You know, I agree with you on many levels, but ultimately --- I don't have the same (dis)regard for fan fiction as you do.
I believe it was Joss Whedon who said "you don't give the audience what they want, you give them what they need" - and Matthew didn't do that. It was very, very cheeky of him. And as you said, narratively, it was suspect. Very suspect.
Have I ever told you I'm a morally suspect person?
Oh, don't get me wrong - I love fanfic.hmpfApril 12 2007, 01:11:56 UTC
I could write you an entire 1800-words declaration of love for fanfic here, on the spot, if I weren't drop-dead tired and about to leave for a holiday.
I just don't want fanfic logic in my canon. (Actually... there's even only so much fanfic logic I'm willing to bear in fanfic - wishfulfilment is nice, but it has to be *really* well motivated within the story to work for me. I guess I'm a bourgeois really - I want my bourgeois art to follow nice, established bourgeois rules of how it all should develop and end.
It is quite a leap to make the main character commit suicide and see that as a positive act . . . and in some ways it's really a surprise to see them go there. I thought they would, it was the only "happy" resoulution I could come up with, but it does leave a lot of questions. My only complaint is that we didn't get to see enough of how miserable Sam was in 2006/2007. We got one meeting, one scene with his mother. I would have liked to have seen him work at it. I would have liked to have seen an awkward scene with Maya, where it's just not going to work. I would have liked to have seen Sam collapsing into bed in 2007 and being miserable, crying himself to sleep. I think we can assume some of that happened and was either cut or not filmed for the sake of TIME, but I do feel we needed it. As it is, feels like he wakes up, goes to work that after noon and jumps that evening. Which of course is absurd
( ... )
>I'm glad that the ending didn't make you completely hate the show.
Oh, don't worry - nothing could manage that. It caters too well to too many of my obsessions. *g*
And I can already feel my anger turning into fic... or rather, morphing one of my already existing works in progress into something quite different, and far more interesting, so... yay! *g*
I really enjoyed reading this - I found myself nodding and "yeah"-ing in agreement throughout. I could quote so many parts, but then this comment would be way too long lol. ^_
( ... )
Re: Thank you.alysscarletApril 12 2007, 21:16:00 UTC
You're not the only one. Thanks for writing this. You've managed to articulate why both my boyfriend and I shouted 'noooooo' when he appeared on the roof and it was obvious he was going to jump. I'm amazed that people were willing him on. I thought we were the only two in the land who felt like this.
I think the ending is a failure on the authors' part, not so much of the story, but of the desire to simultaneously write in a genre and to be seen to have not written in that genre. This raises more questions than it answers. A lot of the ending - not to mention Ashes to Ashes, which I both long for and dread, would seem to make sense only if the 1973-world has some sort of reality outside Sam's brain or if he never physically woke up, and 2007 was another part of the dream (otherwise it's a rather sad story of a cancer patient suffering from post-operative depression who kills himself).
If Sam is dead, and the final scene is his final second of life stretching out to a subjective eternity: then how on earth can Ashes to Ashes feature the detective he sent his tape to in 2007 recognising the characters he describes? And if Sam is "in" A2A because it's all taking place in his imagination, as the BBC Wales site says, then how on earth is he dead? Some one suggested to me that in the final "eternal second" Sam could imagine the story
( ... )
>I think the ending is a failure on the authors' part, not so much of the story, but of the desire to simultaneously write in a genre and to be seen to have not written in that genre.
I don't think the genre was the problem here. They could have kept 1973 on exactly the same level of reality/unreality *and* even kept Sam there permanently, thus giving all the "OMG Sam can't leave Gene/Annie!!!!11" people the happy ending they wanted, with only a few minor changes to what they actually did. No outright sf stuff would have been needed. It could all still have been exactly what it seems to be now, a dream in between life and death or a version of the afterlife. All they would have needed to do was to have Sam die 'properly' (instead of by stupiditysuicide). See my suggestion for an alternative interpretation near the end of my rant. They could have achieved that without *any* changes to the storyline at all - they just would have needed to emphasise a few things slightly differently than they chose to do.
I don't think we're actually disagreeing! It certainly could all be imaginary - including the return to 2007, and that would be more consistent. In fact, John Simms believed that Sam never made it back to 2007 - I'm presuming that's why he played the suicide scene and the previous one as he did.
Where I see the disjunct is that the writer is disingenuous enough to praise simms acting in that scene, to mention his interpretation of "2007", and then to stress that Sam really did go back to 2007, but chose 1973. I think the writers want to hjave their cake and eat it; they've repeatedly gone on record as saying they wanted to make a police show like The Sweeney, and regretting that they couldn't do that, as such a sexist and racist show would never be aired today. Life on Mars is a self-referential and self-critical Sweeney - and it's brilliant, don't get me wrong, I love it. But it does depend on a fairly standard science-fiction cliche, and I think the writers are backing away from that in the final scene, for whatever reason. (And
( ... )
I agree about the writers...hmpfApril 12 2007, 22:25:14 UTC
being very inconsistent and intellectually lazy about it all. Also, I agree with your dark interpretation of the ending, and I wish they would have put more hints in that this was actually what they *meant* to say, because that, depressing as it is, would have made some kind of sense. *sigh*
I've been thinking this over. (And theorising a bit because I've only read the spoilers to 2.08 so far.)
I think I would be happiest if John Simm's theory was the correct one - that Sam had never woken up, and that 2007 was part of his coma dream. If nothing else it's more credible - from what I've read it sounds as if Sam recovered from major brain surgery with no external injuries, and was back to work within a scene or two. Whereas in real life I'd expect months of physical therapy and counselling before he was back on his feet - let alone put in a stressful and responsible position.
(And would no one, really, on the 2007 police force notice that there was something wrong with Sam, and take steps to deal with it? After all, we're not living in Gene Hunt's world, where "let's get a drink in you!" is the answer to all problems
( ... )
I think what is worrying me about this ending, is not this episode on its own, but the episode taken in conjunction with Matthew's interview and his plans for A2A. Because taken on its own Sam's fate sounds as if it can be interpreted in more than one life afirming and/or enobling way.
(Of course the whole A2A project had me worried from the start - because I like my "art", or at least my entertainment, to make intellectual as well as emotional sense. At the moment it looks partly like a LOM ripoff, and partly like a complete muddle. How can a third person interact with someone else's imaginary friends - it boggles the mind!)
Right from the moment we first heard about it I've only been interested in A2A insofar as it touched upon the question of what was real in LOM. Now that LOM is over and has given us a fairly clear answer (plus one or two equally likely alternatives) my interest in A2A has gone from 'very low' to 'non-existent'. And, yeah, I agree, what we've heard so far doesn't sound particularly confidence-inspiring.
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:D
You know, I agree with you on many levels, but ultimately --- I don't have the same (dis)regard for fan fiction as you do.
I believe it was Joss Whedon who said "you don't give the audience what they want, you give them what they need" - and Matthew didn't do that. It was very, very cheeky of him. And as you said, narratively, it was suspect. Very suspect.
Have I ever told you I'm a morally suspect person?
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I just don't want fanfic logic in my canon. (Actually... there's even only so much fanfic logic I'm willing to bear in fanfic - wishfulfilment is nice, but it has to be *really* well motivated within the story to work for me. I guess I'm a bourgeois really - I want my bourgeois art to follow nice, established bourgeois rules of how it all should develop and end.
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I also wrote the alternative one, as you know.
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Oh, don't worry - nothing could manage that. It caters too well to too many of my obsessions. *g*
And I can already feel my anger turning into fic... or rather, morphing one of my already existing works in progress into something quite different, and far more interesting, so... yay! *g*
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I feel a bit like Sam did in 1973, most of the time. Like nobody can possibly understand where I'm coming from. *g*
We need a self-helf group for 2.08 dislikers, we do.
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If Sam is dead, and the final scene is his final second of life stretching out to a subjective eternity: then how on earth can Ashes to Ashes feature the detective he sent his tape to in 2007 recognising the characters he describes? And if Sam is "in" A2A because it's all taking place in his imagination, as the BBC Wales site says, then how on earth is he dead? Some one suggested to me that in the final "eternal second" Sam could imagine the story ( ... )
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I don't think the genre was the problem here. They could have kept 1973 on exactly the same level of reality/unreality *and* even kept Sam there permanently, thus giving all the "OMG Sam can't leave Gene/Annie!!!!11" people the happy ending they wanted, with only a few minor changes to what they actually did. No outright sf stuff would have been needed. It could all still have been exactly what it seems to be now, a dream in between life and death or a version of the afterlife. All they would have needed to do was to have Sam die 'properly' (instead of by stupiditysuicide). See my suggestion for an alternative interpretation near the end of my rant. They could have achieved that without *any* changes to the storyline at all - they just would have needed to emphasise a few things slightly differently than they chose to do.
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Where I see the disjunct is that the writer is disingenuous enough to praise simms acting in that scene, to mention his interpretation of "2007", and then to stress that Sam really did go back to 2007, but chose 1973. I think the writers want to hjave their cake and eat it; they've repeatedly gone on record as saying they wanted to make a police show like The Sweeney, and regretting that they couldn't do that, as such a sexist and racist show would never be aired today. Life on Mars is a self-referential and self-critical Sweeney - and it's brilliant, don't get me wrong, I love it. But it does depend on a fairly standard science-fiction cliche, and I think the writers are backing away from that in the final scene, for whatever reason. (And ( ... )
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I think I would be happiest if John Simm's theory was the correct one - that Sam had never woken up, and that 2007 was part of his coma dream. If nothing else it's more credible - from what I've read it sounds as if Sam recovered from major brain surgery with no external injuries, and was back to work within a scene or two. Whereas in real life I'd expect months of physical therapy and counselling before he was back on his feet - let alone put in a stressful and responsible position.
(And would no one, really, on the 2007 police force notice that there was something wrong with Sam, and take steps to deal with it? After all, we're not living in Gene Hunt's world, where "let's get a drink in you!" is the answer to all problems ( ... )
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(Of course the whole A2A project had me worried from the start - because I like my "art", or at least my entertainment, to make intellectual as well as emotional sense. At the moment it looks partly like a LOM ripoff, and partly like a complete muddle. How can a third person interact with someone else's imaginary friends - it boggles the mind!)
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