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I just read the transcript for the S2 ep, The Tower since I've never seen the episode, and realised that I didn't miss much.
I recall that, after watching The Tower, someone commented that TPTB seemed to be trying to slap "John is het" labels all over the show in reaction against the Shep/McKay slash. (After No Man's Land screened, someone else commented that the more "het" TPTB tried to make John, the more "gay" he seems. I still don't get that logic.) Which they might have been doing. And failed. Mostly because they're still focusing on Sheppard and McKay.
Newsflash for Stargate PTB:
Fandom Rule #1: popular fandom pairing is decided by character proximity and time on the screen, not by the romantic interest or sexual inclination of a character.
It occurs to me that if TPTB gave the women key roles in the episodes, a la Battlestar Galactica, instead of making it a buddy show with token (or male role) women, they wouldn't have half as much of "a slash problem".
Of course, this would require the Stargate PTB writing women as whole, useful creatures, whose life journeys are just as crucial to the plot of the show as anything that happens to the guys. It might require imagining that the technical solution is not the best solution, or even the only one. It might even require taking the focus off the people with cocks.
Heaven forbid.
--
On another train of thought entirely, my readership seems to be extremely segregated. People read my fic for one aspect only: a single character, a single pairing, a single scenario. And the rest of my body of fic is wholesale dismissed because it's not about the character, pairing, or scenario that these people want to see.
This is when I hate being a "anything/everything" writer.
--
Also, it seems that, even when Teyla's a pivotal character in an episode, there's no win for her. Reading through some of the comments and reviews about Phantoms, it seems that people missed the fact that she was pretty much the eye of the storm when everyone else was running around like lunatics. She solved the whole damn scenario using technical knowledge (establishing what Rodney had done at the start and finish of the ep), weapons expertise, and leadership familiarity (how to influence someone who's mind was in a completely different zone to her own).
No, she didn't create problems, stir the pot, get the dramatic lines. That's not what the character does. Teyla looks at situations and solves problems. She doesn't create them. In fact, she does the classic woman's job: she cleans up after other people have made a mess.
Which might explain some of the negative reaction to her: I mean, a woman whose relating and leadership style is influential rather than confrontational? Who makes suggestions rather than gives orders? Who listens and takes in the information and then offers up her knowledge without the ego of needing to be the one in the limelight?
Anathema. Absolute anathema.
It seems that the only women worth lauding are those who are mouthy, authoritative, and decisive in the stereotypical classic feminist model.
Witness the winner of my WTF? Award: a fan who said that Teyla became a whinging, helpless woman in Phantoms - one who had to rely on a man to get about on her wounded leg.
Would it have been better if Elizabeth had been there to get her about on her wounded leg? Less helpless, maybe? Perhaps she shouldn't have tried to get through to John by calling his name? After all, if you say it more than once, then it's nagging, right? Even if you're in a life-or-death situation, hunted by a team-mate who probably isn't seeing you as a friendly, while being helped along by another team-mate who's reprising an M. Night Shyalaman movie...
Even if you save the day.
So, pivotal character in an ep, still no win.
Contrary to the principle of the lynchpin, it seems that one cannot play a "significant" role if one does not move, grind, squeal, grunt, mesh, whirr or loom large in fandom awareness. And one certainly cannot play a significant or meaningful role if one does not conform to feminist expectations of the modern woman (irrespective of whether the character has even heard of such expectations) including the dress standards of 'modest Earth women'. Because only the modern cultural standards of the west matter when defining intergalactic character worth, yo!
I await further stupidity following screening of The Ark - another episode where, it would appear, Teyla sits still while the boys create a whirlpool around her...then pulls the plug on the deal.
--
*sigh*
I recall that, after watching The Tower, someone commented that TPTB seemed to be trying to slap "John is het" labels all over the show in reaction against the Shep/McKay slash. (After No Man's Land screened, someone else commented that the more "het" TPTB tried to make John, the more "gay" he seems. I still don't get that logic.) Which they might have been doing. And failed. Mostly because they're still focusing on Sheppard and McKay.
Newsflash for Stargate PTB:
Fandom Rule #1: popular fandom pairing is decided by character proximity and time on the screen, not by the romantic interest or sexual inclination of a character.
It occurs to me that if TPTB gave the women key roles in the episodes, a la Battlestar Galactica, instead of making it a buddy show with token (or male role) women, they wouldn't have half as much of "a slash problem".
Of course, this would require the Stargate PTB writing women as whole, useful creatures, whose life journeys are just as crucial to the plot of the show as anything that happens to the guys. It might require imagining that the technical solution is not the best solution, or even the only one. It might even require taking the focus off the people with cocks.
Heaven forbid.
--
On another train of thought entirely, my readership seems to be extremely segregated. People read my fic for one aspect only: a single character, a single pairing, a single scenario. And the rest of my body of fic is wholesale dismissed because it's not about the character, pairing, or scenario that these people want to see.
This is when I hate being a "anything/everything" writer.
--
Also, it seems that, even when Teyla's a pivotal character in an episode, there's no win for her. Reading through some of the comments and reviews about Phantoms, it seems that people missed the fact that she was pretty much the eye of the storm when everyone else was running around like lunatics. She solved the whole damn scenario using technical knowledge (establishing what Rodney had done at the start and finish of the ep), weapons expertise, and leadership familiarity (how to influence someone who's mind was in a completely different zone to her own).
No, she didn't create problems, stir the pot, get the dramatic lines. That's not what the character does. Teyla looks at situations and solves problems. She doesn't create them. In fact, she does the classic woman's job: she cleans up after other people have made a mess.
Which might explain some of the negative reaction to her: I mean, a woman whose relating and leadership style is influential rather than confrontational? Who makes suggestions rather than gives orders? Who listens and takes in the information and then offers up her knowledge without the ego of needing to be the one in the limelight?
Anathema. Absolute anathema.
It seems that the only women worth lauding are those who are mouthy, authoritative, and decisive in the stereotypical classic feminist model.
Witness the winner of my WTF? Award: a fan who said that Teyla became a whinging, helpless woman in Phantoms - one who had to rely on a man to get about on her wounded leg.
Would it have been better if Elizabeth had been there to get her about on her wounded leg? Less helpless, maybe? Perhaps she shouldn't have tried to get through to John by calling his name? After all, if you say it more than once, then it's nagging, right? Even if you're in a life-or-death situation, hunted by a team-mate who probably isn't seeing you as a friendly, while being helped along by another team-mate who's reprising an M. Night Shyalaman movie...
Even if you save the day.
So, pivotal character in an ep, still no win.
Contrary to the principle of the lynchpin, it seems that one cannot play a "significant" role if one does not move, grind, squeal, grunt, mesh, whirr or loom large in fandom awareness. And one certainly cannot play a significant or meaningful role if one does not conform to feminist expectations of the modern woman (irrespective of whether the character has even heard of such expectations) including the dress standards of 'modest Earth women'. Because only the modern cultural standards of the west matter when defining intergalactic character worth, yo!
I await further stupidity following screening of The Ark - another episode where, it would appear, Teyla sits still while the boys create a whirlpool around her...then pulls the plug on the deal.
--
*sigh*
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You know me - my brain racks up a lot of overtime about these things. And since you're all in different timezones to me and not keeping me occupied with fic or chat...
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