THE DEAD ZONE IS MY NEW GIRLFRIEND
okay, I know I said I wanted to marry Kate Beaton in my last post, but listen I am FICKLE.
so
eruthros (who I should perhaps mention is my roommate) and I like to watch an episode of television over dinner every night, and lately we've been watching The Dead Zone. And now I am completely, totally, head-over-heels starry-eyed heart-goes-thump in big giant messy love with a show that ended years ago and didn't really have a big fandom to begin with. Why does this always happen to me!
But, but, but! It's so WELL WRITTEN and CLEVER and DOING ACTUAL SCIFI! And it's completely engaged and interested in the idea that Johnny experiences his visions physically, and that this causes all sorts of wonderful and fascinating issues about bodies and feeling and being and self to come up! ( as Greensilver illustrates in this vid)
We're in the middle of season two, and I honestly could cry for joy and relief at seeing television that works this hard and cares this much, and which not-incidentally addresses race and privilege head-on without ever doing "a very special episode." Oh my god.
and now I will gush madly about the show, with spoilers up to 2x12
OMG, 2x12, WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN ALL MY LIFE. This is an episode all about Bruce. Okay, if you don't know the show/haven't read the book, Johnny is a guy who's in a coma for six years, and wakes up psychic - he touches people or objects and has visions. And in the book he goes obsessive and violent, because he learns via his powers that local politician is actually an IMP of the DEVIL (Stephen King-styles) who will bring about massive death and destruction, and he (Johnny) sets out to assassinate the politician (Stillson).
In the show, Johnny doesn't set out to assassinate him (at least not yet, I'm only mid-season two); Johnny doesn't go violent and obsessive and bitter, Johnny doesn't give up on his own life in pursuit of this single-minded goal, Johnny doesn't lose touch with the world: because Johnny has Bruce. Bruce is a character who wasn't in the book but was introduced in the show, Johnny's physical therapist and BFF. Bruce makes people believe Johnny about his visions and literally HOLDS JOHNNY UP when he's having a sudden vision and keeps him from going down the path towards assassination.
So this episode, this episode we just watched, 2x12, is a Bruce-centric episode, and I can't tell you how much I loved it.
eruthros and I just sat there in utter joy through the whole thing, because hey: it's Bruce backstory, and it's engaged with issues of race (Bruce is black, I should mention) without being an episode about how Bruce Is A Black Man - it's an episode where Bruce goes home for his father's funeral, and he touches his father while Johnny touches him and the three of them linked together go into this huge AU-vision, It's-a-Wonderful-Life-styles, into an AU of the show that is actually - wait for it - the original story from the book. IT IS GENIUS.
So it's an AU where Johnny doesn't have Bruce, and loses everything, and tries to assassinate Stillson - but that is almost the side-plot, because what it's really about is the AU in which Bruce doesn't become a dredlocked Buddhist physical therapist in Maine, but rather plays the good son, takes over from his father by becoming a preacher at their local church. And you guys you guys, it's SO ENGAGED with how Bruce feels conflict about having abandoned his (black) church community, the community that his father built, and feels conflict about living in Maine where there aren't any other black people and all his friends are white (Bruce's mom asks Johnny, who OH GOD GOES WITH BRUCE TO INDIANA TO HIS DAD'S FUNERAL BECAUSE HE LOVES HIM IT'S SO SLASHY, Bruce's mom asks Johnny, are there any other black people in Maine? And Johnny's like, "not really?" and Bruce's mom is sad because Bruce doesn't have his community! and it's all really quietly done and understated and just a PART of Bruce's character, because the episode is all about how Bruce had issues with his father and doubts his place in the world and how Bruce has lost his FAITH).
I just . . . I don't even know, it's like sometimes I watch so much bad tv that I have trouble imagining what good tv even looks like, but this is it, right here. This is tv in which race is neither the Issue Of The Day nor ignored out of fake-colourblindness; this is tv in which scifi concepts about bodies and alternate universes and visions of the future are dealt with in an incredibly clever way (and beautifully filmed, I have to say); this is tv in which my pairing is so very readable as gay/slashy without the slash having to be built around misogyny (Bruce and Johnny just love each other! They are not competing over a triangulated female character!) . . . it's so good it's so good.
[[sidebar re: the show doing interesting things with bodies via Johnny's visions: a couple of episodes ago Johnny had a vision in which he saw through the eyes of a woman that Stillson, the evil politician, was having sex with. Like, Johnny felt what it was like to get fucked in the vagina by his nemesis. And the woman/Johnny was on top, and clearly enjoying herself. This is a little sidebar for those of you who love on the enemies-slash: this show has IT ALL. And it does this kind of thing all the damn time.]]
And this episode 2x12 is so VERY easy to read as the story about how Bruce takes his (white, male) significant other home to meet his family, who might want to see him settle down with a nice black woman, and how he feels regret about never having been able to introduce Johnny to his dad, and how through the three-way vision that they experience Bruce gets to a) mend things with his dad, b) get closer to Johnny (he literally says, "I know how it is now, I understand your visions"), and c) talk to his dad after his dad's death, and hear his dad say that he approves of Bruce's choices, and approves of Johnny, and hear his dad say that Bruce BELONGS AT JOHNNY'S SIDE. I mean, Bruce runs away from his church and his family and his religion and becomes a Buddhist dredlocked physical therapist, and he's living this defiant life as far away from his home as he can get . . . it's so beautiful as a gay story. And then the explicit message of the episode is that Johnny has given Bruce his faith back, and Bruce has kept Johnny grounded and sane and acted as his guide and anchor. And at the very end Bruce is like, "you need me" and Johnny is like, "You won't get any argument from me."
SO, as I may have already mentioned, it's the slashiest thing OF ALL TIME.
Anyway I don't even know what to do except ramble on and on about it, this episode was so good, this show is so good, omg omg omg. And season two is EXPONENTIALLY better since there's less of Walt, who's a giant asshole who I don't care about.
(though sigh my joy is not untempered there was an episode earlier this season about a mentally-ill transgender lesbian murderer, it was completely unexpected and like I was suddenly watching CSI or something, I am trying hard to forgive that because so many of the episodes this season have been otherwise stellar, with the female characters getting good screen-time and the plots just written SO WELL and the characters and the actors are amazing I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO. Anyway if you want to watch the show I just suggest that you skip the season two episode "Misbegotten.")
SHOW SHOW SHOW SHOW SHOW! <3
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so
eruthros (who I should perhaps mention is my roommate) and I like to watch an episode of television over dinner every night, and lately we've been watching The Dead Zone. And now I am completely, totally, head-over-heels starry-eyed heart-goes-thump in big giant messy love with a show that ended years ago and didn't really have a big fandom to begin with. Why does this always happen to me!
But, but, but! It's so WELL WRITTEN and CLEVER and DOING ACTUAL SCIFI! And it's completely engaged and interested in the idea that Johnny experiences his visions physically, and that this causes all sorts of wonderful and fascinating issues about bodies and feeling and being and self to come up! ( as Greensilver illustrates in this vid)
We're in the middle of season two, and I honestly could cry for joy and relief at seeing television that works this hard and cares this much, and which not-incidentally addresses race and privilege head-on without ever doing "a very special episode." Oh my god.
and now I will gush madly about the show, with spoilers up to 2x12
OMG, 2x12, WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN ALL MY LIFE. This is an episode all about Bruce. Okay, if you don't know the show/haven't read the book, Johnny is a guy who's in a coma for six years, and wakes up psychic - he touches people or objects and has visions. And in the book he goes obsessive and violent, because he learns via his powers that local politician is actually an IMP of the DEVIL (Stephen King-styles) who will bring about massive death and destruction, and he (Johnny) sets out to assassinate the politician (Stillson).
In the show, Johnny doesn't set out to assassinate him (at least not yet, I'm only mid-season two); Johnny doesn't go violent and obsessive and bitter, Johnny doesn't give up on his own life in pursuit of this single-minded goal, Johnny doesn't lose touch with the world: because Johnny has Bruce. Bruce is a character who wasn't in the book but was introduced in the show, Johnny's physical therapist and BFF. Bruce makes people believe Johnny about his visions and literally HOLDS JOHNNY UP when he's having a sudden vision and keeps him from going down the path towards assassination.
So this episode, this episode we just watched, 2x12, is a Bruce-centric episode, and I can't tell you how much I loved it.
eruthros and I just sat there in utter joy through the whole thing, because hey: it's Bruce backstory, and it's engaged with issues of race (Bruce is black, I should mention) without being an episode about how Bruce Is A Black Man - it's an episode where Bruce goes home for his father's funeral, and he touches his father while Johnny touches him and the three of them linked together go into this huge AU-vision, It's-a-Wonderful-Life-styles, into an AU of the show that is actually - wait for it - the original story from the book. IT IS GENIUS.
So it's an AU where Johnny doesn't have Bruce, and loses everything, and tries to assassinate Stillson - but that is almost the side-plot, because what it's really about is the AU in which Bruce doesn't become a dredlocked Buddhist physical therapist in Maine, but rather plays the good son, takes over from his father by becoming a preacher at their local church. And you guys you guys, it's SO ENGAGED with how Bruce feels conflict about having abandoned his (black) church community, the community that his father built, and feels conflict about living in Maine where there aren't any other black people and all his friends are white (Bruce's mom asks Johnny, who OH GOD GOES WITH BRUCE TO INDIANA TO HIS DAD'S FUNERAL BECAUSE HE LOVES HIM IT'S SO SLASHY, Bruce's mom asks Johnny, are there any other black people in Maine? And Johnny's like, "not really?" and Bruce's mom is sad because Bruce doesn't have his community! and it's all really quietly done and understated and just a PART of Bruce's character, because the episode is all about how Bruce had issues with his father and doubts his place in the world and how Bruce has lost his FAITH).
I just . . . I don't even know, it's like sometimes I watch so much bad tv that I have trouble imagining what good tv even looks like, but this is it, right here. This is tv in which race is neither the Issue Of The Day nor ignored out of fake-colourblindness; this is tv in which scifi concepts about bodies and alternate universes and visions of the future are dealt with in an incredibly clever way (and beautifully filmed, I have to say); this is tv in which my pairing is so very readable as gay/slashy without the slash having to be built around misogyny (Bruce and Johnny just love each other! They are not competing over a triangulated female character!) . . . it's so good it's so good.
[[sidebar re: the show doing interesting things with bodies via Johnny's visions: a couple of episodes ago Johnny had a vision in which he saw through the eyes of a woman that Stillson, the evil politician, was having sex with. Like, Johnny felt what it was like to get fucked in the vagina by his nemesis. And the woman/Johnny was on top, and clearly enjoying herself. This is a little sidebar for those of you who love on the enemies-slash: this show has IT ALL. And it does this kind of thing all the damn time.]]
And this episode 2x12 is so VERY easy to read as the story about how Bruce takes his (white, male) significant other home to meet his family, who might want to see him settle down with a nice black woman, and how he feels regret about never having been able to introduce Johnny to his dad, and how through the three-way vision that they experience Bruce gets to a) mend things with his dad, b) get closer to Johnny (he literally says, "I know how it is now, I understand your visions"), and c) talk to his dad after his dad's death, and hear his dad say that he approves of Bruce's choices, and approves of Johnny, and hear his dad say that Bruce BELONGS AT JOHNNY'S SIDE. I mean, Bruce runs away from his church and his family and his religion and becomes a Buddhist dredlocked physical therapist, and he's living this defiant life as far away from his home as he can get . . . it's so beautiful as a gay story. And then the explicit message of the episode is that Johnny has given Bruce his faith back, and Bruce has kept Johnny grounded and sane and acted as his guide and anchor. And at the very end Bruce is like, "you need me" and Johnny is like, "You won't get any argument from me."
SO, as I may have already mentioned, it's the slashiest thing OF ALL TIME.
Anyway I don't even know what to do except ramble on and on about it, this episode was so good, this show is so good, omg omg omg. And season two is EXPONENTIALLY better since there's less of Walt, who's a giant asshole who I don't care about.
(though sigh my joy is not untempered there was an episode earlier this season about a mentally-ill transgender lesbian murderer, it was completely unexpected and like I was suddenly watching CSI or something, I am trying hard to forgive that because so many of the episodes this season have been otherwise stellar, with the female characters getting good screen-time and the plots just written SO WELL and the characters and the actors are amazing I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO. Anyway if you want to watch the show I just suggest that you skip the season two episode "Misbegotten.")
SHOW SHOW SHOW SHOW SHOW! <3
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comments right now