that feeling of thinking you're done...maybe...

[tielan]

I think I might have finished this piece of work.

*looks both ways*

I think.

Anyway, anyone want to ask me a question? One question: anything and everything fannish - MCU, Pacific Rim, Jupiter Ascending, Mad Max: Fury Road - heck, I'll throw in Sanctuary, Merlin, NCIS, Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG1, Harry Potter, Buffy/Angel, Justice League (cartoons), Firefly, and Battlestar Galactica (2003) just for good measure!

You get to ask me a question and I ask you a question back for as long as you care to keep it up.

Comments

[endeni]

Favorite Buffyverse character and why? *g*

[tielan]

Faith. Without a doubt, Faith.

But only once she came back in S4 of Angel. When she first appeared in S3 of Buffy, I was 'no, not really', and I was more annoyed than pleased when she turned up in Angel S1 (mostly because Buffy turns up and she and Angel fight - I was really into that pairing to start with).

But when Wes breaks her out of jail? (Well, she breaks herself out.) That scene. THAT SCENE.

I could watch that scene a dozen times - the way her face stills when Wesley tells her Angel is dead, the way she simply says, "Stand back." And next minute, BOOM! Faith is free and they're on the run.

How she reacts to Gunn, "Love the name." How she deals with Connor, "Are you a killer? 'Cos I am." And that scene where Wesley pushes her - showing how far they've both come.

I only vaguely remember Buffy S7, but I do love that trio of Angel episodes with Faith in S4 and was so peeved they never brought her back for S5. (I even started writing a virtual S5 for Angel that was going to span the whole BuffyVerse, but it derailed pretty fast and now it's just 'part 1'.)

Um, so, yeah, Faith. :D

And I'm just going to mirror you back: what's your favourite Buffy-verse character?

[endeni]

Oh, excellent choice! Yes, Faith's character arc in Ats was terrific.

/I was really into that pairing to start with/ - Well, who wasn't back then? :D

My favorite Buffyverse character is definitely Wesley. ;)

And yes the jail-breaking scene is amazing. *_*

Talking about Wesley, I really loved his relationship with Faith and how it evolved, reflecting the characters' development.
Wes failed Faith in the third season of BtVS* and when she came to L.A. looking for vengeance she found something she didn't expect to find: Angel's guidance and her chance at redemption.
Personally, I loved the ending of 'Five by Five', with Faith torturing Wes and Angel coming to the rescue and Angel and Faith's subsequent fight in the rain, culminating with Faith desperately asking Angel to kill her, to which Angel answers instead with a hug. Just in time for Wesley to come down from the stairs and see them: his boss and friend comforting the woman was torturing him just a moment before. The dropped knife. Boy, what a killer ending.
Years later, when Wesley goes to ask Faith's help in 'Salvage', it's the first time he has come visiting her in prison. But this time, for the first time, they have something in common, something they both care very much about: they have Angel.**
So it's "Step away from the glass." and window jumping*** and landing on top of a car and bam, they're finally on the same page, finally a functioning Slayer/Watcher team.
And, of course, later their hunt for Angelus is a thing of beauty.

* Just like Angelus says in the episode 'Release', he basically tackled a bad situation and made it worse.

** Again, it's like what Angelus says in next episode, 'Release':
FAITH Let him go. This is between you and me.
ANGELUS It's never just between you and me, Faith. Wes'll always be in the middle.

*** BTW, what's with Faith and falling out of windows? ('Graduation Day, Part One', 'Five by Five', 'Salvage', it's practically an habit..)

So, next question... let's see, how about favorite Buffyverse quote? Or, if you don't have one, a favorite quote from another fandom. ;)

[tielan]

I love the ending of Five By Five now. Back when it first aired I was all "WHAT ARGH NO GRARGH BUFFYANGEL WHYYYY?"

Now, it's great. And that last shot of Faith in the slammer, her limits set, her boundaries fixed? Perfect.

By the time Faith and Wes meet in Angel S4, they've...grown up. Wesley's been to the dark side and come back - just as Faith did - and Faith's worked out who and what she is and made peace with it - as Wesley did through the backend of Angel S3. They're a match for each other in Angel S4 - the second Slayer and the secondary Watcher, although they're no longer in those roles.

Really, I wanted to see that Faith-the-Vampire-Slayer show that never got off the ground because Eliza got the other show about talking with dead people.

(And I madly ship Wes/Faith. Because: brokenness and jagged edges.)

Ooh. Favourite Buffyverse quote... So many. The one that I use most is probably "Okay, so we can do this the hard way or... No, actually, there's just the hard way."

Although "I've got a theory...it could be bunnies!" is also always good.

I'm going to reciprocate again and ask what your favourite quote is - in any fandom, although if you have too many and need to narrow it down, let's make it the Jossverses.

[james]

Pacific Rim - what sort of plot could they give us for the second movie that isn't just bigger, badder Kaiju? (Given that they were pretty big in the first place.)

[tielan]

Invasion from the inside. Humans who've been infected by Kaiju blue becoming kaiju themselves. Newt and Hermann and their brainspace becoming weird. Raleigh - who was actually in the anteverse - fighting not to become the enemy he fought to save humanity from.

I don't know how it would end, though.

Question: what is with the flying hamster of doom in your icon?

[james]

My first thought was KAIJU IN SPAAAAAACE! But then I suppose they came from the ocean for a reason, so maybe not.

The flying hamster of doom is from a postcard that I scanned in and made into an icon, but I cannot remember where I got the postcard from. I suspect someone just sent it to me, because they knew I'd like it. It isn't from anything, as far as I know, it's just silly.

Question: do you think they will actually give us more PR movies without ever bowing to the pressure of making Raleigh and Mako kiss?

[tielan]

Well, I'm in the camp that actually wants them to kiss and be in a relationship. I don't subscribe to the belief that any romantic interest by or for a woman relegates her to the role of a 'love interest'.

What I want from Mako is a female character who can be a hero and be romantically interested in a guy who adores her - who can be both heroic and sexual rather than either the sexual castrate or the sexual omnivore that we so frequently require of female heroes to be appropriately 'liberated'.

Do I think that they'll make more PR movies without having Raleigh and Mako kiss? No. Given that they shot a kiss and then didn't screen it at the end of PR 1, they obviously felt that the potential was there and if they're not using that in PR 2, they'll be completely missing a really excellent dynamic that needs to be more displayed in media: a man and a woman in an equal-but-different partnership with respect and adoration running both ways.

[endeni]

Oh, yes, the end of 'Sanctuary' with that shot of Faith in prison is great. *nods*

/the second Slayer and the secondary Watcher, although they're no longer in those roles/ - Yes, exactly! They've outgrown their original, restricting roles and maybe because of that they're now comfortable embracing them if need be to complete the mission.

As it happens, technically my OTP is Angel/Wesley but I adore all Wesley ships: Wes/Faith, of course, also Wes/Lilah, Wes/Illyria, Wes/Gunn, Wes/Fred, Wes/Giles, you name it...

My favorite Jossverse quote is definitely: “If nothing we do matters, then all that matters is what we do.”
If there is no greater scheme and no reward for good deeds, if we are nothing but cogs in the great machine of caos, ever more so we must search for our own purpose in life: it is what we choose to do with our own life that gives meaning to it.
Or, again, in the words of Joss Whedon: "I believe that the only reality is how we treat each other; that morality comes from the absence of any grander scheme, not from the presence of any grander scheme."
It really appeals to the atheist in me.

Aaaand, if you're still game, here's the next question: favorite Firefly episode?

[james]

I agree that Mako and Raleigh would be a very good and healthy relationship to depict - Mako is a strong person in her own right and wouldn't be defined by her relationship to Raleigh. I am just so over-exposed to "woman meets man, must have fall in love/sex" camp that I'm grateful beyond words that they didn't let them kiss in the first movie.

As I get older, I find myself more and more wanting gen stories -- where people show affection and have respect and have strong emotional bonds but without ever having to have a sexual component to it, whether it's two men or two women or man and woman. I don't trust most of Hollywood to ever give me that, so I get a little excited about the times we do see it.

Hm. I don't have any pacific rim icons, but I feel like this one is emotionally in the same camp. :-)

[everbright]

WHAT is the bit of Jupiter backstory you'd really like to have The Word of God on?

[tielan]

Favourite Firefly episode. Lord, so many!

Probably 'Out Of Gas' because it gives us a glimpse of the crew and how they came to be together on Serenity. It's beautifully intercut and has some wonderful interactions between the crew.

"Ship like this'll be with you for the rest of your life."
"That's because it's a deathtrap, sir."

Okay, so, Firefly - where would you have taken the show if it had been given a second season and you were in creative charge of it. (You can ignore the movie or not as you prefer.)

[tielan]

I think in this case the 'must have love/sex' is diluted for me by the fact that they don't. They know each other inside and out - intimacy in a way that sex can't achieve. Our society idolises sex, but I see it as an extension of emotional and mental intimacy, not as the end goal.

See, for me, I'd work at the strong emotional bonds between Mako and Stacker, Mako and Herc, Mako and Tendo, Raleigh and Tendo - the people they worked with side by side, cheek by jowl for years. Particularly in the wake of Pitfall and rebuilding everything - lots of opportunities for the friendships either Mako and/or Raleigh made in the years before they came together to be shown.

That was an amazing moment in MM:FR - the reunion, if not the homecoming...

[tielan]

...I don't think I have one. I'm kind of happy to have the world be as flexible as possible until canon shuts out the other possibilities. It allows for greater exploration.

What bit of Jupiter backstory would you like to have us see?

[everbright]

*frustrated teakettle noise* Pretty much ANYTHING that explains how she's able to be so good when faced with institutional evil when she's had her resistance to the gears of that machine ground into her for so long. I have a hard time getting a grip on Jupiter's POV, and for awhile I was worrying about internal misogyny (okay and that's still part of it probably.) However, a post on tumblr put a finger on the point that we don't really get character back story on her? We get a ton on where her mother's coming from, and so Jupiter's ultimate background, but the only time we see the inside of her head really clearly (at the beginning of the movie) is when she helps Lingerie Lady. Everything else is just about how stuck she feels in that life, which doesn't necessarily explain how she's able to stand up to those feelings.

I can do a little bit from the inside of my own head, since we have a few things in common, but I have trouble extrapolating.

Which Earth-side character from JA are you interested in the most?

[tielan]

See, I guess I'm according Jupiter the same degree of leeway I accord Steve Rogers. Bullied kids frequently turn out to be bullies themselves; but Steve doesn't - has an innate goodness and valour to him. So Jupiter, in my perspective, has that same goodness and valour to her: a desire to do what's right, in spite of having been done wrong all her life.

Hm. I guess Jupiter, really. Although I do love reading about Aleksa, and Jupiter's life with the Bolotnikovs. Mostly because they're not picture perfect, and sure her cousin's a big dick and her uncle's not particularly nice, but I think they do care about her in their own way. It's not a way that we find particularly respectful of Jupiter, but it's still caring.

[endeni]

Well, first of all, I would have really liked to get a glimpse of Book's past with the Alliance, we never got to know what happened there. (And I know they did a comic book but it's not the same, isn't it?)

Also, some more exploration of Mal's character would be awesome: if there's something that bothers me about Firefly is how the crew seems to be so loyal to such an assole. I mean, he obviously has his moments, which is what makes him endearing, but it almost seems like whenever he acts good he does it in spite of himself. I know that, as River says, Mal means "Bad" in Latin and that's what makes his character original but I'd like to see some character development, a chance to see him slowly grow out of the disillusionment of the war and grow into someone you could be proud to be blindly loyal to, you know what I mean?

Aside from that, I really loved the movie twist about the Reavers and the Alliance and I'd absolutely like to keep that in this hypothetical second season. Only, you know, with a less rushed feel since we'd have more than a couple of hours to explain things.

Wash's death was shocking (and I do ship Zoe/Wash way more than Mal/Inara or Simon/Kaylee) but I guess that bit can remain too, because, in the words of Gina Torres, I love the concept of Zoe being "pregnant when all that went down and she’s got this little beige, curly red headed baby running around the ship. Jayne’s trying to teach him about Vera and he and I fight because I think the kid should learn about guns from me. Kaylie & Simon are very happy. It’s a better-verse. And Mal, well, Mal’s still just a little twisted. His communication skills have not improved. But he’s a good uncle Mal and I just think we’re all still flying. I’m by his side. That’s Zoe."

What's left? I would love some more focus on Simon and River, they're my favorite characters.

Also, back to the characters' development thing, I'd like to see the crew learning to be together, to really work as a team (after all, my favorite eps. where the heist ones: 'The Train Job' and 'Ariel', the best examples of the crew functioning like a smooth team).

...What about you?