Overidentification with fictional characters part 83

[neveralarch]

But first, I filled all the not!fic prompts a little while ago, so here are the links to the two new ones:

BBC Sherlock: Moran/Moriarty kidfic (warnings for blood and death)

RDJ!Holmes movies: secretly a virgin Moran/Moriarty (featuring demisexual/greyA!Moriarty)

And now, here are a bunch of feelings about Commander Sam Vimes:

Comments

[neveralarch]

Ah, I'm glad this post was interesting/made any sense at all. I'm also finding your comment really interesting - I'm already applying my American experience of class to a character written by an English author, so I'm not worried about bringing in Korea too. (Although obvs different history etc - it's just interesting to think about how the inter-generational class differences which I'm thinking about here are almost the norm in Korea, if I'm reading your comment right, whereas in the US it's obviously something that does happen, but doesn't happen as often as the 'American Dream' or whatever would have you expect.)

I went to a college where the average person was way way above my income-level/class, and some of my good friends were middle-class kids with one or two working class parents. I remember them telling me about how their parents tried to get them to understand the values and experiences that come out of a working-class background, and they definitely came out of it more aware of their privilege but not necessarily able to relate to their parents' experiences. Which is fair, because I can't really relate to my parents' experience in the 60s, 70s, 80s either, but- idk, this is just me restating a lot of what is in the post already, there's something here which I haven't managed to wrap my head around yet.

Wrt COPS (always all caps for me, haha), I do think Pratchett has some interesting things to say about the tension between The Law and Justice/authority and the working class, especially in Night Watch and Feet of Clay, but it seems like he usually comes down on the side of cops because in this case the cop is Sam Vimes and the bad officers are an aberration. I do wish he'd give it a book and look at it more in-depth and with more nuance, but I kind of doubt that will happen.

End this long comment on a positive note, SYBIL/SAM FOREVER, there are a lot of couples that I love in Discworld canon, but Sybil/Sam are just about at the top of the list.

[neveralarch]

I see, I see. You may have gathered that I know very little about Korea - the chaebol are probably the only thing I know much at all about, because they were a major part of a political economy class I took. But this is super fascinating, thanks for bringing it up and filling me in!

I'm thinking of Feet of Clay just because there are some scenes with the emerging middle class and the established upper class where I felt like Vimes was going "but I'm not the police for you," which I thought was interesting because that's basically the opposite of what the police usually do. But I've reread Night Watch more recently than Feet of Clay, so I may be misremembering.

Vimes and Carrot, yes, totally, and it's interesting since Vimes is so against kings because a good man can die and be replaced by a bad man, and then you have tyranny? But he's still setting up this system where it works because he is a good man in charge and the whole thing would be terrifying if there was a bad man in charge. And it all does fall apart in The Fifth Elephant when Sgt Colon is put in charge.

I have read these books maybe too many times. But I really do wonder what will happen as the Watch grows and the original generation of Vimes' cops retire/die. Oh, but fic rec, if you want it: Mister Vimes'd Go Spare, which is about Vimes dying (D:) and then becoming a god of policing (me: :D, Vimes: D:), and doesn't resolve any of the issues we were talking about but it's just really fun.

[neveralarch]

Super late with replying, because I was in Boston with no internet, but I'm glad you're excited about the fic rec, because I was like, yes yes, serious conversation, OH THAT FIC, I LOVE THIS FIC, I SHOULD SAY SOMETHING SO YOU CAN READ IT, haha. Anyway.