he's not even close to over his thing with Nassau just as he's not even close to over his thing with Eleanor. I think his actions during the duel prove that.
* It occurs to me that he is at Blackbeard's right hand in this scene as Billy is at Flint's. It's absolutely logical for a summit like this, but at the same time, this sets Billy diagonal from Vane. Given Vane's angle, it's Billy his face has been pointing towards most of the meeting until his judgement is directly solicited. It's very nearly the same sort of internal conflict going on if you leave out the sexual component of Billy's conflict and Charles' Daddy issues. There's the conflict of loyalties, the anger, the betrayal, the fundamental questions about whether the person you are following is leading everyone right to destruction or the only salvation. This scene is not about Billy, he's just there, right in Vane's logical eye line. I think they are thematically linked in this episode: mirrors for each other.
* My question is would it change or not change Charles' response if he knew Blackbeard's secret? I've no answer to that, but it haunts me.
* I am amused by the implication that Jack is telling Woodes' Jack's back story at the same time as he's summarizing his book, all in a handful of sentences. "Wealthy son of a wealthy man takes to the sea to prove something to the parents, presumably. Seeks adventure, finds the limits of his own capacity. Loses everything in the process and then stumbles upon a hell of a story in the process." Mirrors, Mirrors everywhere.
* Remember back in season two how much material there was around the importance of fame reputation, the way it was threaded all through Jack Rackham's arc and through the Flint/Dufresne interactions, and how fundamental Story is to Flint and Silver's power? The telling of stories is why Silver and Flint are so dangerous. Reputation and the loss of it is everything. It's why Dufresne's boarding as Captain was such a botch. It's how Silver and flint got the crew back. It's how Silver built and maintains his power. It turned the Beach against Charles twice. It's why Charles rescued Flint in Charlestown. It's how Flint got his men to reject the pardon and sail into the ship killer of a storm. It's fundamental to Eleanor and Woodes' arcs, character, and how people react to them, and they discuss it openly earlier this season. It's how Flint got the village to free and join them.
Here it is again, thematically. In the summit, Blackbeard references the greats of the previous generation of pirates, amoung them Hornigold and Avery. Hornigold is now playing the other side which it something I need to think about some more. Is he a living symbol to Blackbeard of how his idealized version of Nassau has turned to something he can't recognize? A fierce free place that has been co-opted by the civilization it used to despise?
So now in the scene with Woodes, Jack references Avery as well. The repetition really stood out to be on first watching. He's on Blackbeard's list of idealized Pirates of the past. He is Jack's hero, the man he wanted to be. I don't think it's coincidence that it was Vane he ended up following, apprentice to Blackbeard another of the Greats, and for Jack's generation, a pirate's pirate. Remember that thing Anne said very early on this season about what men would do to have Charles vane call them "a proper pirate?" So here is Jack facing his fundamental failure as a Captain, the realistic view of his reputation measured up to the now semi-mythical Avery, a man even Blackbeard looked up to. "I heard Henry Avery’s name when I was a boy, heard the way people spoke it… grown men in awe of it. I came to this place so determined to do the same. That’s not going to happen the way I thought it was, is it?" Ouch. So much ouch!
But there is Woodes Roger's advice to Jack, a man who is his reflection, "My advice? You want some say in how they speak of you? Write a book." Story changes perception and so often in this show flat out changes reality. It influences not only how history remembers, but what people do in the present. I still have sooooo many questions about Woodes Avery. How much of what people think of him is spin? How much is real and how much embellishment or flat out lies? Did he kill his brother?
* Billy's face and tone when he says, "If he looses, he dies," makes me wonder if this is the moment he starts to untangle his feelings. Ben Gunn asks the second best question of the episode to Billy Bones, "When your men entreated me to join your crew, they said your captain was a man worth following. A strong man, a wise man, they said. But right now I can't tell which side of this contest you'd prefer to see prevail. Can you help me make sense of that?" I think Billy would love to be able to make sense of it, but that's been his personal conflict for two seasons now and it's coming to a head. "A few days ago I could make sense of all of it. He was going to die and we were going to be free, from the account, from him.... With all the shit he's done, the things he's gotten away with, that would have been fair. That would have been right. I think part of the reason I've been able to stand by his side is that I wanted to make sure I've got a good view of the moment the world finally catches up to him... and this story starts to make sense again." I don't think any of it can makes sense to him until he's dealt with his desire and all the feelings it conflicts with like anger and betrayal, as well as his fundamental ethical quandaries.
* I keep asking myself, what is Blackbeard's agenda here? Is it in line with his stated agenda or is there something deeper going on here? I'm suspecting there is something deeper going on here because the pieces don't add up. We're clearly missing a component, and one not as obvious as Flint/Hamilton was to me on first watching season one.
* This is verging on the Magical Negro trope with Madi and Silver, which worries me, much I worry about the White Savior trope with the Pirate and village situation. At the same time there is a long history in this show of more experienced Captains, Quartermasters, etc. mentoring less experienced ones. It didn't bother me with Mr. Scott in previous seasons because the context was so clearly the same as similar examples like Mr. Gates advising Billy or Flint advising Dufresne or Billy, or Vane or Hornigold advising Eleanor, etc.. Here, with the African religious imagery as frame it's more worrisome. I really would like to see more Madi development outside of her interactions with Silver. I really need her to be as fleshed out character wise and with her own goals as the other main ensemble characters, because if she only exists as a plot point or in relation to Silver? not okay.
* Silver is incredibly aware of the ghosts of Flint and Miranda, and the associated worry has haunted him all season:
Silver:What he wants, what he needs, what he fears... the depths of it... they are profound and dark. I serve the crew best by tempering him, steering him where he's needed. I've descended into those depths and connected with him so that I might be able to do so. But I am acutely aware that I'm not the first to have been there... to have been a partner to him in this way. And that the ones that have seen those depths before... they never surfaced again.
Madi:Maybe their mistake was in trying to do it alone. Maybe to go to such a place, one needs another to hold the tether and to find a way out.
Silver:Maybe.
* The Max and Jack conversation had me thinking of Hamilton and "Who tells your story." Fundamentally that's what it's about isn't it? For all of them, really. It's just that Jack and Woodes Rogers are some of the most aware of this (Along with Silver and Flint and more recently Eleanor and Max. I am pretty sure that was one of the things the Eleanor and Death play in 3.1 was about, for example. I know I keep hammering on this, but I honestly think is a major scene of the whole series: Story and who controls it. Reputation and the way it can be used by a person but also against them. The way Eleanor's life turns on a dime based on the words other people use to describe her is a very stark example of this. Dufresne's inability to wield Flint's reputation is another. I think Jack's preoccupation with it from things like Sail design, to his command style, to the idiot decition to go back to Nassau to reclaim his name, to his actions and conversations right here in XXIV are all about trying to deliberately make himself a legend. He is obsessed with the stories the tell about him and whether or not he'll make the history books. Who tells his story matters to him immensely, because that determines who people will think he was long after he's gone.
* It is terribly, terribly Jack to start a war without letting the other side know they are at war until the other side is bleeding. It's how he killed Anne's husband. It's how he beat the other pirate captain in the duel. He exhibited it very clearly when he opened the fort door and shot a man in the head before anyone knew what was happening so very recently. And now he's playing deadly chess with Woodes Rogers, which is fascinating given that this is the game Eleanor and Rogers have been playing all season. The contrast in styles between Eeanor and Jack is _fascinating_. I'm going to be writing a lot more about that in future, but I'm in no condition to do it justice today.
* It pleases me that his opening gambit is to have complete and utter faith in Anne and their connection. This despite all the ways he has misread her pretty much since Vane's crew took Max. Despite the ways they've been partially estranged for most of two seasons. They are fundamentally entwined. I am thinking of Anne telling Jack in XVIII, "Like we was two halves of the same thing. I can't be your wife, Jack. But you and I are gonna be partners till they put us in the fucking ground." He trusts that. He makes his opening gambit based on the correct belief that she will know his mind based on things he doesn't say.
* We've had plenty of manifesto speeches from Flint and Vane particularly, and a number of other characters, but I think this is the first from Jack that I recall. For the first time we know what he wants politically, especially if you add in all the things he's said about story and reputation this episode. This is what he wants for Nassau and this is who he wants to be. I'm not sure even he understood this until he was in that room with Woodes Rogers. "So, one of two outcomes will result. Rogers will understand his defeat to be ultimately inevitable and leave this place, in which case I'll have it back. Or he'll stubbornly refuse and eventually Spain will raze this place to the ground. The English flag will burn, and a second pirate republic will be born from the ashes of the first. Only this time, every man who calls it home will know it came about because of me." I think this is the first time you can really see Vane's influence on who he is. It's certainly the first time I've looked at him and could clearly see him as capable of wielding power on his own account. I think he just started to think bigger. He's got a long way to go in the long term strategy department, but I think this is the first time he grasped that he needs to be better than frying pan to fire. I've said all along he is clever, but mentally lazy.
* For the record, I think Max's tendency to think short term until partway into second season was because she was so busy just trying to survive and get her freedom and a basic level of physical security. It's a completely understandable reason to focus mostly on immediate and short term goals like not being imprisoned, raped, murdered, etc.. I think she's been doing that her whole life and I'm extremely impressed at how quickly she started to think like a Captain once she had even a hint of a chance to breath, and how quickly she has turned into a good one without much in the way of help or advice compared to pretty much everyone else we've seen learning to lead.
* Mr. Scott's prediction also hammers in the theme of using Story to bend the world to one's will. I also expect he's telling us exactly how Flint and Silver will turn from allies into nemeses. "Those men rose to their stations because they are peerless when it comes to shaping the world to their will, in creating a narrative and wielding it to compel men's hearts and minds. But the most compelling story requires a villain at its center. And if either Captain Flint or Mr. Silver sees the other as a villain... or worse... us as that... then all is lost."
* I want to stick a pin in the theme of Madi and her father vs. Madi and her mother. She's the only character I can think of that interacts with both in the present tense, though we mostly lack the dynamic of the three of them together, and I rather worry that there isn't enough depth to their goals and interactions outside of things revolving around white characters' needs.
* I am glad we get a manifesto speech from Mr. Scott because we very much needed one. "But over time, I was determined to leave you something behind, to give you the one thing that no one could ever take away... and that would make you strong enough to understand their world, interact with their world... wage war on their world. But if their identity lies in their stories, I wanted you to know them so that when we are ready to call them enemies, you would be ready for it. The villain makes the story. So to manage our current partners, we must ensure that we all agree at all times who our common villain is." I am very relieved that Mr. Scott did not drink the Flint Koolaid but was biding his time with Flint and the rest as means to an end. That is so much better than him loyally going along with whatever the woman who literally owned him as if he were a thing and not a person. (I know I keep saying it, but really, Eleanor? It to you how many years to think, "Maybe I should free this man who has done so much for me?" Really? You couldn't have freed this human being you pretended to care about the second you had the power to do it?) I still have a lot of side eye for various things past and present, but this manifesto speech is a step in the right direction.
* Here is another significant gift of a book. I am of the opinion that the Flint/Thomas/Miranda book exchanges were all important and both symbolic in the immediate sense but also part of the overarching them about stories changing the world. Here we are almost at the end of an episode that textually foregrounded the importance of stories to shape the world and Mr. Scott gives the same Woodes Rogers book that has been threaded all through the season and this episode in particular to his daughter to use as a weapon. O.o
* Please, please Black Sails, make this good. Do not fuck this up, because this could be terrible or amazing and there isn't much leeway between one or another.
* I love the way the talk in XXIV foregrounds the question of who the villain is depends on who tells the story and how. It's a thing I loved about Black Sails from the very beginning. It's why I'm so interested in ASoIaF. It's why I'm fascinated with stories that play with point of view, like Wuthering Heights (the book, not the mostly creepily sentimental movies). I often when reading or watching a thing, like to take the story and turn it around in my head to play with how it looks to different characters in the narrative. It's why my favorite villains are the ones that could be the hero if you switch the point of view. I love it best when everybody involved is doing what they think is best for perfectly valid reasons. I loved that the original Flint/Vane and Eleanor/Vane conflict was so fundamentally about different ideas to protect Nassau and the people in it, and there was no real way to tell which was closer to right until a lot more things happened. I love that we still kind of don't know what's best for Nassau given all the givens.
* Max draws her line in the sand and chooses herself. Given all she's been through I can't blame her even a little.
* Oh Charles, you break my heart, endlessly forced to chose to betray one mutually exclusive love for another.
* I think it is easy to underestimate the quality of Charles Vane's mind for the exact same reason people overlook Anne's. They are both mostly the "strong silent type." You'll often see them in meetings silent or near silent, taking it all in: the arguments and stratagems and politics. when they do speak up they have strong opinions that imply a lot of thought and observations, but the like to let other people do most of the talking. You can see Charles do it earlier this episode with Flint and Teach. I think of it often watching Anne standing in the background of intense meetings between two other characters. There were quite a few this season, but they are threaded all through, just as they are with Jack. I was thinking about it a lot in the Jack Nassau stratagem meeting before the English arrived because that is a moment Flint would have used his power over Story to make them all Do the Thing, but instead he lets Jack do nearly all the talk himself including that cringe worthy "Mothering" Nassau bit. The thing is Jack does have a Silver adjacent skill set, but up until the manifesto speech this episode didn't even begin to have the weight of confidence to really sell it. Once again he's close to two seasons behind on the development curve, but at least he looks to be on the right track for learning to use it.
* They've paralleled the last two scenes, haven't they? The Eleanor/Woodes/Max scene and the Flint/Vane thing are fundamentally about competing challenges and assets. In the one Max pops up with her uncounted assets and in the other Charles reveals an asset flint knew nothing about. God I love this show's structure.
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* "New e-mails paint Snyder into corner on Flint crisis:"
* "Pony dressed as unicorn leads Calif. authorities on wild chase:" http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2016/02/26/pony-unicorn-police-chase-california-highway-patrol/80975608/
* I had a bit of hastily scheduled RL today and still not enough sleep. (Saturday and Sunday were basically 18 hour commitments that ate all the spoons). I am above average behind on all sorts of commitments not immediately related to Dolphin Festival. I will do my best to get things sorted dependent on how the spoon count runs. Apologies on dropped threads.
* I really do think the overarching theme of Black Sails as a series is that the stories people tell shape reality.
* Black Sails XXIV
* They are juxtaposing Mr. Scott's belly wound and the preparations around his expected demise with Silver's rotting leg. I don't know how I feel about that. I do like that they are framing the wounds and their consequences politically as well as personally.
* The rough joining between the pirates and the village are shown in both contexts one after the other: the political implications of Silver's absence immediately segues into an argument between pirate crew and recruits. I really like the position Flint took on the dispute. The masked political aspect (we need them as much as they need us) merges beautifully with the publicly expressed rationale (If he tied it wrong, you instructed him wrong). That is very much his command style too, very classically navy. The ethic of the man in charge being responsible for the actions of the men under him is very Flint.
Watching it, I thought of the beach scene back during the careening. Billy going round checking the men, but not thinking to check back to see if they actually followed the order to retie the ropes. A more experienced man would have rechecked. I'm betting season three Billy would have rechecked. So that seaman is meant to be teaching the new men how things are done. I get the feeling it's being done resentfully and I'm suspecting the teaching was slipshod. To do it right, you'd have to be exact and patient and thorough. Show it slowly multiple times. make the new sailors do it over and over multiple times. Check and recheck. You'd definitely want to come back and recheck lashings before hoisting. I bet that sailor showed them once or twice impatiently and then left them to it. Flint's assigning of responsibility to the experienced man and not the guy who'd never done the job before and only learned "10 minutes ago" makes it very clear that this sort of half assed work is squarely on the shoulders of the man in charge. It makes him responsible for the success of the trainees and for the safety of anyone harmed. Suddenly it's his ass, not the newcomers. Yes, it has a political angle, showing he's being fair to the ex-slaves, but it's also good crew management. I am now wishing I had access to earlier seasons so I could check if it's one of the sailors from the careening scene who caused the accident, because that would perfect.
* I liked Billy doing the physical enforcing, while flint stepped in with his command voice and face of authority.
* For the first time this season Billy is communicating his doubts directly to the Captain instead of going through Silver. Suddenly there is no mediation, no one trying to manipulate them towards Silver's agenda for good or ill. I stand by my belief that Billy is grappling with pretty massive internal tension around his feelings for Flint. I stand by my belief that this is why he's been coming at things so indirectly by trying to manipulate Silver into manipulating Flint. I still don't think he knows what he wants or what to do with all the intense, often contradictory feelings their messy, messy history has generated. The face acting during their conversation fascinates me. So much is going on there, a whole second conversation.
* "A few hours’ time, assuming he’s there, I’m going to begin a discussion in which I’m going to ask him for something that he can’t possibly give. And the success or failure of this war will depend upon the outcome. In a few hours’ time, there’s a good chance you’re going to look awfully smart." Ouch. So much ouch. It's such a Flint sort of plan. *facepalm* He's not as actively suicidal as he was, but his not actually caring if he lives or dies is fundamental to the sort of risks he takes.
* So know we've got a better idea of Blackbeard's agenda with Charles.
* Mrs. Hudson's story is so cliche it makes me suspicious, which doesn't mean it's not true, It's just Black Sails is more likely to make things not what they appear, so we'll see. My money is on either a lie or a partial lie. She's not in a lot odf scenes yet, but she's too...vivid? In the foreground of scenes she is in? For me not to suspect her of being complex. Is she betraying the Spanish to them, or just pretending to? Is she playing them off each other for her own or some third party purpose? I really like her from that first scene aboard ship with Eleanor, but I don't trust her even a little.
* Woodes acknowledged his interest mid-political conversation. Was that out of character badly acted or was it in character badly acted? I can't tell.
* "Now, I believe Nassau's best chance at survival is with me guiding it." Woodes sounds so much like Flint here, or Vane, or eleanor Guthrie. I think it is very deliberate.
* It's nice of them to orient us to the current state of Nassau politics early on this episode to set us up for Jack.
* Poor Jack seeing how what was monumental for him is snap of the fingers for Woodes. It makes a person wonder whether the issue is if Nassau is worth saving or not, or if the issue is Jack's shittastic commend skills. It could be either or both. I did enjoy the face acting either way.
* Civilization symbolized by the wearing of a cravat!
* Featherstone's reaction to Jack being an idiot is a sensible one.
* Now we get to the heart of Silver's gut clenching terror, one I very much sympathize and identify with. One I've dealt with most of my life. This feels real to me as hard and ugly as it is to watch. "I cannot look weak. I cannot feel weak. I cannot be weak. Not in front of my men. Not in front of your men. Not at all. For some time now, I have been holding my entire world together with both hands, keeping my men in line, seeing to their needs, and the only way that endures is if I look the part. And I cannot look the part while being poked and prodded or while drooling through an opium haze saying who the f*ck knows what. So I will endure this the way I have been enduring it." The appearance of strength and confidence is and very likely always has been a survival skill for him. We don't have his backstory, but I have some guesses as to what makes a man like him. To have something so fundamental be out of his control... Yeah, I do get that well enough. I know it was and likely always will be a struggle for me. I was an athlete, after all. Before. I was used to being able to demand and achieve all sorts of things from my body. It was an incredibly useful tool right up until it wasn't. It is incredibly hard for a control freak like Silver, used to relying utterly and only on himself to suddenly need other people. Trust me, I know what that's like. Asking for is still like knives under my skin and a little part of me dies every single time I must do it. I think it is ten times worse for Silver. Given what made me as I am, given the incredibly disproportionately horrible consequences of even the tiniest hint of weakness, given the costs and the way I learned to protect myself as a child and young adult, I've an idea what it means to Silver and the desperation behind his pretense that everything is all right in front of other people. I think he's significantly worse at trust than I am. I've had a couple of decades to unpick some of the defenses that he hasn't got and I suspect he is worse than I was, even though he expressed it in some different ways. Watching this hurts. It is raw, and painful and close to home.
* I guess I identify with Silver now. Who'd have fucking thought? I'm so much more of a Flint generally.
* "No one prepared you for this, did they? For as long as I can remember, I have been prepared for the day I would take my mother's place. To know that from that day forth, I would forever be the one who tends as opposed to the one who is tended to. You're frustrated. You're angry. You're tired. Perhaps no one else knows why. I believe that not even you know why. But I know why. The crown is always a burden... but it cannot be borne if you cannot stand." - Madi
* I think Madi is ready to become a Captain. For those who have not read my other commentaries, I think that the political structures in Nassau and now this village work similarly to the command structures on the various ships, reflecting and commenting on similar themes and each other. Just as they show us a variety of command styles that are more or less effective at sea in Flint, Vane, Low, Rackham, Blackbeard, etc., you get both Guthries, Max, the Queen, etc. on land, with some figures passing back and forth (Rackham, Hornigold, Scott, Rogers). It is clever and deliberate and I think there is an excellent thesis in it for some grad student. Madi reads to me like a Quartermaster ready to move up, and unlike just about everyone we've seen do that (I'm looking at you Dufresne, but also Max, Jack, etc.), she is fully trained and ready for it, instead of playing catch up. In the other cases, with the possible exception of Mr. Scott (and possibly Flint and Vane in the backstory), people were partially trained (Silver, Billy, Eleanor, Jack), self trained (Max), or flat out not even close to ready (I'm looking at you again, Dufresne) I've a suspicion the free village is the first time we've seen someone with full training, talent, and inclination to lead. (Mr. Gates had training and talent, but he pretty obviously did NOT want to be a Captain, hence him building one to fit his needs). Realistically, training, talent, and inclination need experience and seasoning. The command structure of a ship is meant give a person that as best as possible, but there are certain things that can only be learned by doing. Ex: Billy not rechecking that they followed the order during careening. Strong Captains, Quartermasters, Boatswains, etc. still need time to improve and continue to build a bigger toolbox of tricks and knowledge as they go, but the adjustment is smoother with the right set up. When Madi moves up, there will likely be missteps and adjustments, but she's better set up than most and she's got a handle on the psychological aspects in advance, something Silver and Max have both been struggling with despite them doing very well at it given the givens.
* So we get to the Pirate summit, planned to fail. "Nearly dismasted in a storm… a storm you chased after. Nearly starved to death in the doldrums. Nearly executed by them. Either you are unkillable, friend, or way overdue." -Blackbeard to Flint I'm basically quoting it as it's a lovely summary and amusing both. Blackbeard, quite sensibly doesn't drink Flint's Koolaid. I think he's of of a very few immune to it since he stopped being McGraw. But the pitch isn't aimed at Blackbeard at all. It's intended as a seduction of Charles Vane back to Vane's original cause. The thing Flint says to Billy just before they landed shows that Flint doesn't expect the pitch to Blackbeard to work. I contend this was always the plan: to make Charles choose between his Stab Dad and Nassau. I think the face acting, shot composition, blocking, and the way the close ups are cut in this scene back me up on this. There is this beautiful shot where Charles is framed between Flint and Blackbeard in the bit where they are arguing about whether or not Nassau is worth saving starting at "Was past it's time." He's seated on Blackbeard's side of the table and so slightly closer to him, but he is leaning a little towards Flint physically, and his chair is pulled away giving a sense of distance to them both. He has his listening face on, the one that tells you he's thinking and weighing words, but not what he is thinking about them, if that makes sense. Charles is the judge, silent for the moment, but he's the one they are arguing for, not each other. Their conflict is fixed, but Charles has conflicting loyalties here and in that situation has swung on a dime before, to Blackbeard's cost. I think the conversation between Flint and Vane right before the duel back this theory that it was all about Vane as well from the start. "Forget me, forget Teach, forget loyalty, compacts, honor, debts, all of it. The only question that matters is this. Who are you?" Flint is so GOOD at this.
* I think the question "Who are you?" is the best question in the episode, and I also think this is the episode's theme. It's not just Charles grappling with it. It's Billy, Silver, and Jack. I think to a certain extent it's Blackbeard, though that's mostly under the surface, and possibly Woodes Rogers.
* I think for Charles, Nassau's betrayal of him strikes as deep and painful as Eleanor's betrayal of him. He loves the few things and people he loves so incredibly deeply and passionately: Freedom, Nassau, Eleanor, Blackbeard. He's proved he'll do just about anything for them including seriously imperiling himself and betraying his ideals, and it tears him to ribbons when those loves conflict. I think for all his protests he's not even close to over his thing with Nassau just as he's not even close to over his thing with Eleanor. I think his actions during the duel prove that.
* It occurs to me that he is at Blackbeard's right hand in this scene as Billy is at Flint's. It's absolutely logical for a summit like this, but at the same time, this sets Billy diagonal from Vane. Given Vane's angle, it's Billy his face has been pointing towards most of the meeting until his judgement is directly solicited. It's very nearly the same sort of internal conflict going on if you leave out the sexual component of Billy's conflict and Charles' Daddy issues. There's the conflict of loyalties, the anger, the betrayal, the fundamental questions about whether the person you are following is leading everyone right to destruction or the only salvation. This scene is not about Billy, he's just there, right in Vane's logical eye line. I think they are thematically linked in this episode: mirrors for each other.
* My question is would it change or not change Charles' response if he knew Blackbeard's secret? I've no answer to that, but it haunts me.
* I am amused by the implication that Jack is telling Woodes' Jack's back story at the same time as he's summarizing his book, all in a handful of sentences. "Wealthy son of a wealthy man takes to the sea to prove something to the parents, presumably. Seeks adventure, finds the limits of his own capacity. Loses everything in the process and then stumbles upon a hell of a story in the process." Mirrors, Mirrors everywhere.
* Remember back in season two how much material there was around the importance of fame reputation, the way it was threaded all through Jack Rackham's arc and through the Flint/Dufresne interactions, and how fundamental Story is to Flint and Silver's power? The telling of stories is why Silver and Flint are so dangerous. Reputation and the loss of it is everything. It's why Dufresne's boarding as Captain was such a botch. It's how Silver and flint got the crew back. It's how Silver built and maintains his power. It turned the Beach against Charles twice. It's why Charles rescued Flint in Charlestown. It's how Flint got his men to reject the pardon and sail into the ship killer of a storm. It's fundamental to Eleanor and Woodes' arcs, character, and how people react to them, and they discuss it openly earlier this season. It's how Flint got the village to free and join them.
Here it is again, thematically. In the summit, Blackbeard references the greats of the previous generation of pirates, amoung them Hornigold and Avery. Hornigold is now playing the other side which it something I need to think about some more. Is he a living symbol to Blackbeard of how his idealized version of Nassau has turned to something he can't recognize? A fierce free place that has been co-opted by the civilization it used to despise?
So now in the scene with Woodes, Jack references Avery as well. The repetition really stood out to be on first watching. He's on Blackbeard's list of idealized Pirates of the past. He is Jack's hero, the man he wanted to be. I don't think it's coincidence that it was Vane he ended up following, apprentice to Blackbeard another of the Greats, and for Jack's generation, a pirate's pirate. Remember that thing Anne said very early on this season about what men would do to have Charles vane call them "a proper pirate?" So here is Jack facing his fundamental failure as a Captain, the realistic view of his reputation measured up to the now semi-mythical Avery, a man even Blackbeard looked up to. "I heard Henry Avery’s name when I was a boy, heard the way people spoke it… grown men in awe of it. I came to this place so determined to do the same. That’s not going to happen the way I thought it was, is it?" Ouch. So much ouch!
But there is Woodes Roger's advice to Jack, a man who is his reflection, "My advice? You want some say in how they speak of you? Write a book." Story changes perception and so often in this show flat out changes reality. It influences not only how history remembers, but what people do in the present. I still have sooooo many questions about Woodes Avery. How much of what people think of him is spin? How much is real and how much embellishment or flat out lies? Did he kill his brother?
* Billy's face and tone when he says, "If he looses, he dies," makes me wonder if this is the moment he starts to untangle his feelings. Ben Gunn asks the second best question of the episode to Billy Bones, "When your men entreated me to join your crew, they said your captain was a man worth following. A strong man, a wise man, they said. But right now I can't tell which side of this contest you'd prefer to see prevail. Can you help me make sense of that?" I think Billy would love to be able to make sense of it, but that's been his personal conflict for two seasons now and it's coming to a head. "A few days ago I could make sense of all of it. He was going to die and we were going to be free, from the account, from him.... With all the shit he's done, the things he's gotten away with, that would have been fair. That would have been right. I think part of the reason I've been able to stand by his side is that I wanted to make sure I've got a good view of the moment the world finally catches up to him... and this story starts to make sense again." I don't think any of it can makes sense to him until he's dealt with his desire and all the feelings it conflicts with like anger and betrayal, as well as his fundamental ethical quandaries.
* I keep asking myself, what is Blackbeard's agenda here? Is it in line with his stated agenda or is there something deeper going on here? I'm suspecting there is something deeper going on here because the pieces don't add up. We're clearly missing a component, and one not as obvious as Flint/Hamilton was to me on first watching season one.
* This is verging on the Magical Negro trope with Madi and Silver, which worries me, much I worry about the White Savior trope with the Pirate and village situation. At the same time there is a long history in this show of more experienced Captains, Quartermasters, etc. mentoring less experienced ones. It didn't bother me with Mr. Scott in previous seasons because the context was so clearly the same as similar examples like Mr. Gates advising Billy or Flint advising Dufresne or Billy, or Vane or Hornigold advising Eleanor, etc.. Here, with the African religious imagery as frame it's more worrisome. I really would like to see more Madi development outside of her interactions with Silver. I really need her to be as fleshed out character wise and with her own goals as the other main ensemble characters, because if she only exists as a plot point or in relation to Silver? not okay.
* Silver is incredibly aware of the ghosts of Flint and Miranda, and the associated worry has haunted him all season:
Silver:What he wants, what he needs, what he fears... the depths of it... they are profound and dark. I serve the crew best by tempering him, steering him where he's needed. I've descended into those depths and connected with him so that I might be able to do so. But I am acutely aware that I'm not the first to have been there... to have been a partner to him in this way. And that the ones that have seen those depths before... they never surfaced again.
Madi:Maybe their mistake was in trying to do it alone. Maybe to go to such a place, one needs another to hold the tether and to find a way out.
Silver:Maybe.
* The Max and Jack conversation had me thinking of Hamilton and "Who tells your story." Fundamentally that's what it's about isn't it? For all of them, really. It's just that Jack and Woodes Rogers are some of the most aware of this (Along with Silver and Flint and more recently Eleanor and Max. I am pretty sure that was one of the things the Eleanor and Death play in 3.1 was about, for example. I know I keep hammering on this, but I honestly think is a major scene of the whole series: Story and who controls it. Reputation and the way it can be used by a person but also against them. The way Eleanor's life turns on a dime based on the words other people use to describe her is a very stark example of this. Dufresne's inability to wield Flint's reputation is another. I think Jack's preoccupation with it from things like Sail design, to his command style, to the idiot decition to go back to Nassau to reclaim his name, to his actions and conversations right here in XXIV are all about trying to deliberately make himself a legend. He is obsessed with the stories the tell about him and whether or not he'll make the history books. Who tells his story matters to him immensely, because that determines who people will think he was long after he's gone.
* It is terribly, terribly Jack to start a war without letting the other side know they are at war until the other side is bleeding. It's how he killed Anne's husband. It's how he beat the other pirate captain in the duel. He exhibited it very clearly when he opened the fort door and shot a man in the head before anyone knew what was happening so very recently. And now he's playing deadly chess with Woodes Rogers, which is fascinating given that this is the game Eleanor and Rogers have been playing all season. The contrast in styles between Eeanor and Jack is _fascinating_. I'm going to be writing a lot more about that in future, but I'm in no condition to do it justice today.
* It pleases me that his opening gambit is to have complete and utter faith in Anne and their connection. This despite all the ways he has misread her pretty much since Vane's crew took Max. Despite the ways they've been partially estranged for most of two seasons. They are fundamentally entwined. I am thinking of Anne telling Jack in XVIII, "Like we was two halves of the same thing. I can't be your wife, Jack. But you and I are gonna be partners till they put us in the fucking ground." He trusts that. He makes his opening gambit based on the correct belief that she will know his mind based on things he doesn't say.
* We've had plenty of manifesto speeches from Flint and Vane particularly, and a number of other characters, but I think this is the first from Jack that I recall. For the first time we know what he wants politically, especially if you add in all the things he's said about story and reputation this episode. This is what he wants for Nassau and this is who he wants to be. I'm not sure even he understood this until he was in that room with Woodes Rogers. "So, one of two outcomes will result. Rogers will understand his defeat to be ultimately inevitable and leave this place, in which case I'll have it back. Or he'll stubbornly refuse and eventually Spain will raze this place to the ground. The English flag will burn, and a second pirate republic will be born from the ashes of the first. Only this time, every man who calls it home will know it came about because of me." I think this is the first time you can really see Vane's influence on who he is. It's certainly the first time I've looked at him and could clearly see him as capable of wielding power on his own account. I think he just started to think bigger. He's got a long way to go in the long term strategy department, but I think this is the first time he grasped that he needs to be better than frying pan to fire. I've said all along he is clever, but mentally lazy.
* For the record, I think Max's tendency to think short term until partway into second season was because she was so busy just trying to survive and get her freedom and a basic level of physical security. It's a completely understandable reason to focus mostly on immediate and short term goals like not being imprisoned, raped, murdered, etc.. I think she's been doing that her whole life and I'm extremely impressed at how quickly she started to think like a Captain once she had even a hint of a chance to breath, and how quickly she has turned into a good one without much in the way of help or advice compared to pretty much everyone else we've seen learning to lead.
* Mr. Scott's prediction also hammers in the theme of using Story to bend the world to one's will. I also expect he's telling us exactly how Flint and Silver will turn from allies into nemeses. "Those men rose to their stations because they are peerless when it comes to shaping the world to their will, in creating a narrative and wielding it to compel men's hearts and minds. But the most compelling story requires a villain at its center. And if either Captain Flint or Mr. Silver sees the other as a villain... or worse... us as that... then all is lost."
* I want to stick a pin in the theme of Madi and her father vs. Madi and her mother. She's the only character I can think of that interacts with both in the present tense, though we mostly lack the dynamic of the three of them together, and I rather worry that there isn't enough depth to their goals and interactions outside of things revolving around white characters' needs.
* I am glad we get a manifesto speech from Mr. Scott because we very much needed one. "But over time, I was determined to leave you something behind, to give you the one thing that no one could ever take away... and that would make you strong enough to understand their world, interact with their world... wage war on their world. But if their identity lies in their stories, I wanted you to know them so that when we are ready to call them enemies, you would be ready for it. The villain makes the story. So to manage our current partners, we must ensure that we all agree at all times who our common villain is." I am very relieved that Mr. Scott did not drink the Flint Koolaid but was biding his time with Flint and the rest as means to an end. That is so much better than him loyally going along with whatever the woman who literally owned him as if he were a thing and not a person. (I know I keep saying it, but really, Eleanor? It to you how many years to think, "Maybe I should free this man who has done so much for me?" Really? You couldn't have freed this human being you pretended to care about the second you had the power to do it?) I still have a lot of side eye for various things past and present, but this manifesto speech is a step in the right direction.
* Here is another significant gift of a book. I am of the opinion that the Flint/Thomas/Miranda book exchanges were all important and both symbolic in the immediate sense but also part of the overarching them about stories changing the world. Here we are almost at the end of an episode that textually foregrounded the importance of stories to shape the world and Mr. Scott gives the same Woodes Rogers book that has been threaded all through the season and this episode in particular to his daughter to use as a weapon. O.o
* Please, please Black Sails, make this good. Do not fuck this up, because this could be terrible or amazing and there isn't much leeway between one or another.
* I love the way the talk in XXIV foregrounds the question of who the villain is depends on who tells the story and how. It's a thing I loved about Black Sails from the very beginning. It's why I'm so interested in ASoIaF. It's why I'm fascinated with stories that play with point of view, like Wuthering Heights (the book, not the mostly creepily sentimental movies). I often when reading or watching a thing, like to take the story and turn it around in my head to play with how it looks to different characters in the narrative. It's why my favorite villains are the ones that could be the hero if you switch the point of view. I love it best when everybody involved is doing what they think is best for perfectly valid reasons. I loved that the original Flint/Vane and Eleanor/Vane conflict was so fundamentally about different ideas to protect Nassau and the people in it, and there was no real way to tell which was closer to right until a lot more things happened. I love that we still kind of don't know what's best for Nassau given all the givens.
* Max draws her line in the sand and chooses herself. Given all she's been through I can't blame her even a little.
* Oh Charles, you break my heart, endlessly forced to chose to betray one mutually exclusive love for another.
* I think it is easy to underestimate the quality of Charles Vane's mind for the exact same reason people overlook Anne's. They are both mostly the "strong silent type." You'll often see them in meetings silent or near silent, taking it all in: the arguments and stratagems and politics. when they do speak up they have strong opinions that imply a lot of thought and observations, but the like to let other people do most of the talking. You can see Charles do it earlier this episode with Flint and Teach. I think of it often watching Anne standing in the background of intense meetings between two other characters. There were quite a few this season, but they are threaded all through, just as they are with Jack. I was thinking about it a lot in the Jack Nassau stratagem meeting before the English arrived because that is a moment Flint would have used his power over Story to make them all Do the Thing, but instead he lets Jack do nearly all the talk himself including that cringe worthy "Mothering" Nassau bit. The thing is Jack does have a Silver adjacent skill set, but up until the manifesto speech this episode didn't even begin to have the weight of confidence to really sell it. Once again he's close to two seasons behind on the development curve, but at least he looks to be on the right track for learning to use it.
* They've paralleled the last two scenes, haven't they? The Eleanor/Woodes/Max scene and the Flint/Vane thing are fundamentally about competing challenges and assets. In the one Max pops up with her uncounted assets and in the other Charles reveals an asset flint knew nothing about. God I love this show's structure.
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