CAT: Day Two

[ros_fod]

[I'd like to keep this spoiler-free. superplin - I expect to see some input from you! :)]

Second day of the Connor Appreciation...Time. Some really lovely discussion yesterday about How To Build A Post-Home Connor. Thank you to all those who participated

Comments

[swmbo]

Oh, beautiful. I am not sure how coherent this is going to come out because, as always, I am going to change my mind fifty times while writing this and probably repeat myself. And this might have turned more into a comparison to Angel the person than the series.

Connor is isolation and it’s counterpart, the need to belong.

For me, Connor symbolizes the need to belong, to become a part of something. Angel’s coming to the city and Doyle telling him that he has to make a connection with the world or the people he saves won’t really matter to him. Connor is the opposite of Angel from Season 1, Episode 1. That Angel wanted to remain apart from the world, do his job, save people and be allowed to brood alone, but instead he was forced to make connections, to make friends and form a family. Connor is the opposite. He wants so desperately to make a connection, but he's always just failing, doing it wrong. Angel trusts the right people, Connor trusts the wrong ones. He’s what Angel could have been, in so many ways.

But he doesn’t want to be. He really wants to trust, he wants to find his place, he wants to believe he HAS a place. But he doesn’t really believe that, and so he is constantly testing. So what I think he embodies the isolation and alienation that Angel secretly feels. Angel is not human, but those around him often forget that. Connor is human, but nobody is ever allowed for a moment to forget that he’s not normal. He is always alone and apart, he’s in the shadows, he’s trying to do the right thing but nobody’s explaining to him what that really is. He’s the one watching and trying, without the support of others. And ultimately because of that he is the one failing. Because he doesn’t want to be what he is and he can’t accept himself or let others accept him. So, again, he’s Angel in the extreme.

PS Plan for me to change my mind and go a totally other direction in, oh, two hours :p

[ros_fod]

Ohgodyes. This is exactly what I wanted, and done so beautifully. Honey, with that really lovely bit of The Kiss today and now this...I'm gonna have to grab you in your kovsky again.

Connor is the opposite. He wants so desperately to make a connection, but he's always just failing, doing it wrong. Angel trusts the right people, Connor trusts the wrong ones. He’s what Angel could have been, in so many ways.

And Angel knows who *not* to trust. He's had the 200+ years to make his mistakes, of which he's made many, but he's also been given the opportunity to learn from them.

There are parallels there as well with Liam/Darla and Connor/Cordelia. The boys who want something better, more out of life, an extension of that idea of the need to belong, and in this, a need to belong to something...more.

Angel is not human, but those around him often forget that. Connor is human, but nobody is ever allowed for a moment to forget that he’s not normal.

This may be the best distillation of their relationship and their internal issues that I've ever seen.

Awesome thoughts here. I'll be pondering these for a while yet.

[swmbo]

Honey, with that really lovely bit of The Kiss today and now this...I'm gonna have to grab you in your kovsky again.

Promise? *snuggles you*

And Angel knows who *not* to trust. He's had the 200+ years to make his mistakes, of which he's made many, but he's also been given the opportunity to learn from them.

Exactly ! And he's made so many mistakes along the way, they all have. And yet, to me at least, nobody wants to extend that same grace to Connor. He's not supposed to make mistakes. Although I think that part of that, much of that, may be self-imposed on himself and part of his upbringing from Holtz. And yet, even once he is back in this world - there is never an adjustment. Angel had over 100 years to adjust to his soul and what is right and wrong and come to terms. Connor is expected to adjust to the fact that his world was turned upside down instantly, expected to embrace Angel and AI and everything they stood -without being given a solid reason other than being TOLD, by them, that they weren't evil.

There are parallels there as well with Liam/Darla and Connor/Cordelia. The boys who want something better, more out of life, an extension of that idea of the need to belong, and in this, a need to belong to something...more.

Ohh! I don't think I've ever really thought that through before, not completely. I am going to have to.

*hugs you* Have an amazingly fun weekend with everybody my darling fod!