Top Five Meme: Top 5 Ships
frelling_tralk prompted with this Top 5 Ships. I narrowed it down to canon ships. A lot of my ships have a similar theme. I love ships that are about the inevitable break-up. Three out of my top five ships and quite a few of my honorable mentions have that dynamic. I’m grabbed by conflict and character-stories rather than squeeing over the romance itself.
I find that the writing is more frequently engaged in the characters as the individuals if one of the priorities of the story is to separate the union itself.
I wasn't sure how to pick a Top 5 to balance books, movies, and TV. Plus, I have a very changeable moment. For the moment, my Top 5 is:
1. Don/Betty (Mad Men)
2. Noel Airman/Marjorie Morningstar (Marjorie Morningstar)
3. Alvin Singer/Annie Hall (Annie Hall)
All three are written with the starting intention to describe why they split up. The three relationships are all unique and should be watched on their own terms. However, these New York-centered relationships have their commonalities. The Woman was initially fascinated by the Man’s worldliness and sophistication. However, over time, the Woman found that quality rotted away/revealed itself to be condescension and phoniness. In all three cases, the Woman sort of rebelled against her family by taking up with this Man, even though these qualities metastasized into the reason why she left.
Noel is more of a straight-up asshole (even when played by gorgeous, likable Gene Kelly in the vastly inferior movie but especially in the book). However, Alvin and Don get all of the empathy that they demand from me as central characters in their stories. Yet with that, Alvin and Don got together with Annie and Betty as Manic Pixie Dream Girls of a fashion but they turned out to be anything but. In fact, Annie and Betty were actually looking for their own Manic Pixie Dream *Men* to rescue them from their own instability lurking underneath of their childhood home enforced WASP boredom.
All three stories have these commonalities because the break-up is partly about telling a story about their respective decade in American history among the privileged, naval-gazing, cutting-edge New Yorkers who were defining the history in their own way. The stories themselves aren’t repetitive. Herman Wouk, Woody Allen, and Mathew Weiner are major auteurs of their day.
Rather, it’s a testament to how the Rise of the Intellectual Class and the different sexual revolutions of the 20th century starting the 1920s have created distinct patterns. Marjorie Morningstar is a story about the late ‘30s (very influenced by the ‘50s when Herman Wouk wrote the book). Mad Men is a story about the ‘60s. Annie Hall is a story about the ‘70s and a little bit about the ‘60s. The similarity is that all decades came with their own sexist damage and anxieties that the influenced the story.
However, each is a distinct decade. Just in psychiatry, it’s a cocktail party novelty to bring up Freud in Marjorie Morningstar but no one even thinks about getting therapy. It’s key point of the dysfunction of the Draper marriage that the civilized world has come to realize that therapy is helpful but the powerful man can wield it like a weapon to shame the woman having to pay for her therapy and an investigative tool to control her. It’s an odd bonding discussion and point of pride in Annie Hall.
Society has advanced to the point where it pays tremendous lip service to striking away from one's backward family to getting together with the sophisticated special snowflake who represents the future. This is progress after a fashion. However, society still expects the two to get married and settle down. It creates a split between the courtship and the rest of your life. Hip, urban society in the 1930s encouraged pre-marital sex- but with the subliminal warning that it was supposed to be used to get a husband. This allows the Noel Airmans of the world to expect pre-marital sex because girls felt like they have to put out to have a romantic future but then to condescend to the girls for being calculated about the sex.
For the courtship process, Don Draper wants the WASP princess who flouts her family for him but for the marriage, he wants an obedient, homemaker wife. Meanwhile, Betty wants the mysterious fun of dating the strong, silent Gary Cooper type but when it comes to marriage, she wanted real communication but not so much communication that it impinges on the stereotypical 1950s perfect life. Alvin “rescued” Annie away from her dumb ideals and pushed her to therapy but what happens when that part of the courtship is over and Alvin can no longer play the White Knight of Neurotic Skinny Jewish Guys, leading the shiksa to therapy and arthouse cinemas. If she engages with deep thoughts and introspection on her own level and disagrees with Alvin, than he’s no longer the White Knight. Alvin resents this shift and Annie feels this shift showed that Alvin is kind of beneath her.
If Carrie and Big hadn’t gotten together in a super-artificial, audience-pandering way at the end of Sex and the City and became a very boring couple in the movies, they would have been my ’90-2000s representative of this dynamic and maybe even made my top 5.
4. Jed/Abbey
5. Mitchell/Cameron
My happy ships! Although, Jed and Abbey fight *a lot*. A lot of their best scenes are fights…of awesome!
ABBEY
I don't believe you. You go from 'I've got a lot to say' to 'I can't say it right now because I've got so much to say' to 'I gotta read, I've got agriculture' and 'you're not with me' and go to hell...
BARTLET
Look...
ABBEY
Now that's an extraordinary evolution!
BARTLET
Can I go a week without explaining myself?
ABBEY
You can go as long as you want without explaining yourself. Read your book.
BARTLET
Sit down, we'll talk about it right now.
ABBEY
I'm not in the mood, jackass.
BARTLET
[sarcastically] Isn't there any way I could change your mind, 'cause I really had my heart set on it.
ABBEY
Go to hell. [leaves]
My heart. ‘Tis grown a bulge in it. Their to-the-point bickering allows me to feel truly fluffy about their sweet moments. Really, Abbey gets little of what she wants. She wanted Jed to honor his promise to only serve one term, she wanted her more liberal, feminist agenda enforced, she wanted her family kept safe. Poor Abbey is always held back by the realities of of the day and the fact that Jed, as the Leader of the Free World, is complicit in all of it.
But Abbey makes her feelings clear. She openly wrestles with her desire to have a Jed Bartlet at the helm of the Oval Office with her desire to return to private life. Abbey is institutionally powerless relative to the other TWW characters. Abbey sits at the throne in the golden cage but she's not on board with Jed's presidency or his stated agenda like the West Wing staffers. However, she does vocalize her POV which is enough for a believably healthy marriage even if Abbey doesn't have the veto power or control of the military or Bully Pulpit. TWW' story makes the audience empathize with Abbey because she supported Jed into becoming disproportionately powerful and sometimes Abbey gets the short end of that bargain which one of the most interesting dimensions for a show that romances Jed and the imperial presidency.
5. I was pretty sure what ships would take my first four places. However, I had an impossible time picking a fifth place. I listed the contenders in my Honorable Mention spot. They can all be 5th place!
Honorable Mentions: Elizabeth/Mr. Darcy (Pride and Prejudice), Harry/Sally (When Harry Met Sally), Rick/Ilsa (Casablanca), Josh/Amy (West Wing), Wesley/Lilah (Buffyverse), Angel/Darla (Buffyverse), Viola/William (Shakespeare in Love), Vronsky/Anna Karenina (Anna Karenina), Willow/Oz (Buffyverse), Charlotte/Harry (Sex and the City), Roger/Mona (narrowly edging out Pete/Trudy in the honorable mention spot from Mad Men) Jess/Rory (Gilmore Girls), Richard/Emily (Gilmore Girls), Tony/Carmela (The Sopranos), Christopher/Adriana (The Sopranos), Frasier/Lilith (Frasier/Cheers), Sansa/Tyrion (Game of Thrones), Mitch/Cam (Modern Family)
I find that the writing is more frequently engaged in the characters as the individuals if one of the priorities of the story is to separate the union itself.
I wasn't sure how to pick a Top 5 to balance books, movies, and TV. Plus, I have a very changeable moment. For the moment, my Top 5 is:
1. Don/Betty (Mad Men)
2. Noel Airman/Marjorie Morningstar (Marjorie Morningstar)
3. Alvin Singer/Annie Hall (Annie Hall)
All three are written with the starting intention to describe why they split up. The three relationships are all unique and should be watched on their own terms. However, these New York-centered relationships have their commonalities. The Woman was initially fascinated by the Man’s worldliness and sophistication. However, over time, the Woman found that quality rotted away/revealed itself to be condescension and phoniness. In all three cases, the Woman sort of rebelled against her family by taking up with this Man, even though these qualities metastasized into the reason why she left.
Noel is more of a straight-up asshole (even when played by gorgeous, likable Gene Kelly in the vastly inferior movie but especially in the book). However, Alvin and Don get all of the empathy that they demand from me as central characters in their stories. Yet with that, Alvin and Don got together with Annie and Betty as Manic Pixie Dream Girls of a fashion but they turned out to be anything but. In fact, Annie and Betty were actually looking for their own Manic Pixie Dream *Men* to rescue them from their own instability lurking underneath of their childhood home enforced WASP boredom.
All three stories have these commonalities because the break-up is partly about telling a story about their respective decade in American history among the privileged, naval-gazing, cutting-edge New Yorkers who were defining the history in their own way. The stories themselves aren’t repetitive. Herman Wouk, Woody Allen, and Mathew Weiner are major auteurs of their day.
Rather, it’s a testament to how the Rise of the Intellectual Class and the different sexual revolutions of the 20th century starting the 1920s have created distinct patterns. Marjorie Morningstar is a story about the late ‘30s (very influenced by the ‘50s when Herman Wouk wrote the book). Mad Men is a story about the ‘60s. Annie Hall is a story about the ‘70s and a little bit about the ‘60s. The similarity is that all decades came with their own sexist damage and anxieties that the influenced the story.
However, each is a distinct decade. Just in psychiatry, it’s a cocktail party novelty to bring up Freud in Marjorie Morningstar but no one even thinks about getting therapy. It’s key point of the dysfunction of the Draper marriage that the civilized world has come to realize that therapy is helpful but the powerful man can wield it like a weapon to shame the woman having to pay for her therapy and an investigative tool to control her. It’s an odd bonding discussion and point of pride in Annie Hall.
Society has advanced to the point where it pays tremendous lip service to striking away from one's backward family to getting together with the sophisticated special snowflake who represents the future. This is progress after a fashion. However, society still expects the two to get married and settle down. It creates a split between the courtship and the rest of your life. Hip, urban society in the 1930s encouraged pre-marital sex- but with the subliminal warning that it was supposed to be used to get a husband. This allows the Noel Airmans of the world to expect pre-marital sex because girls felt like they have to put out to have a romantic future but then to condescend to the girls for being calculated about the sex.
For the courtship process, Don Draper wants the WASP princess who flouts her family for him but for the marriage, he wants an obedient, homemaker wife. Meanwhile, Betty wants the mysterious fun of dating the strong, silent Gary Cooper type but when it comes to marriage, she wanted real communication but not so much communication that it impinges on the stereotypical 1950s perfect life. Alvin “rescued” Annie away from her dumb ideals and pushed her to therapy but what happens when that part of the courtship is over and Alvin can no longer play the White Knight of Neurotic Skinny Jewish Guys, leading the shiksa to therapy and arthouse cinemas. If she engages with deep thoughts and introspection on her own level and disagrees with Alvin, than he’s no longer the White Knight. Alvin resents this shift and Annie feels this shift showed that Alvin is kind of beneath her.
If Carrie and Big hadn’t gotten together in a super-artificial, audience-pandering way at the end of Sex and the City and became a very boring couple in the movies, they would have been my ’90-2000s representative of this dynamic and maybe even made my top 5.
4. Jed/Abbey
5. Mitchell/Cameron
My happy ships! Although, Jed and Abbey fight *a lot*. A lot of their best scenes are fights…of awesome!
ABBEY
I don't believe you. You go from 'I've got a lot to say' to 'I can't say it right now because I've got so much to say' to 'I gotta read, I've got agriculture' and 'you're not with me' and go to hell...
BARTLET
Look...
ABBEY
Now that's an extraordinary evolution!
BARTLET
Can I go a week without explaining myself?
ABBEY
You can go as long as you want without explaining yourself. Read your book.
BARTLET
Sit down, we'll talk about it right now.
ABBEY
I'm not in the mood, jackass.
BARTLET
[sarcastically] Isn't there any way I could change your mind, 'cause I really had my heart set on it.
ABBEY
Go to hell. [leaves]
My heart. ‘Tis grown a bulge in it. Their to-the-point bickering allows me to feel truly fluffy about their sweet moments. Really, Abbey gets little of what she wants. She wanted Jed to honor his promise to only serve one term, she wanted her more liberal, feminist agenda enforced, she wanted her family kept safe. Poor Abbey is always held back by the realities of of the day and the fact that Jed, as the Leader of the Free World, is complicit in all of it.
But Abbey makes her feelings clear. She openly wrestles with her desire to have a Jed Bartlet at the helm of the Oval Office with her desire to return to private life. Abbey is institutionally powerless relative to the other TWW characters. Abbey sits at the throne in the golden cage but she's not on board with Jed's presidency or his stated agenda like the West Wing staffers. However, she does vocalize her POV which is enough for a believably healthy marriage even if Abbey doesn't have the veto power or control of the military or Bully Pulpit. TWW' story makes the audience empathize with Abbey because she supported Jed into becoming disproportionately powerful and sometimes Abbey gets the short end of that bargain which one of the most interesting dimensions for a show that romances Jed and the imperial presidency.
5. I was pretty sure what ships would take my first four places. However, I had an impossible time picking a fifth place. I listed the contenders in my Honorable Mention spot. They can all be 5th place!
Honorable Mentions: Elizabeth/Mr. Darcy (Pride and Prejudice), Harry/Sally (When Harry Met Sally), Rick/Ilsa (Casablanca), Josh/Amy (West Wing), Wesley/Lilah (Buffyverse), Angel/Darla (Buffyverse), Viola/William (Shakespeare in Love), Vronsky/Anna Karenina (Anna Karenina), Willow/Oz (Buffyverse), Charlotte/Harry (Sex and the City), Roger/Mona (narrowly edging out Pete/Trudy in the honorable mention spot from Mad Men) Jess/Rory (Gilmore Girls), Richard/Emily (Gilmore Girls), Tony/Carmela (The Sopranos), Christopher/Adriana (The Sopranos), Frasier/Lilith (Frasier/Cheers), Sansa/Tyrion (Game of Thrones), Mitch/Cam (Modern Family)