![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
summer_skinAm I the ONLY one who saw the big 'ole target stamped on Henderickson's forehead? I called it last year! When I call something that's going to happen I figured it would have been waaaaaaaaay more obvious to other people. And last night's episode was just setting him up to fall. It's what happens. The Winchesters are a curse, okay? Next to no one around them stays alive. The people they save from week to week are given passes because they're innocent victims and have no part in the mytharc of the plot. But everyone else around them who's been involved in the whole demon thing? A TARGET.
We've seen this since season 1 when Meg went after Caleb and Pastor Jim, with the Ash and the Roadhouse in season 2. It's just what happens. It's like what the baddie in Serenity said: "If your quarry goes to ground, leave no ground to go to." It's no different here.
I've also been having issues within myself over the rising criticism of there being misogyny and now racism in the show. To be totally and perfectly honest I've never noticed any of it until people started making noise about it.
To be more honest, I don't care, either. While some people have been posting huge metas about it, pointing out what was wrong with this episode or that episode (like 3.09) I was sitting back feeling TOTALLY inadequate because I DON'T SEE IT. I STILL feel that way. I've been feeling like I'm less of a fan or a woman because I enjoy the show for the show.
Do I think people are seeing nonexistent spots? No, not at all. I totally think they're right and there have been instances where women have been portrayed in a less than flattering light on the show. I've even mentioned before about how the victim of the week is most generally a woman and even I have recognized how stereotypical that is. But you know what? I don't care.
I don't see Dean calling a witch a 'bitch', even repeatedly, anything more than trying to find a word to describe the creature she is/was. I don't see Ben in 302 saying, "only grownups send bitches" to mean a slur against women. I see 'bitch' as a term that's evolved to describe any number of things/people now. I don't equate bitch with a woman pretty much at all anymore because it DEPENDS ON CONTEXT. It's just a term for me now. CAN it be used as a derogatory term? Of course. But the way I hear a lot of people using it now on TV or in RL I doubt that anyone thinks of a female in their mind or is actually referring to one when they say it. Am I explaining myself well at all here?
There was also some rumbles of discontentment earlier in the season during 'Red Sky at Morning' when Sam and Dean were both being objectified by women. I'm starting to get whiplash here. If you have a problem with people being objectified period, that's fine, but the majority of this fandom does it to Jared and Jensen and Sam and Dean on a daily basis. I'm getting so confuuuuused.
I love this show. I love the boys. I love that the show has this huge mytharc thing going for it that sucks me in. If there's an episode about the mytharc I'm SO there with bells on. I love it and everything about it, trying to connect the pieces, etc. There are elements of the show I take issue with at times, whether it be a character's writing or a clunky scene or how things played out but it's not something that I let affect how much I love the show.
I've also seen some people complaining that the show has changed this season and that it's not the same as it was in seasons 1 and 2. My answer to that is, well duh. It's season 3! The boys aren't in the same places they were in seasons 1 and 2. Things HAVE to change. The show is turning more toward mytharc centred episodes all the time and less one-shots. The strike doesn't help that, either. The boys have been through A LOT OF SHIT. Sam's died, Dean's died a BUNCH of times, Dean's soul is going to be kaput in a few months, Sam's either wanted to be a demon king or dead by another opposing demon ruler, there's a war coming (or they're already in the thick of it, depending how you look at it) Sam's dealing with his mom's involvement with the whole shebang (which is something I have an issue with because it hasn't been focused on AT ALL since it was revealed at the beginning of the season), etc, etc.
The boys in seasons 1 and 2 were totally footloose and fancy free compared to how they are now. Things that happened in both of those seasons have led season 3, to the boys being the people they are now. You can't want a show to continue and the plot to progress if you want the characters to stay who they were in seasons past.
The bottom line is that I love the show, warts and all. I don't want to start picking it apart because that's when I start to NOT like it anymore and I'm not ready to do that. I doubt I'll ever see what other people do but I don't want to force myself into trying to, especially when I feel VERY inadequate when I don't get it the way other people do and, at times, feel almost guilty for NOT getting it. I want to love this show as long as I can.
This was written over the course of the day and I wasn't sure if I was going to post it, because I'm a wiener, but then I saw someone from my flist post about it and
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif){kind=small}
veronamay and I can feel like I'm not crazy for not seeing what other people are. 
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 05:05 am (UTC)Anyway. Yeah. You're not alone, and I'm starting to get a headache from all of this stuff. I agree that I feel...less of a woman, I guess? For just not SEEING IT.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 06:26 am (UTC)And since Hendricksen chasing them down is only a story beat you can play so many times before people start yawning- sooner or later, something was going to happen to take him out in one way or another.
I mean, YES, I see the point that the fact that he WAS cast as black maybe has some kind of meaning in a larger social context- but I don't think the writers are writing with an eye towards larger social context- they're writing for what they think the show needs from a story point of view only. (I can promise you, not once has 'social context of your work' been brought up as a consideration in any of my classes or textbooks thus far.)
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 05:18 am (UTC)yeah I am the same way I never see any of that stuff, I see the long upset posts about it and sometimes its like :O "did I miss something?"
I actually aree with everything in your post, so most certainly dont think your alone
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 05:18 am (UTC)I watch this show because I ENJOY it and it's entertaining and it makes me FEEL stuff. I don't watch it to pick it apart and complain about all the stuff that's wrong. I don't 100% love every teeny tiny bit, but taking the time to harp on all the bad stuff isn't fun for me.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 06:00 am (UTC)I couldn't agree more, on all points. It's getting to the point where fandom is starting to become unfun after each episode airs, because I KNOW there is going to be something that SOMEONE just has to pick apart. I feel like I'm the only one just sitting back and ENJOYING IT.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 07:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 06:00 am (UTC)Like I have said to
But yeah, I kinda feel like maybe I am a bad feminist or something, because I am not seeing the things that so many people seem to be.
So yes, thank you for verbalising it.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 07:11 am (UTC)Once everything started coming out and people started posting about it it took a while for me to pinpoint why it bothered me so much. But then I realized it was BECAUSE I didn't get it that was bothering me and, really, it made me feel dumb and like I just shouldn't talk about it because everyone else was wrong and I was too dumb to see it. I even IM'd a friend of mine who mentioned that she understood and kind of agreed with what everyone was saying and asked her to explain it to me to see if that would make me get it but it just comes down to it not being a big enough thing to eclipse the glee I feel for the show.
Man, I miss the days when the biggest thing in fandom was "Sam or Dean" and "Jared or Jensen".
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 06:13 am (UTC)Though I must ask... why isn't any of the people complaining of misogyny and racism referencing Tamara from TMS? Case and point of a strong, female, African American character that held her own and survived. That's a two-for-one hit against the accusations.
My own musings aside, I applaud you for posting this.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 07:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 07:17 am (UTC)-gives you chocolate- Chocolate makes everything better. -nods- Chocolate and porn.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 07:52 am (UTC)Mmmm. Pudding porn....
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 07:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 06:28 am (UTC)In case you were wondering. :)
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 06:32 am (UTC)FRAH. But anywho. I agree completely with this post. :)
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 06:36 am (UTC)But what I'd like to know is how much of the script is casting given when they're going through auditions? And also, how much influence do the writers have on casting beyond saying, "We need such-and-such body type/mannerisms/abilities for this character"? And how do the writers decide who lives and dies anyway? I mean, according to Kripke, neither Gordon nor Henricksen were originally supposed to be recurring characters, so the writers didn't even know precisely where their particular arcs were going when they first were cast. And let's face it, by the end of "Hunted" everyone knew that Gordon *had* to die - he was simply too dangerous for the boys to let him live beyond one or two more episodes.
The race issue came up at one point last season, and I mentioned then that I honestly couldn't think of a white actor who would have been able to pull off the spectacular scary-ness of Gordon without coming off as right-out smarmy (really, can you think of a white guy who has Sterling K. Brown's absolute intensity and the capability to pull off that role without being slimy? Because I sure can't). I also argued that perhaps it wasn't so much a lack of racial diversity in the show, but a lack of characters who survive more than a few episodes (if even more than one). Because as you said, very few of the good guys survive - the boys (obviously) and Bobby are the only ones who are still around from S1.
I never called the death of Henrickson because I honestly didn't see it coming. I was hoping for a more prolonged chase and didn't expect him to find out the truth for a while (of course, I was also hoping for a Gordon-Henrickson match-up in that chase, which was sadly dashed with "Fresh Blood").
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 07:24 am (UTC)The whole premise of the show makes it incredibly hard for there to be ANY recurring characters. It was set up as two boys on a roadtrip, saving the world one victim at a time, you know? I think part of the draw of a lot of characters we'd like to see again is that we've had them in small doses only. To integrate them into the show in a bigger way would shift the balance and might not be as well liked as they initially were.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 07:40 am (UTC)I'm not disagreeing with the general point of your comment, but I do think Adrian Pasdar could. Of course he was too busy being Nathan and last season Heroes was brilliant and I wouldn't have had him anywhere else. But the guy who played Jim Profit and Dawson Cole and Ben Aharon can, I think, be as intense as anyone needs him to be.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 03:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-24 10:33 am (UTC)Also, I just remembered that Adrian actually is of Iranian descent *facepalms* how did I forget that? (I'm actually much more of an Adrian fan than a Heroes fan...I've loved him since Profit and I think Heroes underuses him...)
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 08:59 am (UTC)Both easily-answered questions! I read a LOT of spoilers, and for casting, they use what are called "script sides" - teeny portions of scripts. Sometimes these can include every speaking part a character has, sometimes they'll include only a couple lines. It just depends! But with the first introduction of a character, there will usually be a note about what character the writer has in mind when they're writing the part - lots of descriptors like "beautiful", "wise", "elderly", "blonde", "prim", "vapid", "leggy", whatever. But the people that often end up getting cast? Aren't the same as what you see in those descriptions. I'll often read about a girl being a fair-skinned redhead in a script, and it turns out she gets played by a black actress!
Which is why I get completely and utterly confused when people bitch about how badly a show writers "their black characters". Often times, you won't know a character's skin color until they're cast (which can be between a day and two weeks before an episode is filmed). I've even seen instances where people written as men end up with WOMEN in the parts, so. *hands!* You never know who's going to rock the part in an audition room, and that's probably the best way for it to be, right? I'd rather characters be written without a race in mind (except where necessary to the plot - such as in Route 666). But that's just me. :)
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 09:06 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 06:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 03:43 pm (UTC)I think there are a lot of flustered people who maybe don't realize that the only way the show can come up with diversity is to cast people in roles where they will end up dead (because there aren't that many recurring roles to begin with). And actually, if you think about it, two out of the five characters (besides the boys and Bobby) who had recurring roles in S2 - by which I mean they have appeared in more than two episodes total - were black. Which actually isn't a bad ratio.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 06:57 pm (UTC)*whisper* Everybody on this show dies! White, black, purple, female, male, redhead, crippled, whatever. It's a horror show, that stuff just comes with the territory. Kripke said he set out to write a horror movie every week - well, in horror movies? You're lucky if one of 5 protagonists ever survive. *shrug* There are cliches you can consider - the token funny/stupid dude, the super polite good girl, the slut, the black dude, so on and so forth ...
But hmph. *thinkface* Misogynist and racist? I'm going to need something more extreme than cliches to apply words that strong. But again, that's just me. :)
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 08:17 am (UTC)Thanks again. I'm loving season three and I love the way Sam and Dean's characters are developing and changing. And now we have a White Eyed Demon! \O/
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 08:18 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 09:26 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 10:00 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 10:56 am (UTC)The bottom line is that I love the show, warts and all. I don't want to start picking it apart because that's when I start to NOT like it anymore and I'm not ready to do that. I doubt I'll ever see what other people do but I don't want to force myself into trying to, especially when I feel VERY inadequate when I don't get it the way other people do and, at times, feel almost guilty for NOT getting it. I want to love this show as long as I can.
It's early, considering the time I went to sleep last night, so all I can really say right now is: Too bloody right.
I watch the show because I want to get away from years of being trained to pick everything to pieces, to be critical and to look at every angle. I don't want to pick the show apart, because then I'll end up hating it. But I don't want to feel like I'm less of a fan, or not as smart, for not looking for these things, for happily glossing over them.
And really, even if it wasn't obvious at the beginning, as soon as Hendrickson changed his ways he was a goner. That's the way these things work. Having him on side would have cut the boys a long term break when it comes to the law, and you know that can't happen.
And wow, I actually said more there than I planned...
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 10:57 am (UTC)I watch Supernatural (or any of my shows) simply for the entertainment value, to be enthralled with the characters and captivated by the storylines and plots. I don't go looking for things to nitpick and it's ridiculous that fandom will sometimes overreact to the simplest things that, in their mind, they think is the writer/creator's agenda or personal propaganda or whatever. Like you said, to them it's there because they see what they want to see, but sometimes I wonder if they're just seeing it because they think it's there or because they want to think it's there. Does that make sense? I don't know, but for me it's mainly looking for something where there's nothing to begin with, just to make noise about it. There might be something there they'll see, but it'll be blow way out of porportion than what was intended.
And it's not just SPN, lately I've seen other fandoms make noise over the same issues regarding the portrayal or gender roles or race in shows. Personally, I just don't see what the big fuss is about. Then again, it's all about personal perception. Though people tend to get too riled up over it when really, they should just let it go.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 01:37 pm (UTC)So thanks. This has really reassured me. :D
no subject
Date: 2008-02-29 08:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 03:41 pm (UTC)I was beginning to feel like the only way the show could avoid charges of misogyny was to never have any female antagonists.
I thought I might be the only feminist SPN fan who thinks it's all a tempest in a teapot. (Witches aren't evil 'cause they're women, they're evil 'cause they're WITCHES. Lilith was the BABY-EATING WIFE OF SATAN before she was ever a 'reclaimed figure of feminine empowerment'. URK.)
Anyways, thanks again.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-23 03:47 pm (UTC)Re: This empty bedroom won't make anything right
Date: 2008-02-23 07:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-24 12:08 am (UTC)Clearly, I agree with you. And I am so glad to see so many people agreeing with you, because all of the posts about the misogyny and racism that is supposedly dripping off of every frame of our show was really getting ridiculous, in my opinion. I definitely need more people who are watching the same show I am.
no subject
Date: 2008-02-29 07:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-02-24 05:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-03-08 05:22 am (UTC)Amen sister! *High Fives*