A few thoughts on victimhood...
Apr. 3rd, 2005 12:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
graculusEvery fandom has one. The character who always gets it, the one who's more often than not in peril or injured so that the other(s) can rescue him. It's a staple of h/c and always has been. Whether it's Daniel Jackson or Illya Kuryakin (or Obi Wan Kenobi, Harper, Blair Sandburg... the list is endless), there's always one character who gets to be 'the designated victim' more often than not. Often much more often than not.
What puzzles me is how much making those characters any kind of victim, with all the passivity that implies and requires, takes a warping of what we see onscreen beyond all reason. What most of us like about those characters in the first place is their strength of character (call it stubbornness if you like, sometimes that's a more accurate description) and yet writers apparently think nothing of utterly stripping characters of that so that they can be victimised with impunity.
In the worst examples, said victim is tied to the metaphorical railtracks like a silent movie heroine while the manly hero (every fandom has one of those as well, it seems) rescues them. It's bizarre. Because, frankly, you could whump Illya Kuryakin or Daniel Jackson till doomsday and neither of them would just lie there and take it - they'd both be trying to escape under their own steam, snarking at their captors while they did so. They'd suffer the consequences, of course, but neither of them would let a little thing like more pain stop them from trying to do what they could. It's in their nature.
Is there a fandom out there where the risks experienced by the characters are more evenly spread? One where there isn't a designated victim who has to be written OOC in order to play that part effectively? If there is, I'd love to hear about it.
What puzzles me is how much making those characters any kind of victim, with all the passivity that implies and requires, takes a warping of what we see onscreen beyond all reason. What most of us like about those characters in the first place is their strength of character (call it stubbornness if you like, sometimes that's a more accurate description) and yet writers apparently think nothing of utterly stripping characters of that so that they can be victimised with impunity.
In the worst examples, said victim is tied to the metaphorical railtracks like a silent movie heroine while the manly hero (every fandom has one of those as well, it seems) rescues them. It's bizarre. Because, frankly, you could whump Illya Kuryakin or Daniel Jackson till doomsday and neither of them would just lie there and take it - they'd both be trying to escape under their own steam, snarking at their captors while they did so. They'd suffer the consequences, of course, but neither of them would let a little thing like more pain stop them from trying to do what they could. It's in their nature.
Is there a fandom out there where the risks experienced by the characters are more evenly spread? One where there isn't a designated victim who has to be written OOC in order to play that part effectively? If there is, I'd love to hear about it.
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Date: 2005-04-03 01:27 pm (UTC)Um, since when? This is a man who picks up a staff weapon and kills a Jaffa with it, and hits his twice more before he hits the ground in the MOVIE, not to mention suggests using a nuke to blow up a ship where he knows there are innocent children because it's that, or let Skara and Sharya die. In the pilot he's letting the Abydonians guard the gate with assault rifles and submachine guns and in season one he's the one that suggests going after Apophis in the Nox. Frankly, I think if you look at it objectively, Daniel's probably *more* bloodthirsty than Jack.
Yet Daniel is always the victim.
Totally don't get it.
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Date: 2005-04-03 01:38 pm (UTC)True enough, if you're setting yourself up as a fan of the show and have never actually watched an episode. All the way through the series, Daniel is shown more than competently using both handguns and assault weapons. It's true he might not turn to them first, but when he does, then Daniel is more than capable with them and certainly not anyone's definition of a pacifist.
Whether he's more bloodthirsty than Jack is debateable - I don't think there's a great deal in it. Jack is supposed to be a strategist, looking for the best result for his side with the minimum amount of casualties, so therefore he won't always go rushing in, guns blazing. What both Jack and Daniel have in common is that the use of firepower is an option, not the only alternative.
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Date: 2005-04-03 03:42 pm (UTC)Maybe Bloodthirsty is the wrong term. Maybe vicious or cold blooded is a better description.
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Date: 2005-04-03 03:44 pm (UTC)