....in which you can try to dance
So, today, among other things, happens to be the day that concernedlily and I (and also dwinsper, who we are slowly dragging into the Cult of Crack) watched the latest Stargate: Atlantis episode.
Two good Rodney episodes in a row where he goes all superhero-y and saves John! Mmm... Rodney. And was so worried, too. They did a better job this week of making it actually anxiety inducing: Rodney's worry was infectious and they imparted a good sense of urgency about the whole thing with the dead flowers and showing just how fast time was going for John compared to the others. There was also good banter - hee, "MALP on a stick!" - with nice teaminess, including Rodney going "I should have left a note!" about two minutes after I just said that exact thing, which amused me almost as much as him called Teyla and Ronon "Conon and Xena". AHAHAHAHA. I also liked Rodney's bitch-slapping down of Weir; I feel really bad for encouraging fictional men to be insubordinate to their female boss, but frankly Elizabeth got on my nerves too and I felt sympathetic to his urge to go "JOHN MIGHT DIE IN THERE OF OLD AGE OH MY GOD WE DO NOT HAVE TIME FOR THIS", and his rueful admittance that it was Zelenka's idea, and oh, when he said that it was wrong to say it was Sheppard's fault because it was his... I maybe died a bit. Oh my god, the LOVE, people. Even in bad episodes, John and Rodney's caring for each other is just luminous. It's gorgeous. Yay.
I felt really bad for John. Like, wanting to jump into the television to hug him myself. He was just sat there talking to himself, knowing it was useless but having nothing else he could do. And then he kicked things and almost shot himself in the foot literally. It was tragic. Poor, poor baby. Also, he was such a dork with the freaking wheat stalk in his mouth the whole time, hee, and even more so when he was getting chucked around by Wacky Invisible Evil That's Almost Definitely Stolen From Lost TM. Incidentally: hee. Although, trying to fight it with one measly knife? Dude. Seriously. Though I will forgive you for that because you are cute and make amusing faces during Alien Meditation Hour and shout "That's it?!" at the end when the audience can't. Plus, you have good taste in boyfriends. You should tell him that we approve of him appreciating Teyla's smarts, by the way.
Unfortunately they then managed to screw it up rather by having the episode be basically the epitome of all the stuff that does annoy me about SGA. Not only was there Bad Facial Hair (omg John, why the hell didn't you shave?! the other blokes managed to! I don't care that that's the facial hair Joe Flanigan usually has, it's awful! Just Say No, Kids.), but the plot, beyond the "get John out of there" bit, was badly done. Like, what the fuck happened at the end anyway? They magically kill the Id monster with their newly-freed-from-repression minds? What? What the hell was it anyway? And John was there for six months, he'd honestly doubted that his people were going to save him, and that just got glossed right over and let me guess we're never going to hear about it ever again. And then there were the nearlyAscended themselves, who were so annoying I wanted to smack them. Partly because of that, the whole thing seemed really fake and unbelievable; there was nothing to ground it and give it that edge of realism that scifi plots like that really need.
Like, the girl. Who John was so very not interested in - when there was kissing, it was just like "oh god, later I'm going to have to admit that I was so bored I ended up sleeping with a really boring local woman because there was nothing else to do". (In my head: John - "I was there for SIX MONTHS!" Rodney - "Yes, thankyou, Colonel, we know, but next time you might want to consider trying that excuse on somebody who wasn't there for the whole Chaya debacle.") The only good thing about that was the iffiness John felt about having been undressed while he was unconcious - it made me think of the way John's neuroses about having been part bug show themselves in lamardeuse's excellent fanfic, and that was a definite plus. And then at the end, John was all "let's get out of here", and that was OK, but it seemed like there should have been so much more there.
The thing is, I can kind of see how not acknowledging that can be a character thing - John represses everything, like, everything, and after the whole "I am speaking into a void and my friends might leave me here and it's AWFUL and there's nothing to do but sleep and KICK THINGS" bit, he did know that the team was coming for him, and he seems a patient kind of guy, one who would basically see it as futile to stress over stuff that he can't do anything about it. I did like how he ran off when he knew the team was there for him, too. But I can't help but think that most of that is in Joe Flanigan's performance, and while he deserves a hell of a lot of credit, the fact remains he wasn't working with much here. I don't believe it'll come back later, either; we couldn't have even had one bit of "wait; for you it's been how long?" I mean, "I might have even ... missed you a little" could be worse, but it was so little payoff for the journey. No freaking backstory for John in there at all? We already knew about the abandonment issues, fercryingoutloud. Woe is fangirl. :(
On the other hand, maybe the nearlyAscended will be coming back somehow, as a way of finding out more about the Ancients? Though why exactly you'd want to become a glowy squid-like energy being if you weren't, say, dying of radiation poisoning like Daniel, I don't quite get... and the fact that the writers also seem to think this makes me wonder whether they made the nearlyAscended annoying and preachy on purpose. Hmm. They did have the "trying for Ascension vs. living" idea, which also bears that out, and I'd totally agree with John on that particular point, but I kind of got the impression we were supposed to sympathise with the nearlyAscended more.
In short, at least the episode's over - we knew the bad plot was coming, it wasn't even half as bad as I'd feared, and now it's gone. We even got a continuity reference - Carson is still dating Cadman, hooray! And Rodney being all "what's with you and Ascended women?"-jealous was all right, too. Heh. John's little shrug in response was kind of awesome and completely encapsulating his character at the same time. And hopefully there will be lots of good fanfic to make up for the bad stuff. Mmmm, yep. More SGA is of the good.
In other news, concernedlily got me the Atlantis Season One Companion, which is cheesy and awesome. One of the things in it is progress reports on the main members of the expedition done by Elizabeth - including one on herself! Heeeeee. Plus, there are amusing pictures of Elizabeth being all "... did I put my pants on wrong? I did, didn't I. Oh dear.", John being incredibly dorky, Rodney looking like he's actually going to eat people, and quotes from people called things like Guard #2 ("You wish you'd brought bacon to another galaxy?!", hee).
I now have new post-cards on my wall: there's one with "Heterosexuality isn't normal it's just common" (awesome), one with "Never underestimate the power of stupid people in very large groups", one with a woman telling some man "So... if it's a man's world, I suggest you boys get busy and clean this mess up!" and one with a pictures of Leeds factory workers on it, with one guy saying "Has anybody seen the parliamentary road to socialism?" I am possibly weird for finding it quite as funny as I do, but HEEEEE.
Otherwise, I offer: this flash animation called Yo Butt Ain't Made Fo' That! It's genius - the sound is a minster called Willie Wilson, who is the kind of bigot who says that feminism means that girls are now all evil lesbians. (I wish I was kidding on that one, but no, that's what he honestly and truly believes.) It's absolutely disgusting, but the video... oh man, that video made me laugh. Sheer freaking poetry. Some of the juxtapositions are genius. Heee.
Oh, and you can have an actually functioning air guitar too, because I've had a good day, and good days call for strutting around pretending to RAWK THE HELL OUT. Oh yeah. :D
Two good Rodney episodes in a row where he goes all superhero-y and saves John! Mmm... Rodney. And was so worried, too. They did a better job this week of making it actually anxiety inducing: Rodney's worry was infectious and they imparted a good sense of urgency about the whole thing with the dead flowers and showing just how fast time was going for John compared to the others. There was also good banter - hee, "MALP on a stick!" - with nice teaminess, including Rodney going "I should have left a note!" about two minutes after I just said that exact thing, which amused me almost as much as him called Teyla and Ronon "Conon and Xena". AHAHAHAHA. I also liked Rodney's bitch-slapping down of Weir; I feel really bad for encouraging fictional men to be insubordinate to their female boss, but frankly Elizabeth got on my nerves too and I felt sympathetic to his urge to go "JOHN MIGHT DIE IN THERE OF OLD AGE OH MY GOD WE DO NOT HAVE TIME FOR THIS", and his rueful admittance that it was Zelenka's idea, and oh, when he said that it was wrong to say it was Sheppard's fault because it was his... I maybe died a bit. Oh my god, the LOVE, people. Even in bad episodes, John and Rodney's caring for each other is just luminous. It's gorgeous. Yay.
I felt really bad for John. Like, wanting to jump into the television to hug him myself. He was just sat there talking to himself, knowing it was useless but having nothing else he could do. And then he kicked things and almost shot himself in the foot literally. It was tragic. Poor, poor baby. Also, he was such a dork with the freaking wheat stalk in his mouth the whole time, hee, and even more so when he was getting chucked around by Wacky Invisible Evil That's Almost Definitely Stolen From Lost TM. Incidentally: hee. Although, trying to fight it with one measly knife? Dude. Seriously. Though I will forgive you for that because you are cute and make amusing faces during Alien Meditation Hour and shout "That's it?!" at the end when the audience can't. Plus, you have good taste in boyfriends. You should tell him that we approve of him appreciating Teyla's smarts, by the way.
Unfortunately they then managed to screw it up rather by having the episode be basically the epitome of all the stuff that does annoy me about SGA. Not only was there Bad Facial Hair (omg John, why the hell didn't you shave?! the other blokes managed to! I don't care that that's the facial hair Joe Flanigan usually has, it's awful! Just Say No, Kids.), but the plot, beyond the "get John out of there" bit, was badly done. Like, what the fuck happened at the end anyway? They magically kill the Id monster with their newly-freed-from-repression minds? What? What the hell was it anyway? And John was there for six months, he'd honestly doubted that his people were going to save him, and that just got glossed right over and let me guess we're never going to hear about it ever again. And then there were the nearlyAscended themselves, who were so annoying I wanted to smack them. Partly because of that, the whole thing seemed really fake and unbelievable; there was nothing to ground it and give it that edge of realism that scifi plots like that really need.
Like, the girl. Who John was so very not interested in - when there was kissing, it was just like "oh god, later I'm going to have to admit that I was so bored I ended up sleeping with a really boring local woman because there was nothing else to do". (In my head: John - "I was there for SIX MONTHS!" Rodney - "Yes, thankyou, Colonel, we know, but next time you might want to consider trying that excuse on somebody who wasn't there for the whole Chaya debacle.") The only good thing about that was the iffiness John felt about having been undressed while he was unconcious - it made me think of the way John's neuroses about having been part bug show themselves in lamardeuse's excellent fanfic, and that was a definite plus. And then at the end, John was all "let's get out of here", and that was OK, but it seemed like there should have been so much more there.
The thing is, I can kind of see how not acknowledging that can be a character thing - John represses everything, like, everything, and after the whole "I am speaking into a void and my friends might leave me here and it's AWFUL and there's nothing to do but sleep and KICK THINGS" bit, he did know that the team was coming for him, and he seems a patient kind of guy, one who would basically see it as futile to stress over stuff that he can't do anything about it. I did like how he ran off when he knew the team was there for him, too. But I can't help but think that most of that is in Joe Flanigan's performance, and while he deserves a hell of a lot of credit, the fact remains he wasn't working with much here. I don't believe it'll come back later, either; we couldn't have even had one bit of "wait; for you it's been how long?" I mean, "I might have even ... missed you a little" could be worse, but it was so little payoff for the journey. No freaking backstory for John in there at all? We already knew about the abandonment issues, fercryingoutloud. Woe is fangirl. :(
On the other hand, maybe the nearlyAscended will be coming back somehow, as a way of finding out more about the Ancients? Though why exactly you'd want to become a glowy squid-like energy being if you weren't, say, dying of radiation poisoning like Daniel, I don't quite get... and the fact that the writers also seem to think this makes me wonder whether they made the nearlyAscended annoying and preachy on purpose. Hmm. They did have the "trying for Ascension vs. living" idea, which also bears that out, and I'd totally agree with John on that particular point, but I kind of got the impression we were supposed to sympathise with the nearlyAscended more.
In short, at least the episode's over - we knew the bad plot was coming, it wasn't even half as bad as I'd feared, and now it's gone. We even got a continuity reference - Carson is still dating Cadman, hooray! And Rodney being all "what's with you and Ascended women?"-jealous was all right, too. Heh. John's little shrug in response was kind of awesome and completely encapsulating his character at the same time. And hopefully there will be lots of good fanfic to make up for the bad stuff. Mmmm, yep. More SGA is of the good.
In other news, concernedlily got me the Atlantis Season One Companion, which is cheesy and awesome. One of the things in it is progress reports on the main members of the expedition done by Elizabeth - including one on herself! Heeeeee. Plus, there are amusing pictures of Elizabeth being all "... did I put my pants on wrong? I did, didn't I. Oh dear.", John being incredibly dorky, Rodney looking like he's actually going to eat people, and quotes from people called things like Guard #2 ("You wish you'd brought bacon to another galaxy?!", hee).
I now have new post-cards on my wall: there's one with "Heterosexuality isn't normal it's just common" (awesome), one with "Never underestimate the power of stupid people in very large groups", one with a woman telling some man "So... if it's a man's world, I suggest you boys get busy and clean this mess up!" and one with a pictures of Leeds factory workers on it, with one guy saying "Has anybody seen the parliamentary road to socialism?" I am possibly weird for finding it quite as funny as I do, but HEEEEE.
Otherwise, I offer: this flash animation called Yo Butt Ain't Made Fo' That! It's genius - the sound is a minster called Willie Wilson, who is the kind of bigot who says that feminism means that girls are now all evil lesbians. (I wish I was kidding on that one, but no, that's what he honestly and truly believes.) It's absolutely disgusting, but the video... oh man, that video made me laugh. Sheer freaking poetry. Some of the juxtapositions are genius. Heee.
Oh, and you can have an actually functioning air guitar too, because I've had a good day, and good days call for strutting around pretending to RAWK THE HELL OUT. Oh yeah. :D