Re: Art and morals.candogirlApril 12 2007, 07:55:04 UTC
Hmm, we disagree about what the jump back to 73 meant. I never felt like it was a happy ending and I think at most it could be considered bitter sweet. I'm sure some people are all "Aww, Annie and Sam together 4evah!!!" but I thought the darkest moment of the show was when she said stay forever and he said he would. It was his death knell.
I thought the jump was about taking a chance on living, really living, more than it was about giving up. I didn't think they were trying to say that 1973 was a better world or a better time than 2007. Imo, they were saying he was more alive then or that he felt more alive then. Again, maybe the popular interpretation is that 2007 is bad and 1973 is good but that doesn't mean it's the right one.
I have a hard time seeing how there is no cohesion. In the first episode Sam is ready to jump off a building in order to get back to his world. I agree that Sam in ep 1 would not have jumped back into 1973 once he had gotten to 2006, but I think the character arc was always heading in this direction. Morally, for Sam, he promised Annie that he wouldn't leave her. Morally, Sam could not let his friends die because of his actions. The facts told him that these people were in his mind, his emotions told him they were real and waiting for him. In his mind, his moral obligation was to the people he'd abandoned to die. I don't think he seemed overly enthused about it, as he spoke to his mom, it actually seemed like he was trying to lay out a rational argument. As for leaving people behind, well I have to say it was a cop out not to have Maya, I was waiting for her to show up, but I think that the tragedy of the whole situation was that each world was a viable option for Sam- each place had people that loved him and that he loved. It wasn't the world that drove him to his decision. I hate to harp on this, but it was, imo, an existential choice. Sam decides what world he would really be alive in. And it is his perspective on the situation, not ours that matters.
As to what the writers intended, well I can not believe they didn't intentionally gray the ending up so that the audience could interpret it however they wanted. But I will say that I generally don't care what a writer, painter, or actor set out intending to do. As you know, art work has a life of it's own and once it is made it no longer belongs to the people that created it. Therefore their wants shouldn't effect your enjoyment. As someone studying literature, I'm sure you are used to finding meaning in a text and seeing a common theme that the author most likely didn't intend to create. We find our own meanings to fit our own tastes. We subconsciously lay the framework of an idea into the things we do.
As for it being TV and not art, well Shakespeare was no more than a brilliant television writer in his day and we interpret the hell out of his scripts. Just because it's shown on a small box doesn't mean it doesn't have artistic integrity.
Sorry I'm jumping a bit here, but in the pilot on the roof Annie says to Sam that we all feel like jumping sometimes, but we don't. I think the moral of the story is that we need to jump. Not, obviously, to our deaths- the jump means doing something you are unsure of, doing something you are afraid of, doing something that takes you to a new place. I felt the jump was saying that we accept the world and reality all to easily. We should question and fight and try to really live our lives instead of just going with the flow and settling into apathy. If you look at the situation rationally, Sam should have jumped in the pilot, but he was too afraid. This time he had the courage to fight for the life he wanted, even if it meant dying.
This is weird, I think you have a valid argument, I'm not trying to sway you over to my side. I'm just trying to clarify why I enjoyed the episode. Plus I like a good discussion and none of my friends have watched the ep yet. :)
Re: Art and morals.echo_voiceApril 12 2007, 10:29:07 UTC
"I thought the darkest moment of the show was when she said stay forever and he said he would. It was his death knell." THAT is very interesting. It didn't occur to me in the slightest, and I'm not entirely sure that I agree, but I like it nonetheless!
I also very much like this: "If you look at the situation rationally, Sam should have jumped in the pilot, but he was too afraid. This time he had the courage to fight for the life he wanted, even if it meant dying." I don't think Sam's jump is cowardly, though I do partially agree with the original comment that Sam should theoretically have stayed in 2007 and translated his lessons to that life there. Yet...an interview with Matthew had him saying that he couldn't bear for Sam to be in 2007 and I agree with that. If he had, I would have been devastated! I see it as a choice, and Sam chose 1973, like I wanted him to.
As for the morality of the show, I don't think the jump was a deviation from morality for Sam. To me personally, Life on Mars was distinctly amoral the whole way through: I do not believe that it tried to show that anything was the right way of doing things. We see that from the Sam/Gene arguments. Gene's methods seem immoral to Sam, but the morality behind them (protect the citizens above everything else) is surely at least partially valid? The ethical questions the show brought up were part of why I loved it - it challenged my opinions.
Oh, and I love your exploration of the existential aspects of the series. "In last night’s episode, he rejects rationalism for the existential view that man defines his own reality." Oh yes. I LOVE this interpretation.
Arrgh. Just typed out an epic-length reply to this and then hit the wrong key (working on a foreign laptop *g*) and it was gone. Grrrrrrrrr. So.... *again*:
>Hmm, we disagree about what the jump back to 73 meant. I never felt like it was a happy ending and I think at most it could be considered bitter sweet. I'm sure some people are all "Aww, Annie and Sam together 4evah!!!" but I thought the darkest moment of the show was when she said stay forever and he said he would. It was his death knell.
Oh, I never felt it was a happy ending, either! That's the problem! It was so very clearly a tragedy to any rationally thinking person (IMO), yet they *dressed it up* as a happy ending. So many kinds of wrong.
>I thought the jump was about taking a chance on living, really living, more than it was about giving up. I didn't think they were trying to say that 1973 was a better world or a better time than 2007. Imo, they were saying he was more alive then or that he felt more alive then. Again, maybe the popular interpretation is that 2007 is bad and 1973 is good but that doesn't mean it's the right one.
How the bloody hell can jumping to your death be taking a chance on living? Is it taking the 'better to burn out than to fade away' idea to an absolute extreme? Three seconds of fun and that's it? ;-)
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for fantasy, fantasy worlds, parallel universes, time travel and the likes - I come to LoM very much from an SF background. But the show was pretty clear about it all being inside Sam's head, so he really made a decision to withdraw into his own head and leave reality entirely. I may be tragically inflexible or something, but I can't see that as any kind of positive choice 'for' life.
>I have a hard time seeing how there is no cohesion. In the first episode Sam is ready to jump off a building in order to get back to his world. I agree that Sam in ep 1 would not have jumped back into 1973 once he had gotten to 2006, but I think the character arc was always heading in this direction. Morally, for Sam, he promised Annie that he wouldn't leave her. Morally, Sam could not let his friends die because of his actions. The facts told him that these people were in his mind, his emotions told him they were real and waiting for him.
Hmm... I should try that excuse in my life sometime. "Sorry, I couldn't call you because I had a moral obligation to save John Crichton from certain death in my daydreams. Oh, and I got Sam into a really bad pickle, I need to save him, too, so I'm afraid I'll have to cancel our date for next week, too. Need more quality time with my fictional favourites. You know, they're real to me..." ;-)
>I think that the tragedy of the whole situation was that each world was a viable option for Sam- each place had people that loved him and that he loved.
I had thought so until 2.07, too, but 2.07 did a very thorough job of showing us that 2007 is really just a cold, grey-blue, lifeless place full of soulless automatons, with the possible exception of his mum. They *could* have portrayed 2007 in a different way; they could have showed us the conflict. They chose not to.
Which, among other reasons, is especially annoying because they did such a good job, *especially* in series two, of really making us feel the appeal of 2007 for Sam, too - there was a lot of love to be felt in the communications from the present that we heard this series, and a palpable sense of loss very often - except in 2.07 where suddenly 2007 is completely dead.
>It wasn't the world that drove him to his decision. I hate to harp on this, but it was, imo, an existential choice. Sam decides what world he would really be alive in. And it is his perspective on the situation, not ours that matters.
Is it, *really*? Is reality *that* relative? Should we cheer on crazy sect members who think that killing themselves will get them picked up by aliens from Sirius, or suicide bombers who think killing dozens alongside themselves will get them straight into paradise, because after all, that's *their* ideal reality, the world they would like to live in, and they're taking a positive step to achieving their goals?
Re: Reply, part threehmpfApril 12 2007, 23:40:28 UTC
>As for it being TV and not art, well Shakespeare was no more than a brilliant television writer in his day and we interpret the hell out of his scripts. Just because it's shown on a small box doesn't mean it doesn't have artistic integrity.
This is emphatically not what I said. TV, if you ask me, is one of the greatest and most underappreciated art forms of our time. I was not setting it apart from 'art', but from 'art that does not try to make a coherent statement', and even there I did neither mean to imply that 'art that does not try to make a coherent statement' was superior to other, less ambiguous kinds of art, nor that this kind of 'deliberately confusing and unsettling' art could not happen on tv - stuff like Twin Peaks clearly proves that it can. I was speaking about LOM; when I said I was judging it according to the rules of tv, that means that I think there are rules for storytelling in any medium; serial storytelling on tv, like any other medium, has its rules, and these are what my verdict about LOM is based on.
>Sorry I'm jumping a bit here, but in the pilot on the roof Annie says to Sam that we all feel like jumping sometimes, but we don't. I think the moral of the story is that we need to jump. Not, obviously, to our deaths- the jump means doing something you are unsure of, doing something you are afraid of, doing something that takes you to a new place. I felt the jump was saying that we accept the world and reality all to easily. We should question and fight and try to really live our lives instead of just going with the flow and settling into apathy.
Yes, of *course* we should fight! That's my entire point! But. Sam. Was. Not. Fighting. He didn't even try. Unless we are to assume he did and 2007 was just so terribly stifling that it was completely impossible to fight for a better life there.
>This is weird, I think you have a valid argument, I'm not trying to sway you over to my side. I'm just trying to clarify why I enjoyed the episode. Plus I like a good discussion and none of my friends have watched the ep yet. :)
It's okay, I like a good discussion, too, and how boring would discussions be if we all agreed on everything all the time?! ;-)
Re: Reply, part threecandogirlApril 13 2007, 01:00:02 UTC
This is emphatically not what I said. Sorry. I was responding at 3AM so I just misinterpreted what you were saying. I thought you meant TV didn't have to meet any artistic criteria.
He didn't even try. Unless we are to assume he did and 2007 was just so terribly stifling that it was completely impossible to fight for a better life there. You are right, 2007 got the shaft because the writer wanted him back in 1973. I think they tried to show the struggle in the lack of an anchor for him, though. Sam says to the woman, "It helps to talk about it." but he's only been talking into a tape recorder and the woman he is really speaking to doesn't seem to want him to talk about it any more. His mom basically offers up a platitude. Talking to Annie is what made 1973 real. There was no one talking him out of his delusion in 2006, no one telling him there was a purpose or a point in him being there. No one telling him to believe in and trust the world around him. He is unable to fight without those two things.
how boring would discussions be if we all agreed on everything all the time?! ;-) Ridiculously boring! I'm so happy you're indulging me like this, I rarely comment in lj's because people get offended and/or rude when there is a disagreement.
Re: Reply, part one acandogirlApril 13 2007, 00:11:16 UTC
Arrgh. Just typed out an epic-length reply to this and then hit the wrong key (working on a foreign laptop *g*) and it was gone. Grrrrrrrrr. So.... *again*: Stupid keyboards ☺
Oh, I never felt it was a happy ending, either! That's the problem! It was so very clearly a tragedy to any rationally thinking person (IMO), yet they *dressed it up* as a happy ending. So many kinds of wrong.
I think the reason for the dichotomy between what was going on and what we as audience members were seeing, is that for Sam it is a happy ending- it is the life he wanted. We are the ones who realize the world is fake, not him.
How the bloody hell can jumping to your death be taking a chance on living? Is it taking the 'better to burn out than to fade away' idea to an absolute extreme? Three seconds of fun and that's it? ;-)… . I may be tragically inflexible or something, but I can't see that as any kind of positive choice 'for' life.
It’s a chance because, imo, Sam doesn’t think he’s going to die. He thinks he is going to live. He is choosing his reality. We believe that 1973 was in his mind, he doesn’t.
Hmm... I should try that excuse in my life sometime. "Sorry, I couldn't call you because I had a moral obligation to save John Crichton from certain death in my daydreams.
Well, I’d accept it. Who could resist saving a man who wears leather pants so well?
Seriously though, the difference between you and Sam is that you only have one world in your mind. You have a definite boundary for reality and fantasy. Sam does not. It’s gone from the moment he takes Annie’s hand in the pilot. “See, why would I imagine that? Why would I bother to put that kind of detail in it? “ “You wouldn’t?” “What should I do, Annie? “Stay.”
The thing that pulls him back from the edge is a little piece of detail that he can feel. He begins to believe in this world. The thing that pushes him over the edge in the finale is that he can not feel the metal thing stabbing him. Reality and fantasy are completely mixed up in his mind. Actually in the end, I may be contradicting myself. I was saying that he learned to trust feelings and emotions, but in that moment Sam weighs the evidence and the evidence leads him to believe 2007 is not real. In that moment his irrationality is highly rational.
I had thought so until 2.07, too, but 2.07 did a very thorough job of showing us that 2007 is really just a cold, grey-blue, lifeless place full of soulless automatons, with the possible exception of his mum. They *could* have portrayed 2007 in a different way; they could have showed us the conflict. They chose not to…there was a lot of love to be felt in the communications from the present that we heard this series, and a palpable sense of loss very often - except in 2.07 where suddenly 2007 is completely dead.
I agree wholeheartedly with this. I was expecting someone to show up on that rooftop to try and stop him. They were definitely showing us that someone in 1973 noticed he was on the roof but in 2007 no one did. It wasn’t fair that we didn’t get Maya or more of his mother. I thought it was interesting that his mother inadvertently gives him permission to go. She validates his need to keep his promises instead of telling him that those were promises he made to imaginary people. Annie (who in the end is the wrong person to listen to, she’s quite the villain really) makes every effort to make him believe in his surroundings. He has no one telling him that 2007 is real. As for the blue-grey coloring, well I thought it was more about how he saw it than how it was. He feels lifeless in this place.
Re: Reply, part one acandogirlApril 13 2007, 00:14:55 UTC
Sorry that last bit should have read:
I had thought so until 2.07, too, but 2.07 did a very thorough job of showing us that 2007 is really just a cold, grey-blue, lifeless place full of soulless automatons, with the possible exception of his mum. They *could* have portrayed 2007 in a different way; they could have showed us the conflict. They chose not to…there was a lot of love to be felt in the communications from the present that we heard this series, and a palpable sense of loss very often - except in 2.07 where suddenly 2007 is completely dead.
I agree wholeheartedly with this. I was expecting someone to show up on that rooftop to try and stop him. They were definitely showing us that someone in 1973 noticed he was on the roof but in 2007 no one did. It wasn’t fair that we didn’t get Maya or more of his mother. I thought it was interesting that his mother inadvertently gives him permission to go. She validates his need to keep his promises instead of telling him that those were promises he made to imaginary people. Annie (who in the end is the wrong person to listen to, she’s quite the villain really) makes every effort to make him believe in his surroundings. He has no one telling him that 2007 is real. As for the blue-grey coloring, well I thought it was more about how he saw it than how it was. He feels lifeless in this place.
Re: Reply, part one ahmpfApril 15 2007, 12:59:00 UTC
>She validates his need to keep his promises instead of telling him that those were promises he made to imaginary people.
I don't think she knew what he was talking about. I don't believe he told her about 1973. I'm pretty sure that if he'd actually told her, she would *not* have affirmed his need to keep that promise.
>Annie (who in the end is the wrong person to listen to, she’s quite the villain really)
Heh, glad you agree with me! I've felt from the first there was something sinister about her - she was the one who kept trying to convince him that 1973 was real and that he should stay, after all. Back when we were trying to discover meaning in names people kept identifying her as 'anima', but maybe she's 'annihilation'...
(I actually sort of like the Sam/Annie ship, but I've always felt there was this weird, unhealthy edge to it.)
Re: Reply, part one acandogirlApril 15 2007, 18:59:29 UTC
I don't think she knew what he was talking about. I don't believe he told her about 1973. I'm pretty sure that if he'd actually told her, she would *not* have affirmed his need to keep that promise.
Agreed. I meant it was interesting that the writers chose to keep her in the dark. Maybe interesting isn't what I mean. It's more like, I thought it was curious that the ending wasn't balanced between the two worlds. I thought we should have had someone up on that roof trying to stop him (Maya), or that his mom should have been more, "You didn't go somewhere, you were in a coma. You don't owe anyone anything." I was trying to say that I agree they were sloppy with their storytelling there. If there were people telling him to stay, it would have made his struggle more difficult and his decision even darker.
(I actually sort of like the Sam/Annie ship, but I've always felt there was this weird, unhealthy edge to it.) I like Sam/Annie too, but aside from the fact that she repeatedly keeps him in 1973, it's strange to ship Sam/his own mind. Anyway you ship Sam it's a little bent, because it just means that Sam is in love with himself.
I like that she's a very dark character wrapped up in a golden package.
Re: Reply, part one bcandogirlApril 13 2007, 00:12:09 UTC
Sorry! I wrote too much to fit in one reply. Here's the rest...
Is reality *that* relative?
Existentially, yes. Actually, even un-existentially the answer is yes. My truth is not your truth. The way I see the world may not be the way you do. People fight and die every day trying to mold the world into what they want it to be. I’m not saying it’s right, I’m just saying it is. Even the basic facts of life are disputed- I believe in evolution, but there are people who believe in Adam and Eve and think my belief in dinosaurs is lunacy. A person’s reality is not always true.
Should we cheer on crazy sect members who think that killing themselves will get them picked up by aliens from Sirius, or suicide bombers who think killing dozens alongside themselves will get them straight into paradise, because after all, that's *their* ideal reality, the world they would like to live in, and they're taking a positive step to achieving their goals?
Of course not, but this isn’t the real world, it’s a story- it’s an idea, a warning. In real life you’d hope he’d have therapy and people to anchor him and medications. But that’s not the story Life on Mars is trying to tell. They aren’t telling people to jump off a building. They aren’t telling people to believe in imaginary worlds. They are telling people to live and to feel. Nelson is the spiritual guide, the moral, and the truth of the show. The way Sam interprets his words is not the way real people should interpret them. Imo, the ending isn’t meant to be so literal. It’s not the suicide that should be applauded; it’s the decision to live.
But why the *heck* couldn't he decide to live in the Real World?
Oh, I give up. I don't think I'm ever going to 'get' it. I mean, I totally get that it was Sam's worldview and so on - but that doesn't make it *any* bit less wrong. Ultimately, it comes down to a deep gut-feeling of nausea when I think about the ending, and there's no philosophical spin I can put on it that makes it less nausea-inducing.
Re: Decision to livecandogirlApril 13 2007, 01:07:01 UTC
But why the *heck* couldn't he decide to live in the Real World? I can only say that in Sam's mind he *does* decide to live in the real world.
At least that's my opinion. I do feel your frustration, I feel immensely sad that he died. The agreement to stay and the turning off of the radio, along with the girl turning off the story is so sad. I wrote in reply to someone else that, "the reason the show is over is because there is no longer someone left to imagine it. Which is sad, because it means that Sam couldn't have the life he wanted either way."
It's very depressing, but I really like it from a story telling perspective.
Well, as I sort of said before...hmpfApril 15 2007, 12:52:07 UTC
I *would* like this ending from a story telling perspective (I can handle sad or bittersweet endings better than happy ones, in most cases, because they violate my sense of reality less), if I didn't have to read the final ep so strongly against the grain and ignore so much textual evidence to 'see' this ending in it. To me, the authorial intention in this case is so blatant that I just can't ignore it, and the authorial intention that's written all over the ep in big bold letters says - to quote selenak - "Be-happy-Ask-no-questions-tThis-is-liberation-dammit!" Which drains all the meaning from the ending and the entire show.
Re: Well, as I sort of said before...candogirlApril 15 2007, 18:45:29 UTC
This is probably why I try not to find out what the people who make the shows I watch think and feel about their endeavors until they are over. Come to think about it, it's probably why I don't really get involved in fandom too. I like to be able to watch and have my own feelings about it before I find out the writers/actors/directors were mostly stupid.
:)
You're in Germany, yes? If you follow footie, did you see what Michael Ballack did today?
Re: Well, as I sort of said before...hmpfApril 15 2007, 18:54:40 UTC
>This is probably why I try not to find out what the people who make the shows I watch think and feel about their endeavors until they are over. Come to think about it, it's probably why I don't really get involved in fandom too. I like to be able to watch and have my own feelings about it before I find out the writers/actors/directors were mostly stupid.
Yeah, but see, my reaction to the ep really was just that a reaction to the *ep*, not to any extratextual evidence. I did seek out extratextual evidence (the interview) *after* I'd seen the ep, but it only confirmed the impression I'd already gained from the ep itself.
>You're in Germany, yes? If you follow footie, did you see what Michael Ballack did today?
I didn't even know he played today. I don't even know which team he's playing for! Sorry... don't know the first thing about football.
Anything spectacular I should know even as a non-football fan? I'm always willing to learn... ;-)
Re: Well, as I sort of said before...candogirlApril 15 2007, 19:18:23 UTC
I did seek out extratextual evidence (the interview) I so read that as extraterrestrial evidence :P I'm sorry the show ended so badly for you. There was this show called The X-Files that I loved for many years and I was so livid about the way they ended it...it just feels like you've been gypped.
Anything spectacular I should know even as a non-football fan? I'm always willing to learn... ;-)
He scored a brilliant match winning goal for Chelsea in the 109th minute of the FA Cup semi-final. He'd already played the full 90 minutes and then the first of the two 15 minute overtime halves. Absolutely incredible, a big hero today.
Also, you should know that many, many German football players are hot.
I thought the jump was about taking a chance on living, really living, more than it was about giving up. I didn't think they were trying to say that 1973 was a better world or a better time than 2007. Imo, they were saying he was more alive then or that he felt more alive then. Again, maybe the popular interpretation is that 2007 is bad and 1973 is good but that doesn't mean it's the right one.
I have a hard time seeing how there is no cohesion. In the first episode Sam is ready to jump off a building in order to get back to his world. I agree that Sam in ep 1 would not have jumped back into 1973 once he had gotten to 2006, but I think the character arc was always heading in this direction. Morally, for Sam, he promised Annie that he wouldn't leave her. Morally, Sam could not let his friends die because of his actions. The facts told him that these people were in his mind, his emotions told him they were real and waiting for him. In his mind, his moral obligation was to the people he'd abandoned to die. I don't think he seemed overly enthused about it, as he spoke to his mom, it actually seemed like he was trying to lay out a rational argument. As for leaving people behind, well I have to say it was a cop out not to have Maya, I was waiting for her to show up, but I think that the tragedy of the whole situation was that each world was a viable option for Sam- each place had people that loved him and that he loved. It wasn't the world that drove him to his decision. I hate to harp on this, but it was, imo, an existential choice. Sam decides what world he would really be alive in. And it is his perspective on the situation, not ours that matters.
As to what the writers intended, well I can not believe they didn't intentionally gray the ending up so that the audience could interpret it however they wanted. But I will say that I generally don't care what a writer, painter, or actor set out intending to do. As you know, art work has a life of it's own and once it is made it no longer belongs to the people that created it. Therefore their wants shouldn't effect your enjoyment. As someone studying literature, I'm sure you are used to finding meaning in a text and seeing a common theme that the author most likely didn't intend to create. We find our own meanings to fit our own tastes. We subconsciously lay the framework of an idea into the things we do.
As for it being TV and not art, well Shakespeare was no more than a brilliant television writer in his day and we interpret the hell out of his scripts. Just because it's shown on a small box doesn't mean it doesn't have artistic integrity.
Sorry I'm jumping a bit here, but in the pilot on the roof Annie says to Sam that we all feel like jumping sometimes, but we don't. I think the moral of the story is that we need to jump. Not, obviously, to our deaths- the jump means doing something you are unsure of, doing something you are afraid of, doing something that takes you to a new place. I felt the jump was saying that we accept the world and reality all to easily. We should question and fight and try to really live our lives instead of just going with the flow and settling into apathy. If you look at the situation rationally, Sam should have jumped in the pilot, but he was too afraid. This time he had the courage to fight for the life he wanted, even if it meant dying.
This is weird, I think you have a valid argument, I'm not trying to sway you over to my side. I'm just trying to clarify why I enjoyed the episode. Plus I like a good discussion and none of my friends have watched the ep yet.
:)
Reply
I also very much like this: "If you look at the situation rationally, Sam should have jumped in the pilot, but he was too afraid. This time he had the courage to fight for the life he wanted, even if it meant dying." I don't think Sam's jump is cowardly, though I do partially agree with the original comment that Sam should theoretically have stayed in 2007 and translated his lessons to that life there. Yet...an interview with Matthew had him saying that he couldn't bear for Sam to be in 2007 and I agree with that. If he had, I would have been devastated! I see it as a choice, and Sam chose 1973, like I wanted him to.
As for the morality of the show, I don't think the jump was a deviation from morality for Sam. To me personally, Life on Mars was distinctly amoral the whole way through: I do not believe that it tried to show that anything was the right way of doing things. We see that from the Sam/Gene arguments. Gene's methods seem immoral to Sam, but the morality behind them (protect the citizens above everything else) is surely at least partially valid? The ethical questions the show brought up were part of why I loved it - it challenged my opinions.
Oh, and I love your exploration of the existential aspects of the series. "In last night’s episode, he rejects rationalism for the existential view that man defines his own reality." Oh yes. I LOVE this interpretation.
Reply
>Hmm, we disagree about what the jump back to 73 meant. I never felt like it was a happy ending and I think at most it could be considered bitter sweet. I'm sure some people are all "Aww, Annie and Sam together 4evah!!!" but I thought the darkest moment of the show was when she said stay forever and he said he would. It was his death knell.
Oh, I never felt it was a happy ending, either! That's the problem! It was so very clearly a tragedy to any rationally thinking person (IMO), yet they *dressed it up* as a happy ending. So many kinds of wrong.
>I thought the jump was about taking a chance on living, really living, more than it was about giving up. I didn't think they were trying to say that 1973 was a better world or a better time than 2007. Imo, they were saying he was more alive then or that he felt more alive then. Again, maybe the popular interpretation is that 2007 is bad and 1973 is good but that doesn't mean it's the right one.
How the bloody hell can jumping to your death be taking a chance on living? Is it taking the 'better to burn out than to fade away' idea to an absolute extreme? Three seconds of fun and that's it? ;-)
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for fantasy, fantasy worlds, parallel universes, time travel and the likes - I come to LoM very much from an SF background. But the show was pretty clear about it all being inside Sam's head, so he really made a decision to withdraw into his own head and leave reality entirely. I may be tragically inflexible or something, but I can't see that as any kind of positive choice 'for' life.
>I have a hard time seeing how there is no cohesion. In the first episode Sam is ready to jump off a building in order to get back to his world. I agree that Sam in ep 1 would not have jumped back into 1973 once he had gotten to 2006, but I think the character arc was always heading in this direction. Morally, for Sam, he promised Annie that he wouldn't leave her. Morally, Sam could not let his friends die because of his actions. The facts told him that these people were in his mind, his emotions told him they were real and waiting for him.
Hmm... I should try that excuse in my life sometime. "Sorry, I couldn't call you because I had a moral obligation to save John Crichton from certain death in my daydreams. Oh, and I got Sam into a really bad pickle, I need to save him, too, so I'm afraid I'll have to cancel our date for next week, too. Need more quality time with my fictional favourites. You know, they're real to me..." ;-)
>I think that the tragedy of the whole situation was that each world was a viable option for Sam- each place had people that loved him and that he loved.
I had thought so until 2.07, too, but 2.07 did a very thorough job of showing us that 2007 is really just a cold, grey-blue, lifeless place full of soulless automatons, with the possible exception of his mum. They *could* have portrayed 2007 in a different way; they could have showed us the conflict. They chose not to.
Which, among other reasons, is especially annoying because they did such a good job, *especially* in series two, of really making us feel the appeal of 2007 for Sam, too - there was a lot of love to be felt in the communications from the present that we heard this series, and a palpable sense of loss very often - except in 2.07 where suddenly 2007 is completely dead.
>It wasn't the world that drove him to his decision. I hate to harp on this, but it was, imo, an existential choice. Sam decides what world he would really be alive in. And it is his perspective on the situation, not ours that matters.
Is it, *really*? Is reality *that* relative? Should we cheer on crazy sect members who think that killing themselves will get them picked up by aliens from Sirius, or suicide bombers who think killing dozens alongside themselves will get them straight into paradise, because after all, that's *their* ideal reality, the world they would like to live in, and they're taking a positive step to achieving their goals?
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This is emphatically not what I said. TV, if you ask me, is one of the greatest and most underappreciated art forms of our time. I was not setting it apart from 'art', but from 'art that does not try to make a coherent statement', and even there I did neither mean to imply that 'art that does not try to make a coherent statement' was superior to other, less ambiguous kinds of art, nor that this kind of 'deliberately confusing and unsettling' art could not happen on tv - stuff like Twin Peaks clearly proves that it can. I was speaking about LOM; when I said I was judging it according to the rules of tv, that means that I think there are rules for storytelling in any medium; serial storytelling on tv, like any other medium, has its rules, and these are what my verdict about LOM is based on.
>Sorry I'm jumping a bit here, but in the pilot on the roof Annie says to Sam that we all feel like jumping sometimes, but we don't. I think the moral of the story is that we need to jump. Not, obviously, to our deaths- the jump means doing something you are unsure of, doing something you are afraid of, doing something that takes you to a new place. I felt the jump was saying that we accept the world and reality all to easily. We should question and fight and try to really live our lives instead of just going with the flow and settling into apathy.
Yes, of *course* we should fight! That's my entire point! But. Sam. Was. Not. Fighting. He didn't even try. Unless we are to assume he did and 2007 was just so terribly stifling that it was completely impossible to fight for a better life there.
>This is weird, I think you have a valid argument, I'm not trying to sway you over to my side. I'm just trying to clarify why I enjoyed the episode. Plus I like a good discussion and none of my friends have watched the ep yet.
:)
It's okay, I like a good discussion, too, and how boring would discussions be if we all agreed on everything all the time?! ;-)
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Sorry. I was responding at 3AM so I just misinterpreted what you were saying. I thought you meant TV didn't have to meet any artistic criteria.
He didn't even try. Unless we are to assume he did and 2007 was just so terribly stifling that it was completely impossible to fight for a better life there.
You are right, 2007 got the shaft because the writer wanted him back in 1973. I think they tried to show the struggle in the lack of an anchor for him, though. Sam says to the woman, "It helps to talk about it." but he's only been talking into a tape recorder and the woman he is really speaking to doesn't seem to want him to talk about it any more. His mom basically offers up a platitude. Talking to Annie is what made 1973 real. There was no one talking him out of his delusion in 2006, no one telling him there was a purpose or a point in him being there. No one telling him to believe in and trust the world around him. He is unable to fight without those two things.
how boring would discussions be if we all agreed on everything all the time?! ;-)
Ridiculously boring! I'm so happy you're indulging me like this, I rarely comment in lj's because people get offended and/or rude when there is a disagreement.
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Stupid keyboards ☺
Oh, I never felt it was a happy ending, either! That's the problem! It was so very clearly a tragedy to any rationally thinking person (IMO), yet they *dressed it up* as a happy ending. So many kinds of wrong.
I think the reason for the dichotomy between what was going on and what we as audience members were seeing, is that for Sam it is a happy ending- it is the life he wanted. We are the ones who realize the world is fake, not him.
How the bloody hell can jumping to your death be taking a chance on living? Is it taking the 'better to burn out than to fade away' idea to an absolute extreme? Three seconds of fun and that's it? ;-)… . I may be tragically inflexible or something, but I can't see that as any kind of positive choice 'for' life.
It’s a chance because, imo, Sam doesn’t think he’s going to die. He thinks he is going to live. He is choosing his reality. We believe that 1973 was in his mind, he doesn’t.
Hmm... I should try that excuse in my life sometime. "Sorry, I couldn't call you because I had a moral obligation to save John Crichton from certain death in my daydreams.
Well, I’d accept it. Who could resist saving a man who wears leather pants so well?
Seriously though, the difference between you and Sam is that you only have one world in your mind. You have a definite boundary for reality and fantasy. Sam does not. It’s gone from the moment he takes Annie’s hand in the pilot.
“See, why would I imagine that? Why would I bother to put that kind of detail in it? “
“You wouldn’t?”
“What should I do, Annie?
“Stay.”
The thing that pulls him back from the edge is a little piece of detail that he can feel. He begins to believe in this world. The thing that pushes him over the edge in the finale is that he can not feel the metal thing stabbing him. Reality and fantasy are completely mixed up in his mind. Actually in the end, I may be contradicting myself. I was saying that he learned to trust feelings and emotions, but in that moment Sam weighs the evidence and the evidence leads him to believe 2007 is not real. In that moment his irrationality is highly rational.
I had thought so until 2.07, too, but 2.07 did a very thorough job of showing us that 2007 is really just a cold, grey-blue, lifeless place full of soulless automatons, with the possible exception of his mum. They *could* have portrayed 2007 in a different way; they could have showed us the conflict. They chose not to…there was a lot of love to be felt in the communications from the present that we heard this series, and a palpable sense of loss very often - except in 2.07 where suddenly 2007 is completely dead.
I agree wholeheartedly with this. I was expecting someone to show up on that rooftop to try and stop him. They were definitely showing us that someone in 1973 noticed he was on the roof but in 2007 no one did. It wasn’t fair that we didn’t get Maya or more of his mother. I thought it was interesting that his mother inadvertently gives him permission to go. She validates his need to keep his promises instead of telling him that those were promises he made to imaginary people. Annie (who in the end is the wrong person to listen to, she’s quite the villain really) makes every effort to make him believe in his surroundings. He has no one telling him that 2007 is real. As for the blue-grey coloring, well I thought it was more about how he saw it than how it was. He feels lifeless in this place.
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I had thought so until 2.07, too, but 2.07 did a very thorough job of showing us that 2007 is really just a cold, grey-blue, lifeless place full of soulless automatons, with the possible exception of his mum. They *could* have portrayed 2007 in a different way; they could have showed us the conflict. They chose not to…there was a lot of love to be felt in the communications from the present that we heard this series, and a palpable sense of loss very often - except in 2.07 where suddenly 2007 is completely dead.
I agree wholeheartedly with this. I was expecting someone to show up on that rooftop to try and stop him. They were definitely showing us that someone in 1973 noticed he was on the roof but in 2007 no one did. It wasn’t fair that we didn’t get Maya or more of his mother. I thought it was interesting that his mother inadvertently gives him permission to go. She validates his need to keep his promises instead of telling him that those were promises he made to imaginary people. Annie (who in the end is the wrong person to listen to, she’s quite the villain really) makes every effort to make him believe in his surroundings. He has no one telling him that 2007 is real. As for the blue-grey coloring, well I thought it was more about how he saw it than how it was. He feels lifeless in this place.
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I don't think she knew what he was talking about. I don't believe he told her about 1973. I'm pretty sure that if he'd actually told her, she would *not* have affirmed his need to keep that promise.
>Annie (who in the end is the wrong person to listen to, she’s quite the villain really)
Heh, glad you agree with me! I've felt from the first there was something sinister about her - she was the one who kept trying to convince him that 1973 was real and that he should stay, after all. Back when we were trying to discover meaning in names people kept identifying her as 'anima', but maybe she's 'annihilation'...
(I actually sort of like the Sam/Annie ship, but I've always felt there was this weird, unhealthy edge to it.)
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Agreed. I meant it was interesting that the writers chose to keep her in the dark. Maybe interesting isn't what I mean. It's more like, I thought it was curious that the ending wasn't balanced between the two worlds. I thought we should have had someone up on that roof trying to stop him (Maya), or that his mom should have been more, "You didn't go somewhere, you were in a coma. You don't owe anyone anything." I was trying to say that I agree they were sloppy with their storytelling there. If there were people telling him to stay, it would have made his struggle more difficult and his decision even darker.
(I actually sort of like the Sam/Annie ship, but I've always felt there was this weird, unhealthy edge to it.)
I like Sam/Annie too, but aside from the fact that she repeatedly keeps him in 1973, it's strange to ship Sam/his own mind. Anyway you ship Sam it's a little bent, because it just means that Sam is in love with himself.
I like that she's a very dark character wrapped up in a golden package.
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Is reality *that* relative?
Existentially, yes. Actually, even un-existentially the answer is yes. My truth is not your truth. The way I see the world may not be the way you do. People fight and die every day trying to mold the world into what they want it to be. I’m not saying it’s right, I’m just saying it is. Even the basic facts of life are disputed- I believe in evolution, but there are people who believe in Adam and Eve and think my belief in dinosaurs is lunacy. A person’s reality is not always true.
Should we cheer on crazy sect members who think that killing themselves will get them picked up by aliens from Sirius, or suicide bombers who think killing dozens alongside themselves will get them straight into paradise, because after all, that's *their* ideal reality, the world they would like to live in, and they're taking a positive step to achieving their goals?
Of course not, but this isn’t the real world, it’s a story- it’s an idea, a warning. In real life you’d hope he’d have therapy and people to anchor him and medications. But that’s not the story Life on Mars is trying to tell. They aren’t telling people to jump off a building. They aren’t telling people to believe in imaginary worlds. They are telling people to live and to feel. Nelson is the spiritual guide, the moral, and the truth of the show. The way Sam interprets his words is not the way real people should interpret them. Imo, the ending isn’t meant to be so literal. It’s not the suicide that should be applauded; it’s the decision to live.
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Oh, I give up. I don't think I'm ever going to 'get' it. I mean, I totally get that it was Sam's worldview and so on - but that doesn't make it *any* bit less wrong. Ultimately, it comes down to a deep gut-feeling of nausea when I think about the ending, and there's no philosophical spin I can put on it that makes it less nausea-inducing.
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I can only say that in Sam's mind he *does* decide to live in the real world.
At least that's my opinion. I do feel your frustration, I feel immensely sad that he died. The agreement to stay and the turning off of the radio, along with the girl turning off the story is so sad. I wrote in reply to someone else that, "the reason the show is over is because there is no longer someone left to imagine it. Which is sad, because it means that Sam couldn't have the life he wanted either way."
It's very depressing, but I really like it from a story telling perspective.
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:)
You're in Germany, yes? If you follow footie, did you see what Michael Ballack did today?
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Yeah, but see, my reaction to the ep really was just that a reaction to the *ep*, not to any extratextual evidence. I did seek out extratextual evidence (the interview) *after* I'd seen the ep, but it only confirmed the impression I'd already gained from the ep itself.
>You're in Germany, yes? If you follow footie, did you see what Michael Ballack did today?
I didn't even know he played today. I don't even know which team he's playing for! Sorry... don't know the first thing about football.
Anything spectacular I should know even as a non-football fan? I'm always willing to learn... ;-)
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I so read that as extraterrestrial evidence :P
I'm sorry the show ended so badly for you. There was this show called The X-Files that I loved for many years and I was so livid about the way they ended it...it just feels like you've been gypped.
Anything spectacular I should know even as a non-football fan? I'm always willing to learn... ;-)
He scored a brilliant match winning goal for Chelsea in the 109th minute of the FA Cup semi-final. He'd already played the full 90 minutes and then the first of the two 15 minute overtime halves. Absolutely incredible, a big hero today.
Also, you should know that many, many German football players are hot.
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