prunesquallormd | Adding my voice to the chorus of disapproval

OMG. I forgot about it but now I'm scared. I cannot get over these writers this season.

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Oh god, I'm sorry. I thought anyone reading this wouldn't care or would have watched it already.
I'm gonna cut this for sort of spoilers, but I know it's too late for you. I'm really sorry.

(From our point of view, there's not too much to be scared of as such. Well it could have been worse.)

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blurubberband55.livejournal.com

Allow me to pull a John Foster and make you forget it ever happened.

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What?
Who are you?
;D

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Oh, my goodness! You're sweet for worrying about spoiling me but never fear, I really don't have a problem being spoiled unless it's Harry Potter related. I still have no idea what happened in the ep! I'm just assuming the s4 writers decided to be as contentious as we were afraid they would be. This is what comes of hiring teenagers, I think.

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We should probably all just take Forget Me Now's.

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And I actually liked Freddie too ...

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I like all of them, really. I had issues with Katie in S3, and I still do with Cook on occasion, but they're all great characters.

Character death isn't always a bad thing, if it's done well, for the right reasons, and not just for dramatic effect, and especially not just as a plot device. Chris's death 'worked'; it had meaning, and it was incredibly moving. It felt like part of a well thought out story line; and yes, it was devastating, but it didn't leave me thinking 'what the fuck? What are you even trying to do here?'
Freddie's death was completely random. It makes a mockery of everything that went before, and honestly, I truly believe it displays a contempt for the story, the characters and the audience. Sophia's death was bad enough (using a suicide to provide tension in a relationship? Yay, way to fucking go there, Jamie Brittain. Arsehole.) but Freddie's was just a whole other level of shoddy, lazy, contembtible writing. Random psycho on the stairs with the baseball bat? What are we supposed to take from that?
Jesus. I can't even begin to say how much this sucks.

(I've missed seeing you around, by the way. I hope all's good with you :))

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I need some of that for most of this season, to be honest. Except for Katie's ep, maybe; that was pretty awesome. And all the Keffy moments. The rest has just been blurgh :(

In much better news, I'm now officially totally head over heels for Kahlan. OH MY GOD, so adorable ♥

Edited Date: 2010-03-12 09:59 pm (UTC)

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I always feel bad spoilering people, because I know how much it bothers me. Thanks for being understanding though ♥

And yeah, I think they have this idea that hiring writers as close as possible in age to the characters they're writing gives the writing a certain veritas that it wouldn't otherwise have. In reality though, it just means they're inexperienced and, as often as not, just plain bad.

(Oooh, a Harry Potter fan :). I'm probably too old for it, but it's still one of my favourite things. Other than an Effy/Sophia and a tiny little LilyKat, it's the only thing I've written for so far. Ginny/Luna: OTP :D)

Edited Date: 2010-03-12 10:14 pm (UTC)

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By the way, it strikes me that I'm not actually sure of your name. I even tried to read your signature on Morgan's post on handwriting the other day and totally failed :(
My name's Simon, just in case you missed it :). Pleased to meet ya *shakes hands* :)

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Agreed on Katie, although my love of Cookie knows no bounds.

As for deaths it's like any other major plot line - it works if it's done well.

Freddie's was not.

This guy appears in their lives for, what, two/three weeks? And then he just decides to off Freds. I know this is how it can be in real life, psychos are not ones to be reasonable. But that's not the show Skins is. Sophia's death was bad in that it was a totally artificial way for Naomi and Emily to have drama, instead of something like disagreeing over their future or Jenna being impossible. But in itself it worked, for what it showed us in terms of her family and the properly interesting detective sub-plot. Freddie's will have nothing to validate it.

And it's gonna fucking ruin the finale. They already have enough to be sorting through as it is and then they just decide that they should kill him and give over like half the plot to finding him.

I can't quite say why my hate for this is as bad as it is, but it may be that Skins has slipped from parody to self-pardoy. Take the Love Ball scene - classic soppy happy ending, only for two girls. Not a radical departure, but enough to show that Skins had something going on upstairs. It put me in mind of something like Scream, which was just different enough from the basic horror formula for it to always interest. With Freddie what they've done is something that makes almost no link to what had gone before, like they're trying to make a statement but failed.

And all's gravy with me, just drifting a bit, not got much focus at the moment. Hopefully gonna get on with somewriting soon so would be cool if you could see what you think if/when it comes.

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ALL OF THIS
Really, I couldn't agree more.

I'm assuming the statement was: never trust a psychiatrist, cos they'll stave your head in with a baseball bat as soon as look at you. I could be wrong though.
My considered and entirely rational response is "fuck you, Jamie Brittain. Fuck you forever". And no, I don't know why I hate this so much either, but it just feels like deliberate abuse, you know? Is this what it took them the better part of a year to come up with?
Honestly, I'm actually struggling to articulate why I hate it so much.

I've been rereading Transatlanticism today, and it's just brought it home to me, yet again, that there are writers in this fandom - people who just do it for a hobby - who are so much better, and care about the characters so much more, than the actual writers for the show, that it's frankly ridiculous. God, they should just have filmed So-Verse, or Bedlam. It would have been in an entirely different league to the garbage they actually came up with.

I'll look forward to reading what you write, when it comes. And if you need a beta, I'd be happy to do the job :)

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Exactly. There are more reasons than the ones we gave as to why this sucks ass, but you can boil it down to ... is this it?

It didn't have to be the best show ever, it didn't have to always be believable or even always make sense. Hell, it didn't even have to be as good as last series. It just had to be watchable, sometimes fun, sometimes serious but always itself. And that's what they forgot, what the hell they were actually meant to be aiming for, and so we got a repackaged series of Hollyoaks with a few perks.

This is me at my most angry, and I know there's stuff I love about this series, but this one event is so shit that it'll take a while for perspective to come back.

RARRRR!

I never quite got on board with Trans due to my lack of investment in Effy, but So-Verse would have been everything I could hope for. And then, along with all the Sivi's and Betsy's who could do great over-arching themes and stuff there's people like

em_sh who have the dialogue down so word-perfect that it just feels like reading a missing scene from the series 4 that wasn't.

As for writing I already made a crack at two things, your opinion would be most appreciated until I get going on the real deal. Beta-ing would be great when I get to that stage too.

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24 hours later, and, if anything, I'm even more angry about the whole thing.

The only thing I can think of that's even vaguely comparable is Tara's death in S6 of Buffy, but then, this is just a whole new level of awful. Warren was part of the show for the better part of 2 seasons, and he was characterised very clearly as a homicidal narcissist, and added to that, even though Tara's death was brutal and shocking and horrible, it was written by writers who were actually competent. They cared about what they did, and they made it matter. It was a fundamental part of the plot, and necessary for what came after.
Same with Joyce in S5. Which - and this probably goes without saying - is a perfect example of character death as a vehicle for extraordinarily beautiful, heartfelt, humane drama. But then, Joss Whedon has more talent in his little fingernail than Jamie Brittain and the entire rest of the Skins team this season have in their entire bodies.

Gah. I need to stop being so upset about this. Breeeeeathe.

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It just had to be watchable, sometimes fun, sometimes serious but always itself. And that's what they forgot, what the hell they were actually meant to be aiming for, and so we got a repackaged series of Hollyoaks with a few perks.
EXACTLY THIS

And angry? I've never been this angry about anything so supposedly trivial in my entire life. Grrrr.

I'm finding our almost completely opposite tastes rather funny. You love Cook, whom, as often as not, I can't stand, and you don't much care for Effy, who's probably my favourite character in anything ever. I rather love that actually. Things would just be dull if we all liked the same things.

I still haven't read anything of Emma's, although she's garnered high praise from plenty of people. Gotta rectify that soon (I actually have Miniature Catastrophes printed out and on my reading pile, so it'll be soonish). Kate (daneorange) is near the top of my to read pile too; I've only read one of her Lily/Meg stories, and it's incredibley beautiful. 'While we are tidal and flexed' is definitely on the to-read list.

Always happy to offer an opinion :) PM me and I'll send you my email adress if there's anything you want me to look over before you post it.

Edited Date: 2010-03-13 08:47 pm (UTC)

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Wow, I obviously spend far too much time reading fics. Or maybe I'm just limited to this one fandom at the moment, cos I read anything those peeps come out with pretty much instantly. I would recommend Emma's Cook/Naomi friendship one as a first port of call but that may not be your thing so much. As for Kate her RPF's are something else - she's made me variously wish desperately that Lily becomes a radio presenter, a lounge-jazz pianist or just continues as an actor.

I may be giving a biased picture re: Cook, as you've caught me at a strange time. If you'd asked at any point before episode 3 then you'd have heard non-stop about Naomi - SHE is MY favourite character in anything ever. I dunno what it is, but I think it may be kinship; she is me if I was less amiable. So I've analysed everything involving her to death, almost to the complete exclusion of all others - Freddie got praise for the most complete, consistant episode of this Gen, Cook could be hilarious but also irritating, I never quite saw the depth to Katie loads of others did and everyone else was just background (even Emily, since she came up in direct comparison to Naomi so often). It's just that what has now happened is Cook has become the best over the two series, as Naomi has almost systematically been reduced to someone unrecognisable, whereas Cook has gone from strength to strength. Put it this way - every time Cook appears I now the scene will be worth my full attention but when Naomi is in the picture I just shut off, fearful that they'll spoil her even further. So I'm still all for our lesbians at heart, but Cook has just been hard to ignore recently.

The only Skins piece I've done is a drabble thing at my journal, the other is an OC/character study piece I'll send you later. The Skins one is 'ere:

http://lovely-noise.livejournal.com/522.html

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This season has just been so disappointing and emotionally stressful, I can't even talk about it. It's the damned teenagers they have writing for them. They want to do all angst all the time, and they lean toward the fanfic-ish re: "shocking" plot developments, etc.

Kahlan is a freaking doll! But wait til you meet my girlfriend.

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Some people really do get a bee in their bonnets about it, but I feel like- I'm going to see it anyway.

Exactly. I mean, for the most part, it probably works, because a lot of the scenes feel so fresh and edgy. But at the same time, everyone *was* a teenager at some point, and the the emotions the kids go through are universal...IDK,I'm just sad it's not going to end well for Naomi and Ems, sad that Katie and Panda were largely underused, and upset the the finale is going to be worthless in terms of tying up plot points.

Definitely a Harry Potter fan! I need to read you Ginny/Luna, though I'm a diehard Hermione fan. You know, if you squint, your icon looks like Naomi and Emily.

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Yes! We've never been formally, have we! I'm Graham! I'd actually seen a few instances of you being called Simon but I didn't want to be presumptuous and start calling you that before we really knew each other!

Pleased to meet you, Simon!

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Bee in my bonnet? God, I go absolutely insane if I get spoilered on anything at all, especially the things I love. It's not pretty ;D

Agreed, on everything. Where was Panda this season? She barely had 10 lines in the whole thing. And Katie? Admittedly, her episode was the highpoint of the season, and she looked rather fab randomly dressed as an angel and saving Effy in Freddie's ep, but other than that, just wasted.
And that's what makes me so sad: so much wasted potential, all because the writers were just so inept :(

Oh, I adore Hermione; in canon she's my favourite character by far. I started out as a Hermione/Ginny shipper, but I got lured to Ginny/Luna somewhere along the line.
Bizarrely, I also ship Hermione/Pansy with a passion. Obviously, canon Pansy is horrible, but there's something about the dynamic between the two that just seems to work for me. Mind you, a lot of people seem to see Hermansy in the light of distinctly dubious consent, which I'm not comfortable with at all. I prefer the whole idea of a mutual attraction that neither wants and both struggle agains, but in the end is just inevitable.

I'd not thought about that, but you're right, there's a definite Naomily look to it. I love that picture. The original's here (http://thilia.livejournal.com/167197.html). It's so pretty.

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Pleased to meet you too :)

I thought your signature said Graham, and Sivi's used your name a few times, but I was doubtful somehow. It seems to be very rare as an American name, although it's not uncommon here.

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