I posted! I couldn't help myself. <3 By 'anti-fan' I mean a certain breed of fannishness that seems to thrive on bashing a particular source text - not criticism, but 'I hate this show and I feel the need to watch it every week and tell you why I hate it'.
Oh, and I can't recommend Fringe enough. It can be uneven in places - not as consistently well-written as TGW, but Olivia Dunham is the heroine of my heart and the show, when it's good, is very very good. I once wrote up this introduction post for it.
But I'm not assuming that what Owen teases out of her is always the exact, whole truth. I believe it *is* the truth as she's currently processing it--that is, when she says she doesn't love Will, I take that as her unexamined feelings. But she's such a repressed creature that I don't know if I can take that as the whole and complete story. What do you think?
While I don't think Alicia is a very reliable narrator under most circumstances, I think the Owen Chats - particularly the two Owen Chat episodes this season and previous one ('I have no friends' and 'I love Will' respectively) - were too significant to be easily discarded as unreliable. But it's certainly not the whole story. We certainly believe Alicia when she says that she loves Will, but then what? Is it the same as Zach telling Nyssa that he loves her, or is there more to the story? How does she love Will? What is she willing to do for that love? Or in the 'I don't have friends' episode - you can see Alicia tiptoe around the main question, that of her friendship with Kalinda, and how much she clearly needs and misses it. We, as viewers, have to draw our conclusions from everything Alicia doesn't say.
. . . and I agree with this, too. I'm certain that Alicia loves Kalinda, although not in the wordless devotion way that Kalinda does to her (that's Kalinda's alone--nobody else could love like that). The very fact that Alicia managed to maintain such an intense level of iciness toward Kalinda for so long tells me that there's a flip side of deep emotion there--there's only so angry you can be at someone you don't also love. I also believe that Alicia only knows how she feels about things when she receives a shock of some kind. (I've always maintained that she didn't realize that Kalinda was her best friend, for instance, until she uttered the "You slept with my best friend" line to Peter.) I think finding out that Kalinda found Grace was a shock for her that jiggled loose some of her deep feelings toward Kalinda. When she found out that Kalinda was in jail, all of the protective stuff came to the fore as well. Her flying at Cary was instinctive and wonderful to see (and I persist in thinking that Cary also saw all that and secretly admired her for it.)
Truer words never said, especially the part about never realizing that Kalinda was her best friend until she said it out loud (Alicia has to do these things; she often doesn't say things because then they become true - like in that Owen chat episode she had to say, 'I'm in love with Will' to finally believe that yes, she was). She didn't realize how much the friendship meant to her until she lost it, and that's what hurt more.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2012-01-30 05:09 pm (UTC)Oh, and I can't recommend Fringe enough. It can be uneven in places - not as consistently well-written as TGW, but Olivia Dunham is the heroine of my heart and the show, when it's good, is very very good. I once wrote up this introduction post for it.
But I'm not assuming that what Owen teases out of her is always the exact, whole truth. I believe it *is* the truth as she's currently processing it--that is, when she says she doesn't love Will, I take that as her unexamined feelings. But she's such a repressed creature that I don't know if I can take that as the whole and complete story. What do you think?
While I don't think Alicia is a very reliable narrator under most circumstances, I think the Owen Chats - particularly the two Owen Chat episodes this season and previous one ('I have no friends' and 'I love Will' respectively) - were too significant to be easily discarded as unreliable. But it's certainly not the whole story. We certainly believe Alicia when she says that she loves Will, but then what? Is it the same as Zach telling Nyssa that he loves her, or is there more to the story? How does she love Will? What is she willing to do for that love? Or in the 'I don't have friends' episode - you can see Alicia tiptoe around the main question, that of her friendship with Kalinda, and how much she clearly needs and misses it. We, as viewers, have to draw our conclusions from everything Alicia doesn't say.
. . . and I agree with this, too. I'm certain that Alicia loves Kalinda, although not in the wordless devotion way that Kalinda does to her (that's Kalinda's alone--nobody else could love like that). The very fact that Alicia managed to maintain such an intense level of iciness toward Kalinda for so long tells me that there's a flip side of deep emotion there--there's only so angry you can be at someone you don't also love. I also believe that Alicia only knows how she feels about things when she receives a shock of some kind. (I've always maintained that she didn't realize that Kalinda was her best friend, for instance, until she uttered the "You slept with my best friend" line to Peter.) I think finding out that Kalinda found Grace was a shock for her that jiggled loose some of her deep feelings toward Kalinda. When she found out that Kalinda was in jail, all of the protective stuff came to the fore as well. Her flying at Cary was instinctive and wonderful to see (and I persist in thinking that Cary also saw all that and secretly admired her for it.)
Truer words never said, especially the part about never realizing that Kalinda was her best friend until she said it out loud (Alicia has to do these things; she often doesn't say things because then they become true - like in that Owen chat episode she had to say, 'I'm in love with Will' to finally believe that yes, she was). She didn't realize how much the friendship meant to her until she lost it, and that's what hurt more.