Highlander season 5: Haunted
Feb. 5th, 2006 09:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethA Richie ep, and with lots of thinky. And ghosts. All good stuff.
Richie. Sweaty naked kata. Richie with no shirt on being all martial arts guy.
*pause, appreciate, watch*
(then I started thinking of Buffyverse sweaty shirtless kata. If Buffy did that with that little clothes on it would be a whole different show. But, pretty. Or Faith could. Or... well, they're all pretty.)
interesting stuff in this-
Alec starts talking about souls. The transmigration of the soul. "When we take another Immortal's head, what do you think we get?"
"All souls are eternal, not just ours."
So what Alec is saying, what he believes, is that the Quickening *is* the soul.
That would make Immortals *soul eaters*.
They take another Immortal's power, but what does that add up to? Does it contain specific memories? It did for the Hayoka, but that could have been a pre-existing psychic power. Duncan got no such flashbacks.
If the Quickening is the soul, then an Immortal that dies alone dies *forever*.
The Game isn't just important for whoever lives.
It carries the eternity of their entire race.
pretty scary.
"Richie, you're the son-of-a-bitch who killed her husband. Don't freak out, okay?"
so the stuff with the music and the smoking and the fancying her, suddenly we get to re-evaluate it because hey, Quickening! And again, we're back to, what is it they absorb? Can it be something as subtle as tastes and attractions? Or even as important as love?
Joe the plot device intervenes. I mean if he hadn't said anything the story doesn't work at all. But I can see why he would say something. I mean it is really rather tacky, kill a guy and date his wife.
Also - consequences, yaaay!
Richie's little headhunting freakout coming back to haunt him :)
"Richie, Everyone leaves someone behind. Everyone."
"It's open, come in!"
this is how he greets random knocks on the door??
Richie + vampires = trouble
"I know you felt it too. I know it wasn't just me."
you know no such thing you silly woman.
also, silly Richie!
It could just be a case of 'can't keep it in his pants'
but she is all 'we're meant to be' and Richie is still the same Richie as dated Kristin. He wants someone to like him, to think he is special. What is more special than destiny? So I can see the appeal.
And yet. Silly, silly Richie.
on a tangent while there's a sword fight
cities we know Richie has been to on his own - Amsterdam, San Francisco, New Orleans, Rio for carnival.
Are we seeing a pattern?
there's a whole debauchery theme going on
and also just a hint of /
mixing up the sword fight and the Richie/woman smoochies is just... I don't much like watching this particular 'love' scene anyway, and mixing it with the violence makes it kind of disturbing. I mean when its Buffy/Riley and the fighting they're side by side and its both them, together. With this fight/sex combo is a contrast, but is also unsettling if there's anything in common.
Sword fight on a sound stage, deliberate artifice, fake, fake love scene. Themey.
Violence and death. Also themey.
That just isn't happy sex right there. At all.
"I love you Alec" she says
horror look on Richie
yup, that is freaky.
the part that particularly bugs me is violence + sex can = non-con, and the issues here wander close to bad places. She's a little bit crazy, grieving, he could be taking advantage. Or she said before about not having a choice, spirits connecting. If there's no choice there's no consent. Very creepy.
Back to the pretty. Richie's second sword. I like that sword. Nice solid design, visually distinctive. And Richie all sweaty and angsty next to it. Nice image. But again with the slightly disturbing. It reminds me of those dead knights on top of stone coffins. Only they tend to hold their swords, and Richie's is behind him.
Richie confessing to Mac, starts with the 'slept with her' part. For why? I mean yeah, its kind of creepy to watch, I just got through saying. But mostly she's a grown woman and just a friend of Mac, so there isn't any issue there. Why did Richie feel the need to tell? Why did Mac start getting annoyed? I'm reading it a bit like there's some guy ownership thing going on there. Protective in a way he wouldn't be about a guy.
But then Mac says it okay.
and then Richie gets to the real bad.
Richie feels the need to tell Mac, even though he's come back after killing the guy and in theory its of the past now.
Well, Joe told Richie, and he's primarily Mac's friend. Could be Richie's thinking Joe will tell anyway.
Or it could be he just wants to apologise. This is a pretty important thing. Friends don't kill friends friends. Important to know if they have. But, not easy to tell them.
The setup here, Richie waiting in the dojo and Mac in the long dark coat - this is where Richie's nightmares live. Mac isn't reacting like he did in the nightmare, and Richie has been working out here since he got back so he is obviously over the worst of the post trauma freakout, but this specifically is where and who his nightmares were.
Very not easy to be there, I'd think, let alone piss him off.
flashback - Alec in the same long black coat. huh.
also, calling Richie 'kid'. Why do Immortals do that? No good reason. Just to annoy.
Richie using the old sword. (hurt Stan's hands, yesno?) They make a whole story give him new sword, then have flashback.
"Move the bike" is a pretty fucking stupid reason to fight to the death. I realise headhunter!Richie didn't even need that much reason, but Alec should have knowed better too. His stupid for starting that fight. Richie a bit stupid for not walking away. Just a really stupid situation.
Not a stupid story. People do stupid stuff all the time.
Richie being 'fair fight, what have you been teaching me'
which is a teensy unfair, because by example Mac teaches him to pick fights pretty carefully and only for moral reasons.
Richie saying about wife lady (whose name I keep forgetting because she annoys me)
about 'couldn't stop myself' and 'stronger than either one of us'
Mac says 'save it for the romance novels'
well if its a romance then its being exaggerated and they have a choice. if this is *horror* then Richie's situation is entirely different. Buffy episodes with love spells are usually played for laughs, but they usually don't get as far as sex. Katrina is the relevant precedent for sex under supernatural influence. Rape.
If Richie really is possessed, then what happened was rape.
Which is many layers of freaky nasty.
But Mac doesn't believe in ghosts, so it wouldn't occur to him to treat it that way.
I'm getting fic bunnies to respin this one, change that angle and retell it a bit.
Because seriously, that is one creepy as hell situation.
"I wanna fix this thing"
"You can't fix it"
Richie learning about consequences and permanence. Again.
ouch.
But trying.
Mac tells Richie to get out of town, Richie says fine, turns and leaves (with some serious staring and getting in each other's personal space going on)
*pause, rewind, fiddle*
Mac reaches up to Richie as he turns to leave. His hand just comes into shot. He doesn't touch Richie, the gesture doesn't do much of anything, but he reaches for him. Is a very ambiguous gesture. It could be a clenched fist want to hit him, or a loose pinching want to catch hold of him. And its very brief.
Sometimes I want to move the picture over or down just a little bit.
not even for skin, just for context.
Mac doesn't believe Q = soul.
the = should be a really hard belief to live with.
I mean what kind of heaven is being inside a guy forever?
*pause, thinks, rephrase*
er, stuck inside the guy that killed you, specifically.
"thanks for not thinking I'm crazy"
and that look on Mac's face :)
"there's a lot of Alec in you right now"
except there isn't, the way she means it.
so this one is about perception and belief, and not spooks?
but spooks are always about all.
no haunted places, haunted people.
"Because your friend is dead, and Richie killed him."
sparked connections in my head. Joe and Charlie and that dead K'Immie. btdt. Big mess.
"I know how you feel because I feel it too!"
NO. No no no no no. Crazy stalker logic! Feelings happen in seperate people. Never knowings.
"I would do anything to be with you"
Richie being really sweet, but stupid. Oh so very stupid.
and *then* he tells her.
*whistley noise and bomb drop BOOM*
passing thought, how old is she supposed to be? and relative to Richie? Is there a whole older woman thing going on, or did Alec marry her really young this time?
(thinking because of thoughts about Buffy/Angel that really don't map the same at all. so irrelevance.)
"sick son of a bitch" is understandable reaction, but hellooooo, who chased who? He said no, and left, and went home, and tried to leave town.
which isn't at all relevant to the 'killed husband' issue, actually.
(have noticed this writer says son of a bitch a bunch. is meant to be echoey or is just habit??)
"You thought you were doing the right thing"
"Yeah, I know, but did I have to sleep with his wife?"
revealing response there. His first thought isn't right thing = tell truth, its going right back to the fight. When he was fighting, he thought he was doing the right thing. And also, he thinks Joe means that too.
Joe gets to be the wise empathetic bar tender guy.
huh. guys are allowed empathy if drink is involved.
(been reading about 'new man' and theories of masculinity)
(but Xander wasn't good at bartender because it wasn't, actually, about listening sympathetically, it was about money and drinks and stuff. and also he misread people anyway.)
(/tangent *again*)
Joe and Richie are both nodding and maybe about 'Quickening, maybe love too'
neither one is treating it as a creepy possession thing. even though the language is very creepy. none of the parts Richie listed were parts that *wanted* to do, just the part trying to stop and the part that couldn't.
this is freakin creepy if you accept any of the supernatural elements, Quickening or ghosts. Immortals sense of self would get pushed around all over the place!
"I've got a much simpler theory. I'm an idiot."
:) yeah, that works too...
"When two Immortals fight, one dies. That's not murder, that's the way we live."
like hell.
to the 'not murder' part.
I just can't agree with that part. 'Fair fight' doesn't make it not murder. Dueling to the death isn't legal any more.
"Unreasonable? You have no idea how I feel."
Now that, combined with crazy stalker line, gets interesting.
Would Mac say 'unreasonable' to a fellow Immortal?
Don't think so.
Would he say it to a man?
Somehow I can't see it.
He might ask him to be reasonable, but he wouldn't tell him he was being unreasonable.
Unreason=woman.
yesno? I could be wrong of course.
but unreasonable also = not feeling what I feel.
and have no idea also = not feeling what I feel.
because 'I feel it too' = knowing what he feels.
so, interesting.
that sort of pink/red neon light outside Richie's room, that isn't the first time/place he's had that. Also in Prodigal Son he had that outside his room. Richie gets a red light outside his bedroom. *raised eyebrow*
J: "He needs me to do it so he can rest in peace."
Mac: "Killing doesn't bring peace. When you kill, it haunts you for the rest of your life."
they're repeating haunted just a few too many times for elegance, but the theme works, the moment works.
good ghost story.
"Let him carry it. Let it haunt him forever."
same decision Mac made about guy that killed his student.
"she had a choice. she could walk away. You can't."
the partial transcript here says 'We can't', but that isn't what I heard first time. Second time I can barely hear that particular word. So it could be anything. Huh.
"she's dealing with her demons"
Mac using the word, but not for literal.
"You screwed up Rich. It happens. To all of us."
NOT Mac sitting in judgement, sympathy of equals in same bad place.
Richie: "I didn't know you believed in ghosts."
Duncan: "I believe in the kind you carry with you. Everyone you've loved and everyone you've killed. They never leave you."
"When you stop feeling [them], when you stop hurting, that's when you're dead inside. And that, my friend..." hands Richie sword "...is when I'll worry about you."
[I only hear this word when I watch his mouth]
Fade out on Richie looking off to one side, past the sword.
*hugs Richie*
I love this episode, even though I don't so much like the acting of Alec or his wife or that random K'Immie. The thinky stuff, the Richie stuff, that makes it a great ep.
Richie. Sweaty naked kata. Richie with no shirt on being all martial arts guy.
*pause, appreciate, watch*
(then I started thinking of Buffyverse sweaty shirtless kata. If Buffy did that with that little clothes on it would be a whole different show. But, pretty. Or Faith could. Or... well, they're all pretty.)
interesting stuff in this-
Alec starts talking about souls. The transmigration of the soul. "When we take another Immortal's head, what do you think we get?"
"All souls are eternal, not just ours."
So what Alec is saying, what he believes, is that the Quickening *is* the soul.
That would make Immortals *soul eaters*.
They take another Immortal's power, but what does that add up to? Does it contain specific memories? It did for the Hayoka, but that could have been a pre-existing psychic power. Duncan got no such flashbacks.
If the Quickening is the soul, then an Immortal that dies alone dies *forever*.
The Game isn't just important for whoever lives.
It carries the eternity of their entire race.
pretty scary.
"Richie, you're the son-of-a-bitch who killed her husband. Don't freak out, okay?"
so the stuff with the music and the smoking and the fancying her, suddenly we get to re-evaluate it because hey, Quickening! And again, we're back to, what is it they absorb? Can it be something as subtle as tastes and attractions? Or even as important as love?
Joe the plot device intervenes. I mean if he hadn't said anything the story doesn't work at all. But I can see why he would say something. I mean it is really rather tacky, kill a guy and date his wife.
Also - consequences, yaaay!
Richie's little headhunting freakout coming back to haunt him :)
"Richie, Everyone leaves someone behind. Everyone."
"It's open, come in!"
this is how he greets random knocks on the door??
Richie + vampires = trouble
"I know you felt it too. I know it wasn't just me."
you know no such thing you silly woman.
also, silly Richie!
It could just be a case of 'can't keep it in his pants'
but she is all 'we're meant to be' and Richie is still the same Richie as dated Kristin. He wants someone to like him, to think he is special. What is more special than destiny? So I can see the appeal.
And yet. Silly, silly Richie.
on a tangent while there's a sword fight
cities we know Richie has been to on his own - Amsterdam, San Francisco, New Orleans, Rio for carnival.
Are we seeing a pattern?
there's a whole debauchery theme going on
and also just a hint of /
mixing up the sword fight and the Richie/woman smoochies is just... I don't much like watching this particular 'love' scene anyway, and mixing it with the violence makes it kind of disturbing. I mean when its Buffy/Riley and the fighting they're side by side and its both them, together. With this fight/sex combo is a contrast, but is also unsettling if there's anything in common.
Sword fight on a sound stage, deliberate artifice, fake, fake love scene. Themey.
Violence and death. Also themey.
That just isn't happy sex right there. At all.
"I love you Alec" she says
horror look on Richie
yup, that is freaky.
the part that particularly bugs me is violence + sex can = non-con, and the issues here wander close to bad places. She's a little bit crazy, grieving, he could be taking advantage. Or she said before about not having a choice, spirits connecting. If there's no choice there's no consent. Very creepy.
Back to the pretty. Richie's second sword. I like that sword. Nice solid design, visually distinctive. And Richie all sweaty and angsty next to it. Nice image. But again with the slightly disturbing. It reminds me of those dead knights on top of stone coffins. Only they tend to hold their swords, and Richie's is behind him.
Richie confessing to Mac, starts with the 'slept with her' part. For why? I mean yeah, its kind of creepy to watch, I just got through saying. But mostly she's a grown woman and just a friend of Mac, so there isn't any issue there. Why did Richie feel the need to tell? Why did Mac start getting annoyed? I'm reading it a bit like there's some guy ownership thing going on there. Protective in a way he wouldn't be about a guy.
But then Mac says it okay.
and then Richie gets to the real bad.
Richie feels the need to tell Mac, even though he's come back after killing the guy and in theory its of the past now.
Well, Joe told Richie, and he's primarily Mac's friend. Could be Richie's thinking Joe will tell anyway.
Or it could be he just wants to apologise. This is a pretty important thing. Friends don't kill friends friends. Important to know if they have. But, not easy to tell them.
The setup here, Richie waiting in the dojo and Mac in the long dark coat - this is where Richie's nightmares live. Mac isn't reacting like he did in the nightmare, and Richie has been working out here since he got back so he is obviously over the worst of the post trauma freakout, but this specifically is where and who his nightmares were.
Very not easy to be there, I'd think, let alone piss him off.
flashback - Alec in the same long black coat. huh.
also, calling Richie 'kid'. Why do Immortals do that? No good reason. Just to annoy.
Richie using the old sword. (hurt Stan's hands, yesno?) They make a whole story give him new sword, then have flashback.
"Move the bike" is a pretty fucking stupid reason to fight to the death. I realise headhunter!Richie didn't even need that much reason, but Alec should have knowed better too. His stupid for starting that fight. Richie a bit stupid for not walking away. Just a really stupid situation.
Not a stupid story. People do stupid stuff all the time.
Richie being 'fair fight, what have you been teaching me'
which is a teensy unfair, because by example Mac teaches him to pick fights pretty carefully and only for moral reasons.
Richie saying about wife lady (whose name I keep forgetting because she annoys me)
about 'couldn't stop myself' and 'stronger than either one of us'
Mac says 'save it for the romance novels'
well if its a romance then its being exaggerated and they have a choice. if this is *horror* then Richie's situation is entirely different. Buffy episodes with love spells are usually played for laughs, but they usually don't get as far as sex. Katrina is the relevant precedent for sex under supernatural influence. Rape.
If Richie really is possessed, then what happened was rape.
Which is many layers of freaky nasty.
But Mac doesn't believe in ghosts, so it wouldn't occur to him to treat it that way.
I'm getting fic bunnies to respin this one, change that angle and retell it a bit.
Because seriously, that is one creepy as hell situation.
"I wanna fix this thing"
"You can't fix it"
Richie learning about consequences and permanence. Again.
ouch.
But trying.
Mac tells Richie to get out of town, Richie says fine, turns and leaves (with some serious staring and getting in each other's personal space going on)
*pause, rewind, fiddle*
Mac reaches up to Richie as he turns to leave. His hand just comes into shot. He doesn't touch Richie, the gesture doesn't do much of anything, but he reaches for him. Is a very ambiguous gesture. It could be a clenched fist want to hit him, or a loose pinching want to catch hold of him. And its very brief.
Sometimes I want to move the picture over or down just a little bit.
not even for skin, just for context.
Mac doesn't believe Q = soul.
the = should be a really hard belief to live with.
I mean what kind of heaven is being inside a guy forever?
*pause, thinks, rephrase*
er, stuck inside the guy that killed you, specifically.
"thanks for not thinking I'm crazy"
and that look on Mac's face :)
"there's a lot of Alec in you right now"
except there isn't, the way she means it.
so this one is about perception and belief, and not spooks?
but spooks are always about all.
no haunted places, haunted people.
"Because your friend is dead, and Richie killed him."
sparked connections in my head. Joe and Charlie and that dead K'Immie. btdt. Big mess.
"I know how you feel because I feel it too!"
NO. No no no no no. Crazy stalker logic! Feelings happen in seperate people. Never knowings.
"I would do anything to be with you"
Richie being really sweet, but stupid. Oh so very stupid.
and *then* he tells her.
*whistley noise and bomb drop BOOM*
passing thought, how old is she supposed to be? and relative to Richie? Is there a whole older woman thing going on, or did Alec marry her really young this time?
(thinking because of thoughts about Buffy/Angel that really don't map the same at all. so irrelevance.)
"sick son of a bitch" is understandable reaction, but hellooooo, who chased who? He said no, and left, and went home, and tried to leave town.
which isn't at all relevant to the 'killed husband' issue, actually.
(have noticed this writer says son of a bitch a bunch. is meant to be echoey or is just habit??)
"You thought you were doing the right thing"
"Yeah, I know, but did I have to sleep with his wife?"
revealing response there. His first thought isn't right thing = tell truth, its going right back to the fight. When he was fighting, he thought he was doing the right thing. And also, he thinks Joe means that too.
Joe gets to be the wise empathetic bar tender guy.
huh. guys are allowed empathy if drink is involved.
(been reading about 'new man' and theories of masculinity)
(but Xander wasn't good at bartender because it wasn't, actually, about listening sympathetically, it was about money and drinks and stuff. and also he misread people anyway.)
(/tangent *again*)
Joe and Richie are both nodding and maybe about 'Quickening, maybe love too'
neither one is treating it as a creepy possession thing. even though the language is very creepy. none of the parts Richie listed were parts that *wanted* to do, just the part trying to stop and the part that couldn't.
this is freakin creepy if you accept any of the supernatural elements, Quickening or ghosts. Immortals sense of self would get pushed around all over the place!
"I've got a much simpler theory. I'm an idiot."
:) yeah, that works too...
"When two Immortals fight, one dies. That's not murder, that's the way we live."
like hell.
to the 'not murder' part.
I just can't agree with that part. 'Fair fight' doesn't make it not murder. Dueling to the death isn't legal any more.
"Unreasonable? You have no idea how I feel."
Now that, combined with crazy stalker line, gets interesting.
Would Mac say 'unreasonable' to a fellow Immortal?
Don't think so.
Would he say it to a man?
Somehow I can't see it.
He might ask him to be reasonable, but he wouldn't tell him he was being unreasonable.
Unreason=woman.
yesno? I could be wrong of course.
but unreasonable also = not feeling what I feel.
and have no idea also = not feeling what I feel.
because 'I feel it too' = knowing what he feels.
so, interesting.
that sort of pink/red neon light outside Richie's room, that isn't the first time/place he's had that. Also in Prodigal Son he had that outside his room. Richie gets a red light outside his bedroom. *raised eyebrow*
J: "He needs me to do it so he can rest in peace."
Mac: "Killing doesn't bring peace. When you kill, it haunts you for the rest of your life."
they're repeating haunted just a few too many times for elegance, but the theme works, the moment works.
good ghost story.
"Let him carry it. Let it haunt him forever."
same decision Mac made about guy that killed his student.
"she had a choice. she could walk away. You can't."
the partial transcript here says 'We can't', but that isn't what I heard first time. Second time I can barely hear that particular word. So it could be anything. Huh.
"she's dealing with her demons"
Mac using the word, but not for literal.
"You screwed up Rich. It happens. To all of us."
NOT Mac sitting in judgement, sympathy of equals in same bad place.
Richie: "I didn't know you believed in ghosts."
Duncan: "I believe in the kind you carry with you. Everyone you've loved and everyone you've killed. They never leave you."
"When you stop feeling [them], when you stop hurting, that's when you're dead inside. And that, my friend..." hands Richie sword "...is when I'll worry about you."
[I only hear this word when I watch his mouth]
Fade out on Richie looking off to one side, past the sword.
*hugs Richie*
I love this episode, even though I don't so much like the acting of Alec or his wife or that random K'Immie. The thinky stuff, the Richie stuff, that makes it a great ep.