no, you should not analyze characters based on what they say about themselves.

[pocochina]

This was going to be my Grand Unified Theory of Character Motivations, but I think it bleeds a bit into an even bigger picture of how I generally analyze and evaluate fictional characters, which ended up making clear to me why I spend so much time groaning in frustration when something or other gets panned as being "OOC

Comments

[lynnenne]

I think the real takeaway is that Elena buys into the conflation of control, objectification, and devotion - ie, she has internalized and even romanticized the doppelganger experience of the protection-by-disempowerment survival skill set, and she tries to seize some personal power not by pushing back against it but by forcing that experience onto her brother.

I love your Elena thoughts. This makes so much sense to me.

Guys, it is not bad writing when Klaus acts irrationally. Klaus is a lunatic.

HA. Preach!

He only turns to The Lie when it's become excruciatingly clear that the price of Buffy's uncertainty is a lot of lives.

Not to mention Buffy's own life. I firmly believe that if it had been Giles in Xander's place, he would have done exactly the same thing. Buffy was finally ready to kill Angel. Giving her hope would have taken that certainty away and gotten her killed in his place.

[ceciliaj]

I wanted to comment on the Elena thoughts too! I don't even go here re: TVD, but poco always makes it sound so awesome.

[pocochina]

Thanks! Elena makes so much sense to me. I feel for the girl and like her more and more as time goes on, because I think the discrepancy between her stated and apparent motivations is always so thoroughly acknowledged.

Not to mention Buffy's own life. I firmly believe that if it had been Giles in Xander's place, he would have done exactly the same thing. Buffy was finally ready to kill Angel. Giving her hope would have taken that certainty away and gotten her killed in his place.

Completely agreed. I think anyone would do the same in his place, and I am as sure as I can be that she would have held back and lost the fight if she'd been stalling in hopes of a miracle. It was the RIGHT THING TO DO. I wasn't aware that Xander was such a sterling guy that we had to make up bullshit reasons to be unhappy with him, but okay.

[lynnenne]

I wasn't aware that Xander was such a sterling guy that we had to make up bullshit reasons to be unhappy with him

Ahahahaha, yes. I can dislike him quite well on his own.

[local_max]

Hear, hear. I've been talking a lot about some of the Buffyverse examples of late, the obvious ones (well, the W-character ones). The W-character arguments actually apply to each other, too (for Wesley, there is something a bit different, which is of the form of "Wesley had personal issues with people around him which affected his decision making process," which is true, but obviously the rational way to solve awkward workplace situations is not the course of action he took, suggesting that Rational Reason Y is a much bigger factor than Emotional Reason Z for doing what he does).

[pocochina]

Yeah, exactly. Wesley's ultimate goal was pretty clearly for the right reasons and the reasons he claimed; his course of action got warped for character-specific reasons that made a lot of sense.

[pocochina]

[re: the Lie]I would agree with all of that, I think, and yeah, I liked that he honed in on the stupid reason not to like Angel too. But even that I would kind of defend? Because I think that holding the stupid grudge was something that allowed him to (a) stay focused on the real danger to the group and (b) not get overwhelmed by how outmatched he was about the big stuff? Like, being jealous and irritable let him keep his eye on the ball but boil the whole thing down to a size that was psychologically manageable. That is okay! That is good! That is the self-protective, evolutionarily-advantageous REASON we as people do all of those things in our brains, functioning in exactly the way it should.

I also really want to lay stress on part (B), "Failure to account for irrationality." This is so bizarre to me, the extent to which fandom shows a complete lack of awareness of the irrationality of human emotional reaction and human behavior when analyzing characters. I don't get it. Yeah. People really seem to be under the impression that being smarter

[pocochina]

I understand being frustrated with the discrepancy because you (the general you) felt it was ineptly conveyed at points--TBH I felt like that in the early seasons quite a bit--but I thought it was really comfortably obvious by S4, heh.

Yeah, that's fair. I think the show in the early seasons was a lot more...deconstructive of your usual vampire tropes, than actually constructive about itself? And so it was turning a lot of that cynicism outward. But by S4 that cynical eye is getting turned on its own characters and it's amazing.

[ceciliaj]

An excellent post! It is so well-organized, I kind of want to put it on pretty stationary. Or needlepoint it. I don't even know if that's a verb.

[pocochina]

lol, it was "be obnoxiously over-organized" or KEYBOARDSMASH ALL FRUSTRATION WITH FANDOM EVER. I'm glad Option A wasn't totally boring.

[upupa_epops]

He is a thousand-year-old adolescent gorilla with the means to do whatever the fuck he wants.

I want this on a t-shirt. For real.

(I will probably be back later with more thoughts, but I couldn't wait to express my love for the gorilla.)

[pocochina]

HE IS MY BBY, I LOVE HIM SO MUCH, but like: