POV while watching TV
Someday I'll write up my thoughts on how John Reese is not an alpha male (although he is a creepy stalker), but today isn't that day. Instead, here's a ramble about POV characters while I'm watching TV. I tend to watch a show through everyone's point of view. Not all at once, necessarily, but enough so that even when I have a favorite character, I'm still flitting around inside other people's heads part of the time. Most of the time, really.
Even the characters whose actions I dislike on a rational level often get part of my sympathy and perspective as I'm watching a show. The Tenth Doctor on Doctor Who, for example--I didn't like his treatment of Harriet Jones in his very first appearance, I thought he and Rose were too much like manic puppies with no balance, he treated Martha shoddily on a regular basis, treated Donna worse (but just that once! but it was definitely worse!) and then there was Adelaide Brooks (don't get me started!) and THEN he took forever to die...
... but I can watch most of those episodes and still feel like I get him. And not actually hate him. (I'd probably skip certain episodes and certain scenes during a rewatch, however.)
This is at least partly due to being more of an emotional viewer than an intellectual one. And my emotions get attached to almost everyone who has a decent amount of screen time.
This hopping around from POV to POV holds true while I'm watching Person of Interest. Finch is standoffish and scary, but I can still connect with him as I watch an episode. Reese is... frequently inexplicable and his behavior often makes me want to smack my forehead when I actually think about it, but I still identify with him. And Carter, and even Fusco. And a bit with the number of the week, though this is where my female-character bias shows up. (The two most boring episodes for me so far: "Mission Creep" and "Risk." Both episodes focused on a male guest star who wasn't as pretty as John Reese.)
On Battlestar Galactica I felt horrible for everyone involved in the whole mutiny arc; it was brilliant and awful and I ached for Gaeta and wept for injured Sam and wanted to pick up my guns with Kara and go fight. Kara Thrace is the reason I started watching the show, but she wasn't the only character I cared about.
Identifying with characters while watching doesn't automatically translate into having enough comprehension / motivation / interest to write those characters' points of view in fanfic, however. I have more thoughts about that--such as how I've avoided writing Finch ever since I realized just how sinister his nightmare Machine is. Mostly I want to mention this sudden realization: writing Reese's POV is a bit like writing Leoben's. They both give me moments of EEEEEEEP STOP THAT YOU CREEPER! while writing.
So what about you? Do you tend to stay focused on one or two characters, or are you an ensemble viewer, or something else?
Posted at Dreamwidth: http://rose-griffes.dreamwidth.org/237864.html. Comment where you wish.
Even the characters whose actions I dislike on a rational level often get part of my sympathy and perspective as I'm watching a show. The Tenth Doctor on Doctor Who, for example--I didn't like his treatment of Harriet Jones in his very first appearance, I thought he and Rose were too much like manic puppies with no balance, he treated Martha shoddily on a regular basis, treated Donna worse (but just that once! but it was definitely worse!) and then there was Adelaide Brooks (don't get me started!) and THEN he took forever to die...
... but I can watch most of those episodes and still feel like I get him. And not actually hate him. (I'd probably skip certain episodes and certain scenes during a rewatch, however.)
This is at least partly due to being more of an emotional viewer than an intellectual one. And my emotions get attached to almost everyone who has a decent amount of screen time.
This hopping around from POV to POV holds true while I'm watching Person of Interest. Finch is standoffish and scary, but I can still connect with him as I watch an episode. Reese is... frequently inexplicable and his behavior often makes me want to smack my forehead when I actually think about it, but I still identify with him. And Carter, and even Fusco. And a bit with the number of the week, though this is where my female-character bias shows up. (The two most boring episodes for me so far: "Mission Creep" and "Risk." Both episodes focused on a male guest star who wasn't as pretty as John Reese.)
On Battlestar Galactica I felt horrible for everyone involved in the whole mutiny arc; it was brilliant and awful and I ached for Gaeta and wept for injured Sam and wanted to pick up my guns with Kara and go fight. Kara Thrace is the reason I started watching the show, but she wasn't the only character I cared about.
Identifying with characters while watching doesn't automatically translate into having enough comprehension / motivation / interest to write those characters' points of view in fanfic, however. I have more thoughts about that--such as how I've avoided writing Finch ever since I realized just how sinister his nightmare Machine is. Mostly I want to mention this sudden realization: writing Reese's POV is a bit like writing Leoben's. They both give me moments of EEEEEEEP STOP THAT YOU CREEPER! while writing.
So what about you? Do you tend to stay focused on one or two characters, or are you an ensemble viewer, or something else?
Posted at Dreamwidth: http://rose-griffes.dreamwidth.org/237864.html. Comment where you wish.