The Flash season 3
Sep. 14th, 2017 02:01 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethJoe's first date in forever, Wally, Alchemy, and the first appearance of Savitar.
Plus a boringly underused Shade. I mean why even have fancy fx for a red herring with no motivation. blah.
Every time a story makes someone possessed or mind controlled or somehow no longer free willed, it gets absolutely and completely boring. It is the most boring of all boring versions they could possibly tell. It reduces the character to an empty meaningless puppet, and it abandons the most basic realism, cause there's always a choice. Not always a good choice, but always a choice.
The way comics and associated comic derived media presents mental illness has very little to do with how mental illness actually borks choice, in this case especially because it's presented as 'going evil' against her will rather than... anything actually people shaped. So, again, boring. No applicability and nothing to relate to.
So I'm getting the feeling I'm not going to likea major arc or two right here.
If Wally had chosen to seek out Alchemy that would be a thousand times more interesting. If he did exactly like here and chose to help the police, but at the last moment got tempted by the shiny, that would be a thousand times more interesting. Describing it as him being possessed means he didn't make a choice, th shiny made a choice, and then it's boring. He didn't do things because reasons, just because shiny. Boringest version.
And it shouldn't have been, because he is in prime fall to temptation good intentions headspace, so why put that other rubbish on?
Caitlin I just want to have a talk with, about how you can't run away from a fear of mental illness. She needs accurate feedback from people she trusts, and to learn some techniques to manage whatever symptoms she has, like apparently not having nice emotions and having aggressive impulses. But instead of framing things as science she goes straight to 'turning evil'. No help in that paradigm. Might as well be afraid of demon possession. Actually there's more suggestions for how to avoid that.
Barry saying she didn't have powers pre Flashpoint doesn't make sense because she was actively hiding them. Like, he only found out today, and today is post Flashpoint. He's just gathering guilt.
He's also ignoring that they told him not to tell them.
What else... Joe and Cecile. Cute, but, he's known her how long and not known she has a daughter? Did that just never come up?
It's weird because it's like he doesn't have a life when we're not looking.
HR.
... the thing with fixing his face and then fixing it so they can see through it is just... I can see both Watsonian and Doylist reasons to do it that way but I still only feel it's a daft work around. The only thing it does is make it easier to forget the technology later. And leave you vaguely creeped out at the level of routine deception they're all fine with.
HR is annoying. As the writers intend.
Also?
"What do I need cuffs for? I just got to this Earth. I came alone. I haven't met anyone yet; it's gonna take a while, even when I do meet them, to get to the cuff stage."
... that's his first thought, he says this to near strangers, and?
pronouns. neutral.
... why is it the annoying version that is kinky and not straight?
... and how much do Wellses have in common?
HR's management style involves crediting others with ideas he started, "I agree with", and then spinning it further than their statement or question even implied.
... having put these thoughts side by side I'm now thinking one would have to be real clear with him about boundaries and safewords...
But it's a technique they're turning up to 11 so everyone definitely sees it, but you can see how a more subtle version would work. Is fun. And creepy.
But he's also listening to everyone and shaping their contributions together, so if he was less creepy about it, useful skill set.
HR at the movie was ... not cool. Find own date to chat up, dude. And wear your own face at the time, sheesh.
... everyone had story, and look who has most of my attention... *sigh*
But everyone else had story made of not being able to choose. HR was making choices a bunch.
And his idea for the STAR Labs museum is insufficient but a good start. Three years in, it's still only Caitlin and Cisco that know the science of the impossible, and that's not how science optimally works.
Show could make better choices and is focused on making a bunch of deliberately embarrassing right now.
But still got some interesting.
Plus a boringly underused Shade. I mean why even have fancy fx for a red herring with no motivation. blah.
Every time a story makes someone possessed or mind controlled or somehow no longer free willed, it gets absolutely and completely boring. It is the most boring of all boring versions they could possibly tell. It reduces the character to an empty meaningless puppet, and it abandons the most basic realism, cause there's always a choice. Not always a good choice, but always a choice.
The way comics and associated comic derived media presents mental illness has very little to do with how mental illness actually borks choice, in this case especially because it's presented as 'going evil' against her will rather than... anything actually people shaped. So, again, boring. No applicability and nothing to relate to.
So I'm getting the feeling I'm not going to likea major arc or two right here.
If Wally had chosen to seek out Alchemy that would be a thousand times more interesting. If he did exactly like here and chose to help the police, but at the last moment got tempted by the shiny, that would be a thousand times more interesting. Describing it as him being possessed means he didn't make a choice, th shiny made a choice, and then it's boring. He didn't do things because reasons, just because shiny. Boringest version.
And it shouldn't have been, because he is in prime fall to temptation good intentions headspace, so why put that other rubbish on?
Caitlin I just want to have a talk with, about how you can't run away from a fear of mental illness. She needs accurate feedback from people she trusts, and to learn some techniques to manage whatever symptoms she has, like apparently not having nice emotions and having aggressive impulses. But instead of framing things as science she goes straight to 'turning evil'. No help in that paradigm. Might as well be afraid of demon possession. Actually there's more suggestions for how to avoid that.
Barry saying she didn't have powers pre Flashpoint doesn't make sense because she was actively hiding them. Like, he only found out today, and today is post Flashpoint. He's just gathering guilt.
He's also ignoring that they told him not to tell them.
What else... Joe and Cecile. Cute, but, he's known her how long and not known she has a daughter? Did that just never come up?
It's weird because it's like he doesn't have a life when we're not looking.
HR.
... the thing with fixing his face and then fixing it so they can see through it is just... I can see both Watsonian and Doylist reasons to do it that way but I still only feel it's a daft work around. The only thing it does is make it easier to forget the technology later. And leave you vaguely creeped out at the level of routine deception they're all fine with.
HR is annoying. As the writers intend.
Also?
"What do I need cuffs for? I just got to this Earth. I came alone. I haven't met anyone yet; it's gonna take a while, even when I do meet them, to get to the cuff stage."
... that's his first thought, he says this to near strangers, and?
pronouns. neutral.
... why is it the annoying version that is kinky and not straight?
... and how much do Wellses have in common?
HR's management style involves crediting others with ideas he started, "I agree with", and then spinning it further than their statement or question even implied.
... having put these thoughts side by side I'm now thinking one would have to be real clear with him about boundaries and safewords...
But it's a technique they're turning up to 11 so everyone definitely sees it, but you can see how a more subtle version would work. Is fun. And creepy.
But he's also listening to everyone and shaping their contributions together, so if he was less creepy about it, useful skill set.
HR at the movie was ... not cool. Find own date to chat up, dude. And wear your own face at the time, sheesh.
... everyone had story, and look who has most of my attention... *sigh*
But everyone else had story made of not being able to choose. HR was making choices a bunch.
And his idea for the STAR Labs museum is insufficient but a good start. Three years in, it's still only Caitlin and Cisco that know the science of the impossible, and that's not how science optimally works.
Show could make better choices and is focused on making a bunch of deliberately embarrassing right now.
But still got some interesting.