Two links and a thought about narrative promise
Being Human: two quite different yet both eloquent meta posts:
Being Human, Season 3
Vampires and their cryptic bullshit
Both posts, though their interpretation of some characters wildly differ, say yes to s3 and its arc. It occured to me that one of the objections I've heard elsewhere was that "this isn't the show we were promised in the pilot", which immediately reminded me of one of the calmer Children of Earth criticisms (i.e. that CoE Torchwood was not "the show we were promised" in that it was quite different from the TW of Cyberwoman yore). It's a fair point to raise though I would say the difference between pilot Being Human and the first season is already pointed, and not simply because of the recasting of several roles. Still, I can see that if you basically signed on for a very charming supernatural sitcom, which is what you get in the pilot, then what the show turns into is most definitely not what you "were promised". I'm with
abigail_n in one of the posts linked above, though, that with s3 the show has reached the story it was meant to tell. Of course, I feel that way about Children of Earth as well, so...
It's not that I think "dark" always equals good, by the way, on the contrary. For example, I'd say that parts of BSG's third and most definitely its fourth season drift too much into self indulgent angst for angst's sake territory, as does much of Farscape's fourth season (but not the concluding Peacekeeper Wars mini). But in the cases of season 3 of Being Human, Torchwood: Children of Earth or, for that matter, Angel's season 4 I felt the respective shows had each managed to follow a relentless narrative arc to its logical conclusion, to explore their characters more deeply and cast of (much) of the attributes that I was not on board with before - to tell a story only they could in this particular way.
What it comes down to, I guess, is that I don't mind not getting what "we were promised" if what we do get is something that appeals to me more. For that matter, season one DS9 while having potential is still quite different from later season DS9, and you could make a case that the "promise" of that first season show is most definitely not what it turns into later on. Take one of the goals established in the pilot: Sisko is explicitly told that one of the reasons for the Federation presence on DS9 is to woo Bajor into joining the Federation and to prepare the planet for this. One of the most crucial turning points in s5 is when they're all but set to do this in the season 5 episode Rapture and Sisko interrupts it, advising, declaring Bajor must not join the Federation. There is a larger plot reason for this and it pays off, but by the time the show wraps up in s7 Bajor still isn't a Federation member. Which is one of the things that makes DS9 uniquely DS9 - the way the whole joining the Federation and the Federation itself is problematized*, much of the narrative arcs given to non-Fed regular characters like Kira or Odo. My point is, the show DS9 developed into is narratively much richer and more interesting to me than the one arguably promised in the pilot, and if the pilot promise had been stuck to, it would have been a lesser DS9.
Sometimes you start a story in one direction, and you discover potential leading the story in quite different directions. It doesn't always mean the ensueing narrative is worth the departure. But it can be, and when it does, I am your devoted reader/listener/viewer.
* I have to add here that contrary to popular cliché DS9 was not the first Trek show to feature darker sides of the Federation, but TNG did this only sporadically and embedded in many more "bright side" episodes - Measure of a Man or The Drum Head were hardly setting the tones of their respective seasons. Still, they do exist, years before DS9, and that's why I always resent generalizations about pre-DS9 Trek that pretend they don't.
This entry was originally posted at http://selenak.dreamwidth.org/664237.html. Comment there or here, as you wish.
Being Human, Season 3
Vampires and their cryptic bullshit
Both posts, though their interpretation of some characters wildly differ, say yes to s3 and its arc. It occured to me that one of the objections I've heard elsewhere was that "this isn't the show we were promised in the pilot", which immediately reminded me of one of the calmer Children of Earth criticisms (i.e. that CoE Torchwood was not "the show we were promised" in that it was quite different from the TW of Cyberwoman yore). It's a fair point to raise though I would say the difference between pilot Being Human and the first season is already pointed, and not simply because of the recasting of several roles. Still, I can see that if you basically signed on for a very charming supernatural sitcom, which is what you get in the pilot, then what the show turns into is most definitely not what you "were promised". I'm with
abigail_n in one of the posts linked above, though, that with s3 the show has reached the story it was meant to tell. Of course, I feel that way about Children of Earth as well, so...
It's not that I think "dark" always equals good, by the way, on the contrary. For example, I'd say that parts of BSG's third and most definitely its fourth season drift too much into self indulgent angst for angst's sake territory, as does much of Farscape's fourth season (but not the concluding Peacekeeper Wars mini). But in the cases of season 3 of Being Human, Torchwood: Children of Earth or, for that matter, Angel's season 4 I felt the respective shows had each managed to follow a relentless narrative arc to its logical conclusion, to explore their characters more deeply and cast of (much) of the attributes that I was not on board with before - to tell a story only they could in this particular way.
What it comes down to, I guess, is that I don't mind not getting what "we were promised" if what we do get is something that appeals to me more. For that matter, season one DS9 while having potential is still quite different from later season DS9, and you could make a case that the "promise" of that first season show is most definitely not what it turns into later on. Take one of the goals established in the pilot: Sisko is explicitly told that one of the reasons for the Federation presence on DS9 is to woo Bajor into joining the Federation and to prepare the planet for this. One of the most crucial turning points in s5 is when they're all but set to do this in the season 5 episode Rapture and Sisko interrupts it, advising, declaring Bajor must not join the Federation. There is a larger plot reason for this and it pays off, but by the time the show wraps up in s7 Bajor still isn't a Federation member. Which is one of the things that makes DS9 uniquely DS9 - the way the whole joining the Federation and the Federation itself is problematized*, much of the narrative arcs given to non-Fed regular characters like Kira or Odo. My point is, the show DS9 developed into is narratively much richer and more interesting to me than the one arguably promised in the pilot, and if the pilot promise had been stuck to, it would have been a lesser DS9.
Sometimes you start a story in one direction, and you discover potential leading the story in quite different directions. It doesn't always mean the ensueing narrative is worth the departure. But it can be, and when it does, I am your devoted reader/listener/viewer.
* I have to add here that contrary to popular cliché DS9 was not the first Trek show to feature darker sides of the Federation, but TNG did this only sporadically and embedded in many more "bright side" episodes - Measure of a Man or The Drum Head were hardly setting the tones of their respective seasons. Still, they do exist, years before DS9, and that's why I always resent generalizations about pre-DS9 Trek that pretend they don't.
This entry was originally posted at http://selenak.dreamwidth.org/664237.html. Comment there or here, as you wish.