Six Feet Under - the humanity is too much with this one.

In retrospect, I can't say I could sit through Six Feet Under from the start for how self-destructive the characters were. Their flaws did make them so unique and interesting but the mindset I was in back then was able to cope with the cynicism and emotional dragging through the mud. I didn't find the ending that sad, but setting myself up to watch this now would be an ordeal.

I guess I wanted to at least address each main character in terms of how garbage and unlikable they could be. I can't be bothered being that all in depth.

Nate's arc over the show points to a more arrogant personality, he's difficult to satisfy, he's kind of a player, he's not that serious about Brenda and he's not so dedicated to the business of undertaking. Yes, he sleeps with Lisa behind Brenda's back and yes she's sleeping around due to a sex addiction issue, but it didn't make him the saint in the situation. Him sleeping with his own stepsister in the end (who isn't a garbage person, and who also apparently becomes pregnant, Nate's incredibly virile and there's a joke he's had a lot of women to whom he may have given many children) made me really dislike him overall. His guilt over Lisa (it's also hinted her kid wasn't Nate's and was possibly Lisa's brother in law's) isn't so grandiose as his resentment towards her.

I mostly liked Brenda and responded to her bouts of depression, but she's tainted by her relationship with her brother, Billy, who's constantly inserting himself in her life to disrupt it and create issues between her and Nate. The weird incest thread they kept coming back to seemed to just be a part of making the show darker, along with Billy being bipolar. (Sadly, some of his episodes of mania/psychosis felt familiar) But largely he was destructive. Weirdly, she's the subject of a famous book, (which I found was very close to the woman in Gone Girl). The quirk of her having a back tattoo of "Nathanial" before Nate realises the story behind it is kind of thin, I don't know whether it was an idea that made her seem sinister so when it's revealed Billy has "Isabel" on his back, after a book of two siblings they loved as children, it then seems plausible. I got why she was cheating but the more she does it, the less relatable she felt. I remember now her relationship with Joe was really interesting and seemed a lot healthier and she still trashes it for Nate. By the time they're back together and Nate's straying again, that's when I ultimately felt sorry for her, especially since she ends up with Nate's first daughter and their own kid. Nate's getting into Quakerism while she's been an atheist the whole time and he looks like a hypocrite while she comes off as the asshole for not taking his sudden spiritual interests seriously. (Why would you when you suspect it's going to be the reason your husband's about to cheat on you again?).

I loved Claire but she had some real issues, which fit with that narcissistic period some teens go through progressing into adulthood, particularly with her sexual partners, one being a girl. I liked they didn't paint this as Claire being honest in her curiosity, she really was a jerk about experimenting and you feel bad for the girl. She was the most entertaining and delightful hooking up with the Republican, Ted, I liked they were chalk and cheese but still had chemistry. Her brief thing with Billy has more impact on him, he just sublimates his obsession with Brenda for Claire for all eternity (evidently boring Brenda to literal death at the end), while for Claire it was more of a walk on the wild side and a chance for her to explore the world in a "maturer" relationship, despite Billy being unstable and immature. Claire was very tender under her surly demeanor, and hell, she had a goddamn green hearse for a car, which for no good reason was a point of ridicule at school. She tended to date broken guys, particularly Russell and Gabe. She makes the bravest decision to take a shot on New York without a job to go to. Her ending's the nicest, I think. (Interestingly her birth year is 1983, and she always seemed much other and more mature to me back then, she certainly isn't on reflection).

David makes the most sacrifices and winds up being the most resentful of Nate. His relationship with Keith is fairly typical in terms of him being in the closet but wanting to stay committed to someone, so his lack of honestly affects them both. Keith stays in the closet on a professional level, so they're both suffering from expectations society thrusts upon gay men. But they also fall into a lot of toxic situations, try to have an open relationship, (which results in Keith sleeping with Buffy's little sister, Dawn, as an obnoxious pop singer, Celeste - she's markedly better at acting in this but not a huge amount). The show was progressive for its time in its depictions of gay sex, it sat on the same relative level as Queer as Folk (this was less graphic). But there wasn't much in the way of representation outside that, since same-sex relationships were still genuinely taboo in the late 90's to put it on TV was brave and groundbreaking. So, yeah, if you do watch this as a Gen Zer, be prepared for a lot of slurs, however David's supposedly the first realistic gay lead character on TV. David's traumatic carjacking throws him into a spiral which ends with a confrontation with the guy, who can barely even remember him, that episode's kinda burnt onto my mind, it's very interesting in terms of how David's manipulated into doing crack and letting the carjacker blow him, it at least explores the notion of you still being a victim despite agreeing to your attacker's terms. David's probably the least problematic and his flaws feel more acceptable. Keith's hardly a good guy but they make sense as a couple, you want them to stay together.

Ruth's a typical neurotic mother, I remember her story lines more. As a widower, she's suddenly free to pursue other relationships, and exploring the concept of her as a sexual being with wants and needs really sets her apart from other matriarchs. Her sister was a lot of fun, despite being an addict disguised as a hippy. She has a relationship with the man she was having an affair with, has another relationship with a florist who employs her in her first job outside of being a housewife, and she eventually marries James Cromwell, then has to leave him because he's a crackpot, and that's how Nate discovers Maggie, his daughter. In the middle of it, she hooks up with Rainn Wilson too, him basically being Rainn Wilson while having an adorable crush on her while working with David as a mortician. I like she ends up caring for dogs with her sister and the sister's caretaker, that she doesn't end up with a man, even though George is there when she dies. She's a great character, the neuroses are hard to watch but she's easily the most human of everyone having to deal with repressed emotions and wanting the best for her family despite her personal desires.

I won't go into Rico and Vanessa, their stories were still interesting, it rounded out the ensemble, but they weren't particularly bad or good. I didn't like he cheated on Vanessa with a stripper who's basically using him for financial support and he's a complete sucker about it. I liked Vanessa as a character, she didn't succumb to any victimhood from being cheated on. The show was full of interesting characters, just situation-wise, it's a slog to get through on the emotional front and I tended to binge it when I was miserable, so it says a lot to the fact I'm less miserable and don't really want to go through a dirge, despite the show's moments of Ally McBealesque levity (Claire breaking into song in her head was always fun). 

The best thing about the show was using the dead person/s of the week to symbolise a character's inner monologues. It didn't get particularly tired, even if the characters' actions became tiresome in that soap opera way. That's the part I can't really see myself tolerating from the start.

Weeds: My addiction died by the end.

Another classic, this time from 2006. Parenthetical amendments.

Ok, so it's not like I haven't been watching TV for a long time. {I didn't have a high speed connection so I was still relying on actual TV that year}. And though I haven't seen every show out there, I've been aware of most. And there's an ass-groove in my couch that will be visible centuries from now. But my life has been lacking that certain something... that little weekly fix, the access to a nice mental oasis that only television can supply. {This is also pre Netflix binge era that's now returned to weekly episodes because that model is no longer sustainable.} 

No series has come up and grabbed me by the throat and compelled me to turn to the tv at the same bat time and channel for quite some time. Not that there hasn't been a few that weren't brilliant. Sadly I couldn't dedicate myself to Veronica Mars or Six Feet due to their allotments to ridiculous timeslots and what have you... {I still haven't watched Veronica Mars and don't think I can stomach Six Feet Under remembering how garbage the characters are}. 

But I am prepared dedicate myself to one show: Weeds. Thank CHRIST for this show or I'd probably have given up on TV all together. Weeds is so close to flawless on all levels it's putting me in a state of paranoia. Oh to have been a fly on the wall when this was pitched to the network: suburban widow becomes local pot dealer to support her children. And it's not like that's it, folks, that's the only thing going for it. Add to the zip-lock bag the near perfect casting, fantastic story lines and beautiful locations and you have probably one of the best shows I've seen since... god knows what. and thank you Christ yet again that those losers responsible for the Emmys (who should be executed for crimes against humanity for never awarding Joss for Buffy {Wrong, they were right not to give this guy too many props}) bestowed their award 4 times upon Weeds.(because god knows they have A LOT of making up to do.) The dichotomy between the lower-class black crime ridden neighbourhood and the white upper-middle carbon copy ticky-tacky house one is so slight it's hilarious. There's obviously a sinister current running through both, one's just more visible than the other. The characterisation is spot on. You hate some of the regulars one minute, and can't help rootin for them the next. This is a show gen Yers have been gagging for. We're not gonna be sold on the reefer-madnessesque propaganda our governments are trying to spoon-feed us through the media. Weeds puts it all in perspective, and it's educational without being a total "how-to" for setting up shop. The main character isn't a smoker, hell she even states she's not a dealer. But she is a mother, and Mary Louise Parker has rammed the nail through the board with her portrayal of the widow just trying to get by. These aspects and the gorgeous and infectious theme tune, an old ditty from the 30s that sums up the show so well I applauded the first time I heard it (It's stuck in my head as I write this), make this show a hard habit to break. I can't find much wrong with Weeds. I'm hooked. I'll need to go to rehab to help with the withdrawal I'll suffer when the series is over... and I'll be back on it as soon as Season 2 starts up here. It's official, ladies and gentlemen, Weeds really is good shit. 

Real shame it fell in so many toilets it wasn't even worth watching all the way through again. Much like Dexter and Sons of Anarchy, (And yes, Game of Thrones- I always maintained I'd buy all the seasons to make up for my stealing them but we never bothered with the final season), I can't go back to the start knowing the endings are awful. Six Feet Under finished strong but I'm not the same person I was when that was airing and it's depressing to watch characters behave so badly because they hate themselves. There's even a new season of Dexter coming that doesn't look bad, but there's no telling if it'll be good, it seems to just be a compensation for its horrendous final episodes. All these shows suffered from coming out of the gate too strong. Breaking Bad was at least relatively consistent, El Camino was enjoyable but I didn't need it to exist. Better Call Saul just gets better, I've already rewatched it once, and I think it'll finish strong. Weeds really did let itself down by having too kooky a premise that by the time it wandered into the realms of ridiculous it was a frustrating watch that had a weird, existential ending, I can't say the lead characters were invested in continuing. It's hard to say what direction it began with but again the characters all became bad, made awful decisions that were hard to related to or support and then you didn't care what happened. Sons of Anarchy was infuriating, poor Jimmy Smits falls for Gemma, gets involved with the club and Jax at the cost of his own business that was fine until Gemma and Jax showed up, then he gets lumped with the kids so Jax can make a messiah-level sacrifice and bail on the situation rather than go to jail where he belongs. But then Jimmy Smits' character in Dexter kinda ruined that season. I could probably watch Weeds up until she gets into bed with the Mexican cartel. She goes to jail but as soon as she's out she's looking to deal again which is annoying. Ben Folds did some episodes. Apparently it might have a sequel but meh, who cares? I didn't think Mary-Louise Parker was down to keep going.

Bullshit I once wrote about James Cameron and Joss Wheedon I need to fix.

I think I'm starting a series of posts from my other blog that kind of belong here with lengthy corrections to my stupid, decade plus shitty observations. So, once again, I'll be parenthetical and amend my bollocks.

 

This post comes off the back of my viewing of Avatar. This is not a review, more a statement I feel needs to be made in regards to its director, James Cameron. And whilst writing this, I felt I couldn't leave out Joss Whedon in my argument.

Jim has copped some flack recently over Avatar being too derivative. Matt and Trey labeled it Dances with Smurfs, my brother has found it too like Disney's Fern Gully. Watching it, I came to the realisation that everything is derivative now. Avatar is Native American spirituality 101. Or to be more blunt, Message from Gaia to American armed forces: you're on my list, mother fuckers. Let's face it, given the state of the planet now, we can all be called Earth Mother Fuckers. This is essentially the crux of Avatar as far as I was concerned. There was nothing pretentious about it. Very basic narrative structure. But one thing Jim has achieved once again in this epically long (my butt was hurting really bad towards the end) allegory is the depiction of a strong female archetype. 

Before I go into any descriptions relating to Avatar, I'll ask you to cast your minds back to the iconic Sarah Connor. Her transformation from meek diner waitress to Green Beret trained soldier has not been something that has been replicated so readily of late. Monsieur Cameron has done more for the resurrection of the Athena archetype in film than I can say for our mutual friend, Little Miss Stephanie Meyer. {This was my year of hate for her} What saddens me is Sarah has done nothing to inspire women to take up arms against any oppressors much less cybernetic killing machines from the future, while Miss Meyer has caused thousands of young girls (and sadly their insipid mothers) to bare their wrists and hearts to an abusive, callous vampire who doesn't even fucking exist. (Before anyone accuses me of hypocrisy, yes, I was fully prepared to bare my neck for Brad Pitt and/or Tom Cruise - but at least Claudia had more balls than Bella Swan.) 

Neytiri, the female lead of Avatar, mimics Artemis and Athena in her stance as huntress, and later warrior in the battle against the humans on Pandora. {This was me in post uni trying to get back into Greek mythology/archetype comparisons} Her fragility in opening to love to a stranger and human takes nothing from her reserve as a fighter. What the fear is (as we already know), like a woman cannot be spiritual and sexual at once, she cannot be powerful and frail at once either. Cameron has represented both aspects in near-unison in Neytiri and Sarah. Both characters express passion to the point of hysteria when they are betrayed or not believed in. Their intelligence and forward thinking is not suppressed in order to attract a mate, it is apparent in order to protect or avenge him. Another character Cameron has conceived is Max Guevara from the short run series Dark Angel. Genetically engineered for military purposes, Max is designed to be the perfect soldier, but cannot erase or diminish her emotional side. This in most parts acts as no hindrance to her ability to carry out missions with callous precision. 

Meanwhile, another writer/director who doesn't get enough props for helping feminism is Joss Whedon. {Retract all of this. What he did to Charisma Carpenter was abysmal and I wish it'd come out way sooner since she seemed to be the only one suffering under his bullshit}. The Slayer. Enough said. River. No further discussion required. Zoe. I can shut up now, if you have no idea what I'm referring to, Google the shit out of Buffy and Firefly. The women in Joss's universe are as apt and as powerful as their male counterparts. Even his villianesses had a lot of moxy. Frail and emotional yet capable of fierce retribution, Joss's female characters are believable role models for young women, but yet again, Stephanie Meyer seems to be the only one having any influence over said demographic. I can't blame her in the entirety on this. For one thing, James Cameron doesn't really write for women as a whole. Joss has a huge underground following, but sadly I've known some of his fans, and Buffy failed to have any influence on them in the bravado department. {Buffy is overrated, to be honest, I like it but it's not brilliant.} I've taken courses that touched on feminism in cinema, and ate up the whole "vagina dentata" BS analogy, but it failed to illustrate where the strong female archetypes have risen in modern film and television. I would hope this would be rectified at some point, given there's a lot of fodder for study in both these artist's work, and the only fodder Ms Meyer can produce is for the unit "Why Feminism is Failing" 101. As Tori knows it's getting harder and harder to empower anyone, much less women. We're all being downtrodden. But if any of us bitches had a little Sarah Connor in us, shit could get serious. For the better.

Okay so there's nothing I need to really fix but this is badly written and so in line with me trying to get write essays rather than blog posts so my analytical mind didn't shut down. Oh, and James Cameron sucks too. The fact he thinks Avatar can still be a thing in four more sequels is laughable. He has an ego that knows no bounds.

So I have to reverse everything I said in this about Joss now it's come to light he really is the misogynistic bastard most sensible feminists saw him as. I'm only glad someone like Gal Gadot was actually taken seriously when she took her complaint about him to the higher-ups. I'm not her biggest fan, I genuinely didn't like Wonder Woman, I think it was overhyped and over-praised, and now in the sequel, there's some really questionable as fuck scenarios involving her character's treatment of a man (not her fault she can't be held accountable for shit writing), but I feel like Joss believed he had it over on her, decided because she wasn't a native speaker of English she was just another exotic bimbo and could put her in her place with a classic "ya career's on the line, toots" strategy only to be foiled by her publicly now. I believe everything that's been said of Joss because you can imagine the arrogance the praise got him for his shows, which also weren't the most brilliant, they were just clever, and back then, clever accounted for straight up genius. He didn't fix Justice League, he didn't fix bad portrayals of women in film and television. He's actually done nothing for humanity as a whole. Straight up asshole. Sorry. Also apparently he left some kid by a lake (when he was a kid) and they drowned. Don't know why you'd bring that up in an interview designed to set any records straight.

Rebel in the Rye and the art of handholding for dumb audiences.

I don't know how to feel about Catcher in the Rye anymore. I liked it then I studied it for uni and hated it then I just read hit pieces on the author that said he was a philandering cad. Now I'm watching Rebel in the Rye, and I forgot Kevin Spacey was in it, but I persevered. He's not good. Nicholas Hoult's a favourite of mine, and he does well with whatever you give him, (see the Favourite in particular). Oh, and there's my boy James Urbaniak, in a little bit role.

The problem with these fanciful biopics is they tend toward overdramatic montages, like this teeters on the edge of that tired cliche of clicking typewriters and pages flying in the air scored to fast, ethereal music. Like there is no other way to show the creative process. It insists upon defining a writer, I'd show this to people who struggle with their want to write over their need for recognition. Then there's the war montages, everything's very much by rote here, it's trying to imply some of these memories may be false but then there's nothing to suggest this is true, which I believe alludes to the notion of Holden Caulfield being an unreliable narrator. The scenes of accomplishment and rejection are all saccharine and over-explained. Yes, the protagonist is a known asshole. He has a showdown with the publisher over marketing and distribution, him going into bat for his precious Holden, who his lecturer insists deserves a novel. It's all very blatant as these things tend to be. It's more a highlight reel of the specific events in his life, I can't in all honesty believe the conversations as they're written. Sarah Paulson isn't misused here as the agent, but her adoration of him as an author is so overblown. I didn't know about the meditation, I don't know if he befriended a Hindu swami but apparently he slid right past Scientology and met Hubbard. I guess his reclusiveness is better illustrated. Everyone he respects initially becomes a simp of sorts. It's hard to make a philandering cad sympathetic. It's really hard to hear his family and peers gush over him, it insists with this idea that despite all his flaws people adored him. I found it fascinating he was just intent on being a short story writer, that he had to grapple with the entire process of writing for pleasure versus desiring an audience and publication, something I personally struggled with, this persistence of publishing being "everything" then ironically deciding it isn't by the film's end, once the struggle of recognition (i.e. primarily stalkers and the PTSD triggered paranoia of being lied to and manipulated by journalists), it's almost condescending and it never picks a damn lane, which I resent in all honesty. 

I haven't watched Hoult's rendition of Tolkien, the story of which has some similarities (one being they're both set during WWI and WWII), and came out two years later, but I recall seeing trailers around the same time. I believe the Tolkien one is better. Rebel in the Rye is really too extravagant, I think a degree of subtlety was required but this seemed to be directed at readers to reflect what they think of famous authors and the publishing industry, rather than authors who understand the intricacies of being an author. This obsession with people keeping rejection letters you can show off when you're finally published or use as motivation, that in itself is tired. I don't recommend people do this, especially considering people don't write individual letters to authors anymore when they're rejected, and they tend to be way too nice with their carbon copy form letters anyway, which encourage bad writers to keep at it. For you to get a  solid reason as to why you're not being published, that's a luxury afforded very few now, because there are too many players and not enough parts. It's not that encouraging to tell people "Hey, so and so got rejected so many times before they ..." Anyway, as someone who went through this process I wouldn't watch this movie and expect to enjoy it. But if you want to at least use it as a foundation for re-evaluating how you perceive yourself as a writer, it's probably not so bad. It's certainly a good example of the difference between having a wish and the stark reality that when it comes true, it wasn't all you hoped it would be.

Sidenote, I was going over my Heathers the musical rant and completely forgot Salinger refused to let Catcher be Heather Duke's book of choice, which made way more sense, and that's why we had to settle for the public domain text Moby Dick. That would've been way cooler to have a scene where he's told about the script and he refuses its inclusion. So the main character who's the most problematic turns out to be Jason Dean. (PS I thought the Veronicas also took their name from the Archie comics but they were referring to the line, "I'm a Veronica" when JD asks if she's a Heather. So the lawsuit that was issued on the band makes far less sense, according to them they didn't want the "wholesomeness" of Archie ruined by a sexy band duo, which means the concept of Riverdale now makes zero sense. That show is not wholesome.)