(no subject)

[ginny_t]

Dear Joss Whedon:

A woman in the refrigerator? I expected better of you.

Congrats, you've made me officially Done With You.

Disgruntledly yours,

Ginny

Also, to writers: if you write a story in which anyone is trying for eternal life & youth/philosopher's stone/immortality/what-have-you, expect me to get my spork. I will show no mercy.

Comments

[seangaffney.livejournal.com]

I never even bothered to start watching it. I've been Jossed before. My sympathies.

[ginny-t.livejournal.com]

The thing is, I thought I was Done. You know how I feel about the last two seasons of Buffy, and notwithstanding my love for Illyria, everything after The Gift gets a "lalala!" reaction.

But then everyone loved Firefly. I tried it (before the love exploded with love-juice all over the internet), and it kind of reinforced my done with Joss-ness. But everyone loved it so, so I tried, and I tried, and then it was going to be taken down tomorrow, so I gave it a chance. Yuck.

[cow.livejournal.com]

Oh my lawd I am so glad to see I'm not the only one. Because it sure feels that way on the internets sometimes.

[ginny-t.livejournal.com]

We can form a support group. ^_^

[gruberman.livejournal.com]

Is this in regards to Dr. Horrible? I haven't started watching it yet.

[ginny-t.livejournal.com]

It is, yes. However, I'm officially Difficult To Please. I won't think much any less of you if you like it.

[edg.livejournal.com]

Didn't he do much the same thing with Tara in Buffy S6? (In fact, wasn't it functionally the same plot point?)

I liked Dr. Horrible very much, but on rewatching it does become obvious that Penny is a passive character in the story (which is odd, because she's very active outside the story), which is frustrating. I'm trying to think of ways that DHSAB could be rewritten to change that, and in particular ways to get to a similar ending without the Innocent's Sacrifice at the end, and ideally without the Stereotypical Innocent throughout.

[ginny-t.livejournal.com]

It was indeed functionally the same plot point. I want to say that Tara at least had more agency… but I don't know that I can. She at least got more screen time. (whee?)

Penny was a grossly simplistic character (they all were, in fact), which is a shame because he's created some very interesting characters in the past. :(

[edg.livejournal.com]

Tara might have gotten more absolute screen time, but I think Penny was on-screen more relative to the length of time between when she was released and when she was killed. Which is kind of unfortunate.

You're right that they were kind of simplistic characters, but I think that might have been the point. Even their names point to it - Dr. Horrible, Captain Hammer, Penny (does she even get a last name?) - which is, perhaps, a look into the "protagonist"'s mindset. The characterization and outcome are a lot more understandable if the whole series after the middle of the first song is just Billy Buddy's fantasy.

[thespian.livejournal.com]

he's not Billy Buddy; she refers to him as "Billy, buddy" at one point in a song.

[edg.livejournal.com]

Actually, he refers to himself the same way near the end of "Slipping", and you can see her mouthing the words just after he says them. While that might just be repetition from her earlier song, I don't see any evidence to argue against "Billy Buddy" being his name.

[ginny-t.livejournal.com]

Good point about proportional screen time. *grumble*

I agree that the characters were probably purposely simplistic. The thing is that their simplicity doesn't do anything new. It looks a whole lot like a bunch of other stories that are shallow and simplistic because that's all their writer can come up with. Joss has done better, so what's with this story?

If the whole thing is just Billy's fantasy, then that's even worse. Even in his fantasies, he's bumbling and unsuccessful, thwarted by his nemesis professionally and personally. His fantasies reduce Penny to an object that he destroys in the battle with his nemesis.

[edg.livejournal.com]

But are they simplistic because that's all Whedon can come up with, or are they simplistic because Whedon is being deliberately tropaic? The World May Never Know, and I suppose there's really no way to find out. Either way, though, you probably have a point there. If they're the best he could come up with, then yes, we know he can do better. If they're deliberately tropaic, then we should see him doing something new with the tropes.

You are right that the "Billy's fantasy" idea makes less sense the more I think about it. As I suggested it, it was just an elegant way to turn the flatness of the characters into a story element - they're two-dimensional because that's all Billy can come up with.

I'd like to examine the story in more detail (for example, I find it interesting that just as Captain Hammer took credit for saving Penny's life in the first episode, Dr. Horrible took credit for her death so he could gain entrance to the League), and it's frustrating that I keep being hung up on the shallowness of the characters. I really want to find some way to give them depth so that I don't feel bad about liking the story!

[ginny-t.livejournal.com]

heh. I've been worrying that you might be getting vexed with me for pointing out its flaws.

There's nothing wrong with enjoying something you find entertaining in spite of its flaws which you're well aware of. ^_^

[akinarei.livejournal.com]

...Highly disturbing. Very, yes. WTF?

(I wrote a story involving a doppleganger. Don't spork me, please.)

[ginny-t.livejournal.com]

*petpet* I won't spork the authors, just the story. Doppelgangers aren't so grossly overdone (at least in what I've read/watched/&c.) as the immortality thing. Ugh.

[akinarei.livejournal.com]

No one uses doppelgangers anymore. I was surprised that Ghost Hunt didn't.

[monkeyman.livejournal.com]

I was disappointed, too. I was expecting him to give her some real purpose in the third act to make up for it ... because really, no matter what you think of Buffy/Angel/Firefly, he doesn't usually treat female characters this poorly.

It's a shame, because I did enjoy the main character -- but even beyond the anti-feminist aspects, I really didn't think the plot was much to talk about either. It's all been done before, and there wasn't anything fresh brought to it.

(And the blogging parts took forever.)

[ginny-t.livejournal.com]

There just wasn't much to this. Sure, it was a bit of a throwaway thing that it seems like they made on a lark. Okay, fine. But did he not realise that this would become a part of his body of work that everyone would notice and evaluate? He knows how his work gets closely analysed--what the hell was he thinking?

You can have over-the-top fun without resorting to cardboard cut-out clichés. *grumble*