Ashes to Ashes 1.05
Mar. 21st, 2008 12:42 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
out_thereOh, Ashes to Ashes. I have issues with you (where I just don't quite love you as much as I want to), but I'll have to love you forever for getting Gene Hunt into a gay bar. Gene Hunt! Defender of all things macho and masculine! In a gay bar!
It's fanfic clichés brought to life! And it made me cackle hysterically. Much like having Ray *successfully* flirt with a guy, and Shaz doing a half-flirting thing with Alex.
I haven't really posted about AtA so far, and I've seen the first five eps, so here are my issues.
Alex. *sigh* Simply put, she's the *least* likeable member of the team. Unfortunately, I think it's just the way the series is set up. In LoM, Sam was our viewpoint, the guy who shared our modern ideology, who clashed terribly with the violent, crude, bigoted Gene Hunt. But that entire series was set up in a way that made the audience -- along with Sam -- start to prefer the less complicated, more action-based world of '73; characters that started out as misogynistic dinosaurs became likeable as they showed their strong principles of protecting civilians (which they all have/had, once you saw past the horrible way they treated people). By the end of LoM, we preferred Gene and his violent, vitriolic anger, and his determination to keep his streets safe.
Now, AtA isn't a sequel to LoM in the sense of exploring how someone from our time reacts to waking up in a different decade. It's not us going into the show sympathising with Alex and her confusion, and trying to get to know strangers. It's a spin-off for Gene (and the wonder that is Chris and Ray, who I love even when they're utter twits). So the audience goes into it already liking Gene, Chris and Ray. We already have a good understanding of the characters (which in this series has grown deeper for both Chris and Ray, I'm glad to say) and we're rooting for them to catch the bad guy.
The only new "main" characters are Alex and Shaz. And this is where I have the issue. Because Shaz is the Annie of this series: a relatively modern-thinking woman (for her time) who thinks for herself within the constraints of her society. She's gutsy and interesting, fun and confident, and she also has to play by the rules of her culture. I like both of them a great deal, so the writers can write female characters that are fun. But Alex… isn't.
Alex isn't a woman in the same mould. She isn't progressive for her time -- she takes modern standards for granted and acts the way she does because that's her *norm*, because she doesn't think the same way the people around her do. She's not thinking for herself, she's simply carrying her cultural norms to another time and acting on them.
Now, having said this, I'm trying really hard not to hold it against Alex herself. For a few reasons. Partly because I've had an actor-crush on her since seeing "Tipping the Velvet" a few years back. Partly because as much as I loved LoM, Sam himself… there were times when I wanted to beat his head into the wall. And pretty much for the same reasons that Alex annoys me: acting on unconsidered social norms, being a know-it-all twit and screwing stuff up, accusing others of acting irrationally and then acting out for purely emotional reasons (usually while in a professional role as a police officer which really bugs me, especially after giving some speech on the right way to be a copper).
So I'm reining in the annoyance and remembering that Sam bugged me a lot in the first few episodes too.
On another note that is not Alex's fault, she's purposely written as a love interest for Gene. (End result of this: me being weirdly charmed by Gene's "insult 'em 'til they fall into your arms" approach and suddenly thinking of LoM as a hell of a lot slashier than I first suspected.) But because of this, I think they're trying to set her up as "feisty" and an equal to Gene. It's the "equal" thing that's rubbing me the wrong way, because Alex just comes across as arrogant. LoM always kept Gene as the boss, always kept him as the metaphorical sheriff, laying down the law in his town. He trusted Sam, he worked with Sam, he respected Sam, but he *never* treated Sam as a complete equal (a begrudged bordering-on-just-maybe-if-we-squint equal, but never an outright balance). The show set him up as the Gov, as the head of the restricted world of CID.
And now, with AtA, they're trying to rewrite the rules a bit so that Gene's authority is lessened and Alex appears more of an equal, and it doesn't sit right. I think it's the gender thing, honestly. Gene Hunt is a chauvinist -- a charming one, but still a guy who thinks that men are intrinsically different and just a bit better at being coppers, than women -- and he patronises them. He automatically considers himself slightly superior and the respect he shows them (i.e. not punching back when Alex hit him) comes from that belief, that obligation to protect those weaker, less capable and less intelligent than himself. (Which, okay, is an attitude he shows towards his entire team to a certain extent -- that they try to emulate him but they're not as capable as Gene, so he needs to protect them from the world -- but it's a stronger attitude when it comes to women.)
With Gene's history of treating women badly, I think the writers are trying to show that what would attract Gene is an equal. But if no other character can equal Gene, it makes no sense that Alex can. Instead, it feels like… okay, I may get kicked out of the feminist club here, but it feels like she's using her gender to get the upper hand. In the punching scene, for example, I was wondering if Gene would hit her back. Except the only thing that stopped him was she was a woman (and therefore weaker, and he doesn't hit women, therefore she was relatively safe); if it had been Sam -- or an honest-to-god equal -- he would have punched them back and fought for dominance.
So Alex is getting special treatment. I think this shouldn't bug me, because she's not specifically asking for it. She is, in fact, acting as much like one of the guys (if you ignore her wardrobe and being touchy-feely sympathetic with women, although Sam did the latter anyway) as she can. But there's still something about the gender inequality that bothers me, although not on a strictly character level. Just on a... I don't understand this emphasis on not acknowledging Gene as a higher authority figure (as a character with more professional power, if nothing else), unless it's meant as a drive for equality. And until Gene stops holding back simply because she's a woman (he doesn't verbally, but he does physically and I'm not convinced that the eight years that have passed internally have stopped Gene from being an overgrown bully), it's never going to be *equal* in any true sense. Maybe the writers are doing it to make Gene seem more likable, more appealing from a woman's perspective (oh, look, he talks roughly but really respects her because he doesn't knock her head into the pavement! He's a chivalrous gentleman in disguise!) but it doesn't quite work for me.
Gene Hunt, as shown in LoM, is an interesting, fascinating, charismatic character. He's flawed, crude, violent, bigoted and his driving is simply terrifying. But he's also highly principled, takes responsibility seriously and deeply cares for the people on his team. He's a flawed hero, a man who will yell insults and both verbally and physically abuse his team, and yet will also protect them with his own life (and who inspires they're absolute loyalty and respect). This is why I started watching AtA -- to see more of Gene.
But Alex is so very certain that it's all inside her head -- that it's all about her -- that she doesn't seem to respect Gene, regardless of how solid and reassuring she finds his company (from the amount of time they spend together). The problem with this is that the show itself isn't set up around Alex -- Alex is just the stated reason to see more of Gene Hunt, because it's Gene's spin-off.
So I'm trying not to dislike Alex because it's not the characters fault that things don't quite mesh well inside my head, but it's still a show that I watch and partially enjoy (and partially cringe at). However, they took Gene Hunt to a gay bar and that wins a whole truckload of glee points with me.
ETA: While I'm rambling, I have to say that for some reason, Alex's makeup bothers me. It's very nice, very flattering, very 80s. But I keep looking at it and wondering how she has the knowledge to apply make-up like that. I wouldn't. She shows up the next day dressed in the 80s fashions found in her wardrobe (very reminiscent of certain modern styles, I keep noticing, which is smart. It makes sense that Alex would feel slightly more at home in styles that she'd been seeing on the street in the last few years, even if these are more extreme versions of them) but she has perfectly applied make-up. I have to assume that her subconscious dictates her appearance, so she appears to fit in -- and her eyeshadow would appear as a perfect 80s style, regardless of how it was applied.
Also, because I'm contrary and vaguely annoyed at times by AtA, I keep hoping that unlike Sam, Alex will have actually travelled back in time and be stuck. Or end up dead at the end. As much as the constant not-knowing of Sam's position started to bug me, now I miss the ambiguous meanings of reality. Silly, but true.
It's fanfic clichés brought to life! And it made me cackle hysterically. Much like having Ray *successfully* flirt with a guy, and Shaz doing a half-flirting thing with Alex.
I haven't really posted about AtA so far, and I've seen the first five eps, so here are my issues.
Alex. *sigh* Simply put, she's the *least* likeable member of the team. Unfortunately, I think it's just the way the series is set up. In LoM, Sam was our viewpoint, the guy who shared our modern ideology, who clashed terribly with the violent, crude, bigoted Gene Hunt. But that entire series was set up in a way that made the audience -- along with Sam -- start to prefer the less complicated, more action-based world of '73; characters that started out as misogynistic dinosaurs became likeable as they showed their strong principles of protecting civilians (which they all have/had, once you saw past the horrible way they treated people). By the end of LoM, we preferred Gene and his violent, vitriolic anger, and his determination to keep his streets safe.
Now, AtA isn't a sequel to LoM in the sense of exploring how someone from our time reacts to waking up in a different decade. It's not us going into the show sympathising with Alex and her confusion, and trying to get to know strangers. It's a spin-off for Gene (and the wonder that is Chris and Ray, who I love even when they're utter twits). So the audience goes into it already liking Gene, Chris and Ray. We already have a good understanding of the characters (which in this series has grown deeper for both Chris and Ray, I'm glad to say) and we're rooting for them to catch the bad guy.
The only new "main" characters are Alex and Shaz. And this is where I have the issue. Because Shaz is the Annie of this series: a relatively modern-thinking woman (for her time) who thinks for herself within the constraints of her society. She's gutsy and interesting, fun and confident, and she also has to play by the rules of her culture. I like both of them a great deal, so the writers can write female characters that are fun. But Alex… isn't.
Alex isn't a woman in the same mould. She isn't progressive for her time -- she takes modern standards for granted and acts the way she does because that's her *norm*, because she doesn't think the same way the people around her do. She's not thinking for herself, she's simply carrying her cultural norms to another time and acting on them.
Now, having said this, I'm trying really hard not to hold it against Alex herself. For a few reasons. Partly because I've had an actor-crush on her since seeing "Tipping the Velvet" a few years back. Partly because as much as I loved LoM, Sam himself… there were times when I wanted to beat his head into the wall. And pretty much for the same reasons that Alex annoys me: acting on unconsidered social norms, being a know-it-all twit and screwing stuff up, accusing others of acting irrationally and then acting out for purely emotional reasons (usually while in a professional role as a police officer which really bugs me, especially after giving some speech on the right way to be a copper).
So I'm reining in the annoyance and remembering that Sam bugged me a lot in the first few episodes too.
On another note that is not Alex's fault, she's purposely written as a love interest for Gene. (End result of this: me being weirdly charmed by Gene's "insult 'em 'til they fall into your arms" approach and suddenly thinking of LoM as a hell of a lot slashier than I first suspected.) But because of this, I think they're trying to set her up as "feisty" and an equal to Gene. It's the "equal" thing that's rubbing me the wrong way, because Alex just comes across as arrogant. LoM always kept Gene as the boss, always kept him as the metaphorical sheriff, laying down the law in his town. He trusted Sam, he worked with Sam, he respected Sam, but he *never* treated Sam as a complete equal (a begrudged bordering-on-just-maybe-if-we-squint equal, but never an outright balance). The show set him up as the Gov, as the head of the restricted world of CID.
And now, with AtA, they're trying to rewrite the rules a bit so that Gene's authority is lessened and Alex appears more of an equal, and it doesn't sit right. I think it's the gender thing, honestly. Gene Hunt is a chauvinist -- a charming one, but still a guy who thinks that men are intrinsically different and just a bit better at being coppers, than women -- and he patronises them. He automatically considers himself slightly superior and the respect he shows them (i.e. not punching back when Alex hit him) comes from that belief, that obligation to protect those weaker, less capable and less intelligent than himself. (Which, okay, is an attitude he shows towards his entire team to a certain extent -- that they try to emulate him but they're not as capable as Gene, so he needs to protect them from the world -- but it's a stronger attitude when it comes to women.)
With Gene's history of treating women badly, I think the writers are trying to show that what would attract Gene is an equal. But if no other character can equal Gene, it makes no sense that Alex can. Instead, it feels like… okay, I may get kicked out of the feminist club here, but it feels like she's using her gender to get the upper hand. In the punching scene, for example, I was wondering if Gene would hit her back. Except the only thing that stopped him was she was a woman (and therefore weaker, and he doesn't hit women, therefore she was relatively safe); if it had been Sam -- or an honest-to-god equal -- he would have punched them back and fought for dominance.
So Alex is getting special treatment. I think this shouldn't bug me, because she's not specifically asking for it. She is, in fact, acting as much like one of the guys (if you ignore her wardrobe and being touchy-feely sympathetic with women, although Sam did the latter anyway) as she can. But there's still something about the gender inequality that bothers me, although not on a strictly character level. Just on a... I don't understand this emphasis on not acknowledging Gene as a higher authority figure (as a character with more professional power, if nothing else), unless it's meant as a drive for equality. And until Gene stops holding back simply because she's a woman (he doesn't verbally, but he does physically and I'm not convinced that the eight years that have passed internally have stopped Gene from being an overgrown bully), it's never going to be *equal* in any true sense. Maybe the writers are doing it to make Gene seem more likable, more appealing from a woman's perspective (oh, look, he talks roughly but really respects her because he doesn't knock her head into the pavement! He's a chivalrous gentleman in disguise!) but it doesn't quite work for me.
Gene Hunt, as shown in LoM, is an interesting, fascinating, charismatic character. He's flawed, crude, violent, bigoted and his driving is simply terrifying. But he's also highly principled, takes responsibility seriously and deeply cares for the people on his team. He's a flawed hero, a man who will yell insults and both verbally and physically abuse his team, and yet will also protect them with his own life (and who inspires they're absolute loyalty and respect). This is why I started watching AtA -- to see more of Gene.
But Alex is so very certain that it's all inside her head -- that it's all about her -- that she doesn't seem to respect Gene, regardless of how solid and reassuring she finds his company (from the amount of time they spend together). The problem with this is that the show itself isn't set up around Alex -- Alex is just the stated reason to see more of Gene Hunt, because it's Gene's spin-off.
So I'm trying not to dislike Alex because it's not the characters fault that things don't quite mesh well inside my head, but it's still a show that I watch and partially enjoy (and partially cringe at). However, they took Gene Hunt to a gay bar and that wins a whole truckload of glee points with me.
ETA: While I'm rambling, I have to say that for some reason, Alex's makeup bothers me. It's very nice, very flattering, very 80s. But I keep looking at it and wondering how she has the knowledge to apply make-up like that. I wouldn't. She shows up the next day dressed in the 80s fashions found in her wardrobe (very reminiscent of certain modern styles, I keep noticing, which is smart. It makes sense that Alex would feel slightly more at home in styles that she'd been seeing on the street in the last few years, even if these are more extreme versions of them) but she has perfectly applied make-up. I have to assume that her subconscious dictates her appearance, so she appears to fit in -- and her eyeshadow would appear as a perfect 80s style, regardless of how it was applied.
Also, because I'm contrary and vaguely annoyed at times by AtA, I keep hoping that unlike Sam, Alex will have actually travelled back in time and be stuck. Or end up dead at the end. As much as the constant not-knowing of Sam's position started to bug me, now I miss the ambiguous meanings of reality. Silly, but true.
