Poetic range
Mar. 7th, 2021 01:15 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethI was thinking about Legends of Tomorrow and the Arrowverse...
... okay, first I was thinking about teaching at Sunnydale High, and then about iambic pentameter, amd then about how Shakespeare endures because his characters are just so human
and that Legends of Tomorrow episode where he started writing about superheroes? That would be like, retro, like old school King Arthur stuff, all those sagas about some super warrior with a super power. Those had been around. Shakespeare wrote about people shaped people. Imitable violence. And one reason the royal stories endure is when your family argues it can feel like the end of the world, like it can bring down kingdoms and end everything, even if family mostly tends to involve less stabbing and poison and so on. So instead of portraying nobles as fundamentally different than thee and I, the stories we keep hold of are just, like, what if they're just us? Us but with all the power. Fucked up families that can start wars.
So if he was writing about superheroes, the powers part might grab the attention, but I reckon he'd write more about how they're people sized people. You know? Like sure they can shake the world, but they're us.
And I was thinking how Legends of Tomorrow, by being completely gonzo and able to have anything happen, has *very* people shaped people. Like, yes, sometimes there are demons, sometimes there is Beebo, sometimes they've rewritten all of human history, but they do it for such people shaped reasons. Including love and despair and how your family fucks you up, but also just, like, forgetting their bag somewhere? Trying to buy a kids toy for a holiday they dont even celebrate? Little ordinary stuff as well.
And any story that doesnt include the small stuff or the funny stuff or the daft stuff is only people shaped from one angle. They'll be larger than life on a pedestal, or all grim in the dark, but you try and imagine them playing a board game or lining up for the loo and you kind of have to break genre to do it. But not Legends.
It's pretty cool.
Plus, caring about characters on Legends usually works out... kind of fulfiling? Like, even when they become part of the cycle of coping with grief and loss and the experience of trauma not being linear, they still... I don't know exactly. I hated most of the Earth X story but not that Martin chose to not monkey with time. I'd want to save Leonard Snart but love what they did with the absence of him. It's satisfying drama even if the first thing I'd do with a universal reboot is bring back Cold.
(Which would be tricky to make as satisfying as Mick's whole journey without him has been.)
Arrow though... with a season still unwatched, I have not felt that Arrow often rewards caring about characters. Because bad things are going to happen to them. And then more bad things. And it doesn't feel like the tonal range of the show leaves them many ways out.
I'm sure people who like Arrow best are getting more out of it than me though.
I just like the show where we know for sure they're hanging out playing D&D or Cards Against the Timeline in between episodes.
So that's my thoughts for the day.
... I have a college trained urge to go looking for sources and making sure I know what I'm talking about, but it is like half one in the morning, I probably do not know what I'm talking about.
But these are the kind of thoughts I'm having lately. Wandering ones, cause it's not like we need to get anywhere.
Maybe I should go watch some episodes or something...
... okay, first I was thinking about teaching at Sunnydale High, and then about iambic pentameter, amd then about how Shakespeare endures because his characters are just so human
and that Legends of Tomorrow episode where he started writing about superheroes? That would be like, retro, like old school King Arthur stuff, all those sagas about some super warrior with a super power. Those had been around. Shakespeare wrote about people shaped people. Imitable violence. And one reason the royal stories endure is when your family argues it can feel like the end of the world, like it can bring down kingdoms and end everything, even if family mostly tends to involve less stabbing and poison and so on. So instead of portraying nobles as fundamentally different than thee and I, the stories we keep hold of are just, like, what if they're just us? Us but with all the power. Fucked up families that can start wars.
So if he was writing about superheroes, the powers part might grab the attention, but I reckon he'd write more about how they're people sized people. You know? Like sure they can shake the world, but they're us.
And I was thinking how Legends of Tomorrow, by being completely gonzo and able to have anything happen, has *very* people shaped people. Like, yes, sometimes there are demons, sometimes there is Beebo, sometimes they've rewritten all of human history, but they do it for such people shaped reasons. Including love and despair and how your family fucks you up, but also just, like, forgetting their bag somewhere? Trying to buy a kids toy for a holiday they dont even celebrate? Little ordinary stuff as well.
And any story that doesnt include the small stuff or the funny stuff or the daft stuff is only people shaped from one angle. They'll be larger than life on a pedestal, or all grim in the dark, but you try and imagine them playing a board game or lining up for the loo and you kind of have to break genre to do it. But not Legends.
It's pretty cool.
Plus, caring about characters on Legends usually works out... kind of fulfiling? Like, even when they become part of the cycle of coping with grief and loss and the experience of trauma not being linear, they still... I don't know exactly. I hated most of the Earth X story but not that Martin chose to not monkey with time. I'd want to save Leonard Snart but love what they did with the absence of him. It's satisfying drama even if the first thing I'd do with a universal reboot is bring back Cold.
(Which would be tricky to make as satisfying as Mick's whole journey without him has been.)
Arrow though... with a season still unwatched, I have not felt that Arrow often rewards caring about characters. Because bad things are going to happen to them. And then more bad things. And it doesn't feel like the tonal range of the show leaves them many ways out.
I'm sure people who like Arrow best are getting more out of it than me though.
I just like the show where we know for sure they're hanging out playing D&D or Cards Against the Timeline in between episodes.
So that's my thoughts for the day.
... I have a college trained urge to go looking for sources and making sure I know what I'm talking about, but it is like half one in the morning, I probably do not know what I'm talking about.
But these are the kind of thoughts I'm having lately. Wandering ones, cause it's not like we need to get anywhere.
Maybe I should go watch some episodes or something...