The thing that annoyed me most about Gene's characterisation in A2A (but that had crept into S2 of LoM too), was that they glorified him so much. I don't know how far you got into that first series, but there were some ludicrously overblown scenes of him being a Big Damn Hero that didn't ring true, at all. I think, mostly, the reason he seems like more of a stereotype is that he doesn't get called on his behaviour much --- is, in fact, now shown as being the Protagonist whose opinion we're meant to relate to. (There's some grey there, it isn't exactly like that, but this is definitely a lingering impression.) And I don't agree with most of Gene's views most of the time.
My Gene was always the insightful, intelligent, loyal and protective one who'd come into view during those quiet introspective scenes with Sam. Yes, he needfully encompasses all of his other aspects, because that brings his virtues into sharper relief, and, you know, I derive a certain amount of humour from ironically enjoying his awfulness. But I was never that "oh, he's such a bad man!" fan. I'm too politically correct for that. We may still get to see his protectiveness, but in A2A it's couched as him being The Saviour as opposed to it being another facet of his character. And Gene Hunt is a magnificent bastard, dammit, not a cherished specimen of the human race. If he's a hero, it's a flawed, Shakespearean one, not the kind we should all aspire to be.
And yeah, it does come down to that thing that I said when the press release for A2A first came out --- a Gene without a Sam is an imperfect whole. One half of a coin. Alex doesn't balance him out like Sam did --- she doesn't call him on his behaviour enough, she doesn't seem to believe he can grow. In the first series, she doesn't seem to think much of him at all.
I constantly find it a source of 'what the fuck' that writers who could get so much right with Life on Mars could balls it up so spectacularly in other endeavours.
You didn't have to watch much of A2A to see that... I was WTF-ing loudly from the moment the heroic music struck up every time he set foot on screen to say nothing of the way they filmed him.
But enough of talking about this imaginary show that so many people seem to think they've seen. *sings la la la*
My Gene was always the insightful, intelligent, loyal and protective one who'd come into view during those quiet introspective scenes with Sam. Yes, he needfully encompasses all of his other aspects, because that brings his virtues into sharper relief, and, you know, I derive a certain amount of humour from ironically enjoying his awfulness. But I was never that "oh, he's such a bad man!" fan. I'm too politically correct for that. We may still get to see his protectiveness, but in A2A it's couched as him being The Saviour as opposed to it being another facet of his character. And Gene Hunt is a magnificent bastard, dammit, not a cherished specimen of the human race. If he's a hero, it's a flawed, Shakespearean one, not the kind we should all aspire to be.
And yeah, it does come down to that thing that I said when the press release for A2A first came out --- a Gene without a Sam is an imperfect whole. One half of a coin. Alex doesn't balance him out like Sam did --- she doesn't call him on his behaviour enough, she doesn't seem to believe he can grow. In the first series, she doesn't seem to think much of him at all.
I constantly find it a source of 'what the fuck' that writers who could get so much right with Life on Mars could balls it up so spectacularly in other endeavours.
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You didn't have to watch much of A2A to see that... I was WTF-ing loudly from the moment the heroic music struck up every time he set foot on screen to say nothing of the way they filmed him.
But enough of talking about this imaginary show that so many people seem to think they've seen. *sings la la la*
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