There were moments when you were super confrontational and certainly did act like you thought you knew better than the person you were engaging in discussion with. There were a couple of times when you made me feel uncomfortable because you suggested people who liked the ending were delusional. But we've all done that kind of thing at some point. I wouldn't say you were a bully --- just, passionate.
Re: Well...lozenger8September 13 2009, 22:43:59 UTC
Hmpf, you're doing it again. There are no hard and fast facts of the episode. Different people interpreted what we were given differently.
So many of us wanted Sam to go back to 1973. And he did. And that was wonderful for those of us who wanted that. Sam sacrificed himself in one world to save another --- and there was no death, we never saw one. For all we know, Sam jumped through a time portal. For all we know, he's a mess of blood and guts on the ground. None of us truly know what happened, not even Matthew Graham himself, because it wasn't explicit to the nth degree (deliberately not explicit to the nth degree!) and there were enough strange anomalies that you could do a quick rewrite with only having to handwave/ignore one element --- and you could do that either waySo it isn't delusion and you're not necessarily right. You came to a conclusion based on your interpretation of the 'facts' of the episode, and other people came to their own. In a show that was slowly (too slowly, I would argue, but still doing so) working towards
( ... )
I guess it depends a lot on whether you allow...hmpfSeptember 13 2009, 23:26:05 UTC
emotional bias as evidence. So "we liked Gene and co. so much that it effectively made them real to us even if the text as much as stated that they weren't" can be evidence. It isn't in my book, obviously, because to me, the emotional effect of a text is too subjective to be considered 'hard' evidence. Hard textual evidence to me is the stuff that stays on the page no matter who reads it, and "this character feels real to me" isn't on the page (or on the digital audiovisual storage medium. ;-)) But I suppose if you're more postmodern in your inclinations, you could argue that the emotional effect is inseparable from other elements of a text, and therefore can be considered as evidence just as much as any other part of the text and the reader's interaction with and experience of the text
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Re: Well...lozenger8September 14 2009, 07:55:19 UTC
There are some. Enough of them to make the fandom mainstream interpretation factually wrong, IMO.
Emphasis on the 'in your opinion'. Because the next facts you state? Not facts! Your interpretation of what's implied? Yes. But facts? Not so much.
1) We don't know for sure that 1973 was imaginary. Sorry, but we don't. There's nothing to prove it was real, but equally there was nothing to prove it wasn't either.
We don't even know if Sam ever really woke up, because it's very strange that Morgan was his surgeon, that he had longer sideburns, that he was in 'Hyde Ward 2612'. There is a surreality to that sequence that very much suggests a degree of unreliable narration.
2) We don't know it's suicide --- especially if Sam never actually made it back to 2006.
We were given contradictory statements all through Life on Mars. We were told from the beginning that Sam 'chose' to transfer to 1973, that maybe he likes it there, that even if he went back, things would not be the same. We were told that feelings and instincts were important
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Hahahahah... (I'm laughing at myself, not at you. I disagree with you, but not maliciously, so I wouldn't laugh at you. I'm laughing because, well, I read your comment this morning and then went to a doctor's appointment, and all the way there *and* all the way back I feverishly collected arguments, which I scribbled down on countless little scraps of paper I found in my backpack. I am like a frelling robot on this topic: push my buttons, and I jump. Really, I'm beyond ridiculous. - Okay, on second thought, maybe I'm laughing a bit at us both, as you seem to have a teeny tiny bit of the same compulsion
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I just told you where some of the ambiguity is! GRAH! hahahaha :p
No, seriously, we both have a problem here.
I obviously totally and absolutely share your interpretation of events, some of the time. I do! That's why I hate the ending/S2 as an arc in so many ways, because it neither proves nor disproves any one theory --- but I feel, because of sloppy writing and laziness, that it definitely lends itself more to the negative interpretation. Well, it does for me. You have to do at least some very obvious handwavey stuff to argue 1973 is real, real, real, at any rate. And if '73 isn't real in some way and Sam absolutely knew this and decided to jump? Yeah, I'm against that, as you know. (At the same time, I still don't think we've conclusive proof it isn't, and I am sticking by my guns here, Hmpf!) But I can see why other people interpret the show differently, I don't think there's any lack of understanding or completely wilful ignorance there --- I just think those people concentrate on other aspects of the story.
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So many of us wanted Sam to go back to 1973. And he did. And that was wonderful for those of us who wanted that. Sam sacrificed himself in one world to save another --- and there was no death, we never saw one. For all we know, Sam jumped through a time portal. For all we know, he's a mess of blood and guts on the ground. None of us truly know what happened, not even Matthew Graham himself, because it wasn't explicit to the nth degree (deliberately not explicit to the nth degree!) and there were enough strange anomalies that you could do a quick rewrite with only having to handwave/ignore one element --- and you could do that either waySo it isn't delusion and you're not necessarily right. You came to a conclusion based on your interpretation of the 'facts' of the episode, and other people came to their own. In a show that was slowly (too slowly, I would argue, but still doing so) working towards ( ... )
Reply
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Emphasis on the 'in your opinion'. Because the next facts you state? Not facts! Your interpretation of what's implied? Yes. But facts? Not so much.
1) We don't know for sure that 1973 was imaginary. Sorry, but we don't. There's nothing to prove it was real, but equally there was nothing to prove it wasn't either.
We don't even know if Sam ever really woke up, because it's very strange that Morgan was his surgeon, that he had longer sideburns, that he was in 'Hyde Ward 2612'. There is a surreality to that sequence that very much suggests a degree of unreliable narration.
2) We don't know it's suicide --- especially if Sam never actually made it back to 2006.
We were given contradictory statements all through Life on Mars. We were told from the beginning that Sam 'chose' to transfer to 1973, that maybe he likes it there, that even if he went back, things would not be the same. We were told that feelings and instincts were important ( ... )
Reply
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No, seriously, we both have a problem here.
I obviously totally and absolutely share your interpretation of events, some of the time. I do! That's why I hate the ending/S2 as an arc in so many ways, because it neither proves nor disproves any one theory --- but I feel, because of sloppy writing and laziness, that it definitely lends itself more to the negative interpretation. Well, it does for me. You have to do at least some very obvious handwavey stuff to argue 1973 is real, real, real, at any rate. And if '73 isn't real in some way and Sam absolutely knew this and decided to jump? Yeah, I'm against that, as you know. (At the same time, I still don't think we've conclusive proof it isn't, and I am sticking by my guns here, Hmpf!) But I can see why other people interpret the show differently, I don't think there's any lack of understanding or completely wilful ignorance there --- I just think those people concentrate on other aspects of the story.
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