weeeeekend + Olde Fandom stuff
May. 27th, 2006 09:50 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rivendellroseCat = whiney obnoxious bastard. I sooo need to refill the squirt guns and keep one by my bed.
Other than that, I've been awake for an hour and have accomplished nothing except eating an apple, reading fic, reading a little bit more of Fantasy Girls, and getting annoyed over things that happened in a sci-fi series that's been defunct for... six years, probably almost to the day. Go me.
Had a really fun night last night, out with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
ryunohi, wanderingbeyond and the work people, and then out with part of the usual crew to celebrate coramegan's survival of year 2 of med school. Much alcohol and nachos, much coffee, much strawberry shortcake, and very much silliness all around. Today, I get to write a paper for The Class I hate. And a paper for The Class I Love, too, but that one won't take nearly as long. Which is sad. Fortunately I have all weekend. Unfortunately, this is a really busy weekend. And I'm being attacked by out-of-date plotbunnies. *Sighs*
A question for those of you who actually watched DS9, back in 'the day': I'm curious - what pairings did you like? Which pairings did you dislike? Which ones did you feel were totally smashed onto the series by the producer/writers in a way that made you want to gag? Not that I'm biased and totally thought they did that kind of shit way too much, mind you. Not at all.
While I'm on the subject, here's a little essay found while picture-hunting the other day, contemplating the complete abandonment of Garak and Bashir's friendship in the later seasons of DS9, something that drove me practically up the wall at the time and hasn't failed to irritate me any time I think about the series since. You don't just drop an interaction like that! Bad writers. And the two-second "gee, I guess this is goodbye" at the end of the series doesn't count, damn it.And not just because I was sitting on the couch practically screaming at them to just kiss and get it over with. One quibble about the article - personally, I would argue that Berman/Piller didn't actually have Garak's sexuality within their "artistic perview" after the first episode. They left it to interpretation, the actor interpreted (whoooo boy, did he ever) and any amount of asking him to tone it down that they may or may not have done really couldn't change the fact of that first conversation.
(Regarding the end of the article, though - was I the only person to whom it had absolutely never occurred that there might be sexual tension going on between Seven and Janeway? Admittedly, that show lost my attention there toward the end, but... nope, definitely never caught that vibe. Seven/Doctor, yes, but Seven/Janeway? o_O)
Fandoms never leave. They just go into remission.
Other than that, I've been awake for an hour and have accomplished nothing except eating an apple, reading fic, reading a little bit more of Fantasy Girls, and getting annoyed over things that happened in a sci-fi series that's been defunct for... six years, probably almost to the day. Go me.
Had a really fun night last night, out with
ryunohi, wanderingbeyond and the work people, and then out with part of the usual crew to celebrate coramegan's survival of year 2 of med school. Much alcohol and nachos, much coffee, much strawberry shortcake, and very much silliness all around. Today, I get to write a paper for The Class I hate. And a paper for The Class I Love, too, but that one won't take nearly as long. Which is sad. Fortunately I have all weekend. Unfortunately, this is a really busy weekend. And I'm being attacked by out-of-date plotbunnies. *Sighs*A question for those of you who actually watched DS9, back in 'the day': I'm curious - what pairings did you like? Which pairings did you dislike? Which ones did you feel were totally smashed onto the series by the producer/writers in a way that made you want to gag? Not that I'm biased and totally thought they did that kind of shit way too much, mind you. Not at all.
While I'm on the subject, here's a little essay found while picture-hunting the other day, contemplating the complete abandonment of Garak and Bashir's friendship in the later seasons of DS9, something that drove me practically up the wall at the time and hasn't failed to irritate me any time I think about the series since. You don't just drop an interaction like that! Bad writers. And the two-second "gee, I guess this is goodbye" at the end of the series doesn't count, damn it.
(Regarding the end of the article, though - was I the only person to whom it had absolutely never occurred that there might be sexual tension going on between Seven and Janeway? Admittedly, that show lost my attention there toward the end, but... nope, definitely never caught that vibe. Seven/Doctor, yes, but Seven/Janeway? o_O)
Fandoms never leave. They just go into remission.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2006-05-27 05:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-27 05:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-28 03:46 am (UTC)My post in my LJ, however, might have me strung up. Just not by you. *laughs and wanders off*
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Date: 2006-05-28 04:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-28 08:03 am (UTC)One of my duties at work is to switch magazines out of their holders weekly so people can read the latest issues. Perhaps a week or so ago, there was an op ed article in Times or Newsweek (perhaps US News and World Report?) talking about how Bush's form of Christianity isn't the same as all forms of Christianity, like the Taliban's form of being Muslim isn't all forms of Islam. He called for Bush's form of Christianity for be called Christianist instead of Chrisianism, which I found interesting--true, I only skimmed the article, but still, I'm wondering if I could find it online and link it, to start a debate in my LJ, considering I've got a girl whose father is running for public office on the Republican ticket in a special election on my friends list, and a self-avowed "liberal commie pinko" who would quite happily live in Canada if he could. (The Communist part's mostly exaggerated, but...)
Anyway, now that I've written you a novel... ;)
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Date: 2006-05-28 03:43 pm (UTC)http://www.time.com/time/archive/preview/0,10987,1191826,00.html
I think it's moved to subcriber access only now that it's no longer the current issue, but some quuck Googling got me someone who c&p-ed it to their own blog.
http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/17490.htm
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Date: 2006-05-28 03:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-29 04:30 am (UTC)That really is so true. There are crazies in every religion (or whatever group, really), but when the crazies are loud and powerful... it tends to mess things up so much more than usual.
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Date: 2006-05-27 06:35 pm (UTC)Are you having a "good" busy weekend, or a "bad" busy weekend?
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Date: 2006-05-27 10:51 pm (UTC)Eh, good busy, I guess? Aside from wanting to kill my stupid anthro paper. Dear sweet gods I cannot wait to be done with that stupid class.
Ahh, DS9
Date: 2006-05-27 06:48 pm (UTC)Well, I was always a fan of Sisko and Cassidy. I don't actually have more to say about that though because I only cared about them so much. I was generally happy with Kira and Bariel and very amused that Kira had the most varied sex life of any of the characters. Especially considering the original concept of the character, it was surprising to see how much she apparently did care about sex. Kira/Odo, on the other hand. They had some cute moments that weren't all gag-worthy, but we also had to put up with Odo pining after her for years, and it just seemed like he could have been doing something better with his time.
Bad pairings:
The worst: DAX AND WORF! What the hell? Wouldn't it be funny if we half built up tension between Bashir and Dax and then made a Uie. Would this be a reason it's bad to have little symbionts running around reminding you how much you love the Klingons even though the current host has never been to the homeworld? Dax's death made me so happy. All the mushy stuff in between they're really bizarre courtship and her dying was stomach turning.
Runner up for the worst: Ezri and Bashir. Boy, remember all those fans who wanted Jadzia and Julian to get it on 5 years ago? Well, let's throw them a bone. A really tiny, gnarly one. And let's make Julian sillier than he's been in years over this one. And don't even get me started on Ezri.
Pairings that could have been but were beautiful the way they were:
1. Bashir and O'Brien. They gave me no end of pleasure. There were some weak moments, a la O'Brien comes back from his undercover sting with the Orion Syndicate and Julian just gives him the get over it speech instead of recalling that he too sympathized with the enemy once and could have some frickin compassion. But the darts and the holoprograms and the bickering. The great scene where O'Brien confesses that "I don't...hate you...anymore," and the even better scene where they realize he loves Keiko but he likes Bashir better. Where are all the great fanfics? I've only found a few.
2. Odo and Quark. Hard to realistically picture a relationship. I think it would ruin the dynamic. But god, they rocked.
Silly relationships: Just about all of Bashir's flings. Leeta?? What was up with that? And then there's Leeta and Rom, which was generally harmless but sometimes I wanted to hit the mute button. They both make the most god awful whining noises. Dax and that guy from the 1st season with his world that only appeared once every 100 years or whatever. Boy, I've only known you for 3 days, but I'm going to sit and my room and weep disconsolately for a week over you.
And now to Garak and Bashir. This is where the gap in my watching takes its toll. Sometime, I think in the 6th season, I stopped watching regularly, partially because I couldn't stand Dax and Worf that much, and then I didn't see anything of the 7th season until this year when I watched them all on Spike TV. Because a lot of years went on in between, I didn't actually notice that their level of interaction took a nose dive, but now that you mention it...yeah, that does suck. In the end, though, I confess I'd never even considered the possibility of a relationship until I stumbled across some fanfic of that nature this year. I could go either way on it.
The flood subsides.
Re: Ahh, DS9
Date: 2006-05-27 10:50 pm (UTC)Sisko and Cassidy were definitely cool - I especially loved Cassidy, just because of the way she dealt with everything and kept her cool. Awesome woman. My one regret is that they never bothered to have her interact with the other female characters, to my memory, which would've been interesting. Kira and Bariel, also interesting although occasionally I got creepy vibes off Bariel. Might've been seeing him as a very immoral view of Lord Byron in some random movie in a highschool English class that did that, I don't know.
Kira/Odo made me kind of sad, because it seemed like a cop-out, in so many ways, to have him in love with her. Would it be so awful for two people to have a lot of history and a deep friendship without falling in love?
I was actually totally okay with Worf and Dax - not sure why, but they amused me. Maybe it's because I always liked them as individuals, so when they got together... *Shrugs* I will totally agree with you on Ezri and Bashir, though - I hated the two of them together. Almost as much as I hated Ezri on her own, in fact...
Odo and Quark were so fun. I would never in a zillion years think to pair them in an actual relationship (largely because... umm... ick), but they were hilarious. O'Brien and Bashir, though... I hate to admit it, but I never liked O'Brien. I know he was the 'common man,' he was the family guy, he was the one we were supposed to be able to identify with... I just thought he was boring, and a bit irritating. And it seemed like he was always getting captured and tortured/imprisoned by somebody, which was just weird. Why him? Could they not think of anything else to do with him?
Leeta was obnoxious, but at least her and Rom were vaguely amusing in their shared idiocy. Bashir's flings made me want to write a Special Episode of DS9 where he comes under malpractice and sexual harassment charges, much as I liked him. And 100-year-guy qualified as the aboslute low point of Dax's character, and was just plain pathetic. I liked her so much most of the time (free spirit, confident, intelligent, practical... what's not to love?), but that was just plain dumb.
What did it for me on Bashir and Garak was actually going back to watch the first few episodes Garak was in, especially the first. He'd always been one of my favorite characters, and to my vague shame I admit that I thought (and still kind of think) that Bashir is adorable, so I was probably pre-disposed. But the first episode he's in, the actor who played Garak was laying on the seduction vibe thick. Like, I'm surprised the director didn't tell him to tone it down. Once I'd watched that as a late teen, it stuck in my head, and I just couldn't stop seeing it.
Re: Ahh, DS9
Date: 2006-05-28 06:24 am (UTC)Re: Ahh, DS9
Date: 2006-05-28 06:53 am (UTC)...Oh god. I've never tried to write O'Brien before, but I am sooo tempted by that, now.
Poor Bashir. He's such a moron. I could totally see all these crazy machinations going on behind his back, and eventually almost right out in front of him, and him being totally unaware.
Re: Ahh, DS9
Date: 2006-05-28 03:44 am (UTC)Ironically? I loved Nicole deBoer's character in Cube. (I almost made a reference to the movie above... don't want to spoil anything. heh)
But yes. Ezri, compared to Jadzia, was a whiny little... thing. UGH.
Re: Ahh, DS9
Date: 2006-05-28 04:13 am (UTC)As for Cube, I don't think I've ever heard of it. Huh. Recent? I guess it'd have to be, Nicole deBoer is pretty young....
Re: Ahh, DS9
Date: 2006-05-28 07:54 am (UTC)Re: Ahh, DS9
Date: 2006-05-29 04:28 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-27 06:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-27 09:02 pm (UTC)Oh god. It's so true, but that makes me laugh. I feel kind of guilty, now, for not having liked Janeway - I'm a feminist, I wanted to like her, I wanted her to be a good role model... but something in there just didn't work, for me.
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Date: 2006-05-28 03:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-28 04:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-28 06:20 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-28 06:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-28 07:56 am (UTC)And I'm using this icon to beat you down from here. :P ^^
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Date: 2006-05-29 04:27 am (UTC)And that icon is very cute.
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Date: 2006-05-29 01:45 am (UTC)I remember when Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges was first aired, with its 92-second Garak appearance. (I timed it!) We were actually pretty darn glad to get that, especially when it was revealed that there'd been a miscommunication between Andy, his agent, and the producers: the evening before he was due to shoot, he was packing to visit his daughter on the East Coast. The president of his fan club phoned him to ask about filming on the episode, which is the only thing that alerted him to the fact that he had filming that week. He then called his agent and found out he was supposed to be on set the next morning!
Collectively, we were extremely put out by Bashir/Ezri in the last few episodes--aside from our Garak bias, we mostly figured she'd be better off with Jake or Quark. Or hey, alone. Imagine a woman who has non-relationship-based storylines! We also felt it was cruel of her to tell him that if Worf hadn't come along, "it would have been you." What a thing to say to a grieving man!
Several of the G/B fans, including me, viewed the Bashir/O'Brien homoeroticism as a way for the writers to thumb their noses at us specifically. :0) (A bit paranoid in retrospect, but whatever.) Not only did they stop the onscreen Bashir/Garak interaction, but they started giving him deliberately homoerotic interaction with a man completely unlike Garak. I felt taunted, I tell you.
BTW, I just friended you. I hope that's okay.
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Date: 2006-05-29 04:26 am (UTC)That story about "Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges" (which, I have to say, is probably the most hideously hard-to-remember title in any TV show I've ever paid attention to) sounds like an actor's worst nightmare. Poor man!
It's interesting you should mention that about Ezri - I initially had wanted to like her, but that scene in the replimat absolutely ruined her for me. What kind of counselor thinks that something like that would be a good thing to say?! Even without my devotion to G/B, I couldn't imagine her and Bashir lasting long - you're right that she seems more suited to someone like Jake, both in age and in personality. And think how many strange moments that could lead to for her and Sisko! ;)
As for O'Brien... honestly, I only remember wondering if they were really intending to put all of that subtext in, at least as anything other than a joke. I couldn't decide whether or not to feel upset or insulted, or on whose behalf. It was a bizarre development, that's for sure.
Of course! I'm flattered, to be honest!
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Date: 2006-05-29 06:23 pm (UTC)