3 Jun 2013 07:37 am
Orphan Black -- S1
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frayadjacentWow, I was not expecting that finale to be so *sad.* Exciting and revealing, yes. A game changer, quite possibly. A cliffhanger, probably. But a little heartbreaking? I wouldn't have guessed.
Years ago I read an Ursula K. Le Guin essay -- I forget which, now, but I believe it was in the anthology The Language of the Night -- that argued that a good way to know if a story has well-written characters is if you can remember their names a year later. Now, it's only been two days, not a year, but despite this show having a fairly large main/supporting cast -- and four main characters who look an awful lot alike -- I recall their names better than on many shows, where I will continue to refer to people as "the blonde one", etc for months on end.
So, while the plot is definitely engaging, and I'm apparently still naive enough about drama/thriller/SFF tropes that I'm not catching the abundance of them on this show, or at least am not bothered about them, the draw is absolutely the characters. I'm pretty sure every single character significant enough to appear in more than, say, two episodes has garnered a fairly strong emotional reaction from me. A few of them are "I hate this character", but not in a way I don't think the writers intended. Leeky and Tomas totally suck! Paul was an annoying creepdog till we learned he was Beth's monitor, now he is still a creepdog but not quite so much so, and even -- dare I say -- a bit interesting. The rest: Sarah, Felix, Mrs. S (Mrs S! Oh my heart. More on that later.) Allison, Cosima, Helena, Art, have all engaged me and made me feel for them and care about them more than plenty of shows with twice the run. I'm even coming around to Delphine.
So I'll continue this by talking about individual characters in turn.
Sarah: Smart, compassionate, tough, and very much a survivor -- it's pretty damn hard for me not to like her. Basically anytime the character who adapts easily to new situations and learns quickly and handles crises like a pro and is not a rich white dude is already in the plus column for me. But her love for Kira and Felix, and her increasingly tender relationship with Mrs. S (gah!) fully won me over pretty quickly. I love that she *could* be the toughly individualistic working class woman, but she's not. She relies on other people -- and occasionally they even rely on her. I loved how she became a member of a team of sorts by the end.
(Aside: I read all of the clones as multi-racial for most of the show. Am I the only one who thought this? Alas, I looked up Tatiana Maslany and it appears that she is definitely white, and white people playing people of color or mixed race people is NOT OK with me, so I guess that changes how I view the character.)
Felix: I love his big heart, his wit, and his loving relationship with Sarah, Kira, and Mrs. S (gah!). His relationship with Sarah is the emotional center of the show for me. I love their teasing, their affection, and how protective they are of each other. I do hope he gets a little more of his own story next season. Occasionally I felt like he was nearing the line of "funny gay BFF", albeit one with an independent sex life for sure. (I want to take this moment to say that I also kind of love Colin despite him having like 4 scenes. He's a weird duck.) I think the writers played with this a bit in his relationship with Allison, who pretty clearly *wanted* him to be her sassy gay BFF. To his credit, I think Felix saw right through this but played along, especially during the intervention scene when she was going through some serious shit, and despite himself he'd seen other sides of her and grown to care for her. (I can't see any other reason why Felix would be psyched to help a wealthy suburbanite "put on her face".)
Also, can I please have Felix's apartment? Just bring it on over to Melbourne and I'll move in this fall. Thanks!
Mrs. S. GAH! I loved how the family dynamic between her, Kira, Sarah, and Felix unfolded, with the slow rebuilding of trust, and the growing feeling that she wasn't keeping Sarah away out of a grudge, but to protect Kira. And I can see arguments either way for how sound that was, but regardless by about midway through the series I was delighted by the feeling of family re-developing between them. Plus, she's pretty cool! I loved when she complained to Sarah that she became a punk with "none of the politics". OK, that line alone probably won my heart, actually, but anyway I was totally intrigued by her political background and was excited to learn more, and oh I also loved her "hunting's not just for the rich" line, and gah she is a scientist and she worked for them and she kidnapped Kira! :: cries forever :: Though I don't think she was Sarah's monitor, or if she was she "went off the grid". Because why would Leekie lie to Sarah about her having been the one they couldn't find, if it turned out Mrs. S had been monitoring her all that time? So I'm hoping she took off with Kira for the same reason that Sarah planned to -- to protect her from Leekie et al. Am I deluding myself that this is even a possibility? I mean, it's still pretty damn awful, but I can also see Mrs. S believing that she can protect Kira far better than Sarah can. And, as with her mistrust of Sarah at the start of the series, maybe there's some truth in that? Sarah is damn capable, but Mrs. S has more experience. Still, this totally sucks! Poor Sarah. My heart was broken for her at the end. Broken.
Speaking of Kira: she doesn't get her own thing, but I love how her *weirdness* was totally unremarked upon until the car accident, but it became more and more evident even before that that she is a different sort of kid. I mean, she was like a short, cute adult from the get-go! But I didn't think too much of it until more and more started being revealed. Maybe because children are so often poorly written and acted that I try not to pay much attention to them. Anyway, nice work, show.
Allison: the character I love to be annoyed by becomes the character I love! She's so basking in her privilege when she's introduced, I really couldn't stand her, but I loved how even at the very start her determination and resilience showed through. Like when she taught Sarah how to shoot. And her "get off my lawn" moment with Felix takes a new dimension when you think about where she's coming from. She's a rich property owner pointing a gun at a working class guy because he stepped on her property, but she's ALSO someone with pretty legitimate reasons to fear change and want to protect her family. Those basic facets of her characterization came through all the way. And awful and shocking as her final scene with the neighbor lady was, in retrospect I didn't find it un-fitting with her earlier behavior, including her "funny torture" scene with her husband/monitor (excellent reveal, though by then I was already sure that the neighbor wasn't the monitor, which left him the prime suspect). Anyway, she's been strongly characterized and incredibly well-acted, as with all the clones, and had some great moments, including some of my favorite comedy on the show.
(BTW, I love this show's sense of humor! Not that many of the characters make jokes, but the dry irony of some of the situations presented got many a laugh out of me. For me, that is *key* to getting emotionally invested in a show.)
Cosima: Aw! I liked her immediately and was intrigued by how strongly she believed that she could work the situation from the inside -- by developing her relationship with Delphine despite her suspicions, by "following the science" etc. And so her realization at the end -- along with her sickness -- was another heartbreak. She's their *property*. (Of course, this does beg the question of how one would patent illegally-created genetic material, but I'm no patent law expert and I suspect it's best not to think too much about that one.) I love that she *wants* to trust Delphine. Who, by the way, *I* still don't trust, but I'm starting to suspect that even if she was still working for Leekie when she showed up at Felix's apartment, she might leave them now. Maybe for the same reason that (I'm really hoping!) Mrs. S did at some point? BTW, one of my chief complaints about the show is Delphine's relationship with Leekie. It just felt super cliche. So I hope that's over with.
Helena: she was pretty interesting, and I liked her struggle against Tomas's brainwashing, which mirror's Delphine and Cosima's growing realization that working from "within the system" isn't going to end well for them. I kind of hope she isn't dead, though honestly if she's just going to continue to be a super unpredictable antagonist obsessed with Sarah and Kira then maybe I'm OK with her being gone. You know, there's probably some symbolism in Sarah killing her twin sister, who in turn just killed their birth mother. Anyone who's had more coffee than me want to tell me what it is?
Art: He hasn't had as much to do as I expected. I kept expecting him to come into the fold, and despite my automatic strong dislike of cops, I wanted him to. (Aside: I'm tired of so many of the black characters on shows I watch being cops.) He seemed like maybe he'd be useful? It was interesting to see Sarah's trust in him grow through their work together, despite the fact that she's got plenty of reasons to mistrust cops too. Anyway, it will be interesting to see how he investigates this, but I hope he does so by working *with* Sarah. I don't really want another Paul Ballard (from Dollhouse) type, even without the creepy obsession aspect that that character suffered from.
I feel like I could go on and on, but this is getting pretty long, I need to go to work, and I haven't read anyone else's posts yet! Besides, this is more than I usually manage to write about a show. So I'll leave off here.
Thoughts, anyone?
Years ago I read an Ursula K. Le Guin essay -- I forget which, now, but I believe it was in the anthology The Language of the Night -- that argued that a good way to know if a story has well-written characters is if you can remember their names a year later. Now, it's only been two days, not a year, but despite this show having a fairly large main/supporting cast -- and four main characters who look an awful lot alike -- I recall their names better than on many shows, where I will continue to refer to people as "the blonde one", etc for months on end.
So, while the plot is definitely engaging, and I'm apparently still naive enough about drama/thriller/SFF tropes that I'm not catching the abundance of them on this show, or at least am not bothered about them, the draw is absolutely the characters. I'm pretty sure every single character significant enough to appear in more than, say, two episodes has garnered a fairly strong emotional reaction from me. A few of them are "I hate this character", but not in a way I don't think the writers intended. Leeky and Tomas totally suck! Paul was an annoying creepdog till we learned he was Beth's monitor, now he is still a creepdog but not quite so much so, and even -- dare I say -- a bit interesting. The rest: Sarah, Felix, Mrs. S (Mrs S! Oh my heart. More on that later.) Allison, Cosima, Helena, Art, have all engaged me and made me feel for them and care about them more than plenty of shows with twice the run. I'm even coming around to Delphine.
So I'll continue this by talking about individual characters in turn.
Sarah: Smart, compassionate, tough, and very much a survivor -- it's pretty damn hard for me not to like her. Basically anytime the character who adapts easily to new situations and learns quickly and handles crises like a pro and is not a rich white dude is already in the plus column for me. But her love for Kira and Felix, and her increasingly tender relationship with Mrs. S (gah!) fully won me over pretty quickly. I love that she *could* be the toughly individualistic working class woman, but she's not. She relies on other people -- and occasionally they even rely on her. I loved how she became a member of a team of sorts by the end.
(Aside: I read all of the clones as multi-racial for most of the show. Am I the only one who thought this? Alas, I looked up Tatiana Maslany and it appears that she is definitely white, and white people playing people of color or mixed race people is NOT OK with me, so I guess that changes how I view the character.)
Felix: I love his big heart, his wit, and his loving relationship with Sarah, Kira, and Mrs. S (gah!). His relationship with Sarah is the emotional center of the show for me. I love their teasing, their affection, and how protective they are of each other. I do hope he gets a little more of his own story next season. Occasionally I felt like he was nearing the line of "funny gay BFF", albeit one with an independent sex life for sure. (I want to take this moment to say that I also kind of love Colin despite him having like 4 scenes. He's a weird duck.) I think the writers played with this a bit in his relationship with Allison, who pretty clearly *wanted* him to be her sassy gay BFF. To his credit, I think Felix saw right through this but played along, especially during the intervention scene when she was going through some serious shit, and despite himself he'd seen other sides of her and grown to care for her. (I can't see any other reason why Felix would be psyched to help a wealthy suburbanite "put on her face".)
Also, can I please have Felix's apartment? Just bring it on over to Melbourne and I'll move in this fall. Thanks!
Mrs. S. GAH! I loved how the family dynamic between her, Kira, Sarah, and Felix unfolded, with the slow rebuilding of trust, and the growing feeling that she wasn't keeping Sarah away out of a grudge, but to protect Kira. And I can see arguments either way for how sound that was, but regardless by about midway through the series I was delighted by the feeling of family re-developing between them. Plus, she's pretty cool! I loved when she complained to Sarah that she became a punk with "none of the politics". OK, that line alone probably won my heart, actually, but anyway I was totally intrigued by her political background and was excited to learn more, and oh I also loved her "hunting's not just for the rich" line, and gah she is a scientist and she worked for them and she kidnapped Kira! :: cries forever :: Though I don't think she was Sarah's monitor, or if she was she "went off the grid". Because why would Leekie lie to Sarah about her having been the one they couldn't find, if it turned out Mrs. S had been monitoring her all that time? So I'm hoping she took off with Kira for the same reason that Sarah planned to -- to protect her from Leekie et al. Am I deluding myself that this is even a possibility? I mean, it's still pretty damn awful, but I can also see Mrs. S believing that she can protect Kira far better than Sarah can. And, as with her mistrust of Sarah at the start of the series, maybe there's some truth in that? Sarah is damn capable, but Mrs. S has more experience. Still, this totally sucks! Poor Sarah. My heart was broken for her at the end. Broken.
Speaking of Kira: she doesn't get her own thing, but I love how her *weirdness* was totally unremarked upon until the car accident, but it became more and more evident even before that that she is a different sort of kid. I mean, she was like a short, cute adult from the get-go! But I didn't think too much of it until more and more started being revealed. Maybe because children are so often poorly written and acted that I try not to pay much attention to them. Anyway, nice work, show.
Allison: the character I love to be annoyed by becomes the character I love! She's so basking in her privilege when she's introduced, I really couldn't stand her, but I loved how even at the very start her determination and resilience showed through. Like when she taught Sarah how to shoot. And her "get off my lawn" moment with Felix takes a new dimension when you think about where she's coming from. She's a rich property owner pointing a gun at a working class guy because he stepped on her property, but she's ALSO someone with pretty legitimate reasons to fear change and want to protect her family. Those basic facets of her characterization came through all the way. And awful and shocking as her final scene with the neighbor lady was, in retrospect I didn't find it un-fitting with her earlier behavior, including her "funny torture" scene with her husband/monitor (excellent reveal, though by then I was already sure that the neighbor wasn't the monitor, which left him the prime suspect). Anyway, she's been strongly characterized and incredibly well-acted, as with all the clones, and had some great moments, including some of my favorite comedy on the show.
(BTW, I love this show's sense of humor! Not that many of the characters make jokes, but the dry irony of some of the situations presented got many a laugh out of me. For me, that is *key* to getting emotionally invested in a show.)
Cosima: Aw! I liked her immediately and was intrigued by how strongly she believed that she could work the situation from the inside -- by developing her relationship with Delphine despite her suspicions, by "following the science" etc. And so her realization at the end -- along with her sickness -- was another heartbreak. She's their *property*. (Of course, this does beg the question of how one would patent illegally-created genetic material, but I'm no patent law expert and I suspect it's best not to think too much about that one.) I love that she *wants* to trust Delphine. Who, by the way, *I* still don't trust, but I'm starting to suspect that even if she was still working for Leekie when she showed up at Felix's apartment, she might leave them now. Maybe for the same reason that (I'm really hoping!) Mrs. S did at some point? BTW, one of my chief complaints about the show is Delphine's relationship with Leekie. It just felt super cliche. So I hope that's over with.
Helena: she was pretty interesting, and I liked her struggle against Tomas's brainwashing, which mirror's Delphine and Cosima's growing realization that working from "within the system" isn't going to end well for them. I kind of hope she isn't dead, though honestly if she's just going to continue to be a super unpredictable antagonist obsessed with Sarah and Kira then maybe I'm OK with her being gone. You know, there's probably some symbolism in Sarah killing her twin sister, who in turn just killed their birth mother. Anyone who's had more coffee than me want to tell me what it is?
Art: He hasn't had as much to do as I expected. I kept expecting him to come into the fold, and despite my automatic strong dislike of cops, I wanted him to. (Aside: I'm tired of so many of the black characters on shows I watch being cops.) He seemed like maybe he'd be useful? It was interesting to see Sarah's trust in him grow through their work together, despite the fact that she's got plenty of reasons to mistrust cops too. Anyway, it will be interesting to see how he investigates this, but I hope he does so by working *with* Sarah. I don't really want another Paul Ballard (from Dollhouse) type, even without the creepy obsession aspect that that character suffered from.
I feel like I could go on and on, but this is getting pretty long, I need to go to work, and I haven't read anyone else's posts yet! Besides, this is more than I usually manage to write about a show. So I'll leave off here.
Thoughts, anyone?
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