would you like a little RAGE with your RAGE?

[xparrot]

So Martin Gero made some comments on the most recent episode of SGA.

"For five years, we didn’t even know it, but all [Rodney] wanted was for someone to tell him that they loved him in an unconditional way."

I want to...I want to kick Martin Gero's head in with a big spiky boot. OF LOVE.

So the love of friends and family (because doesn't Jeannie love him, too? or was she lying when she said "I love you" in "Miller's Crossing" and faking her tears in "The Shrine"?) counts for snot, because it's not romantic, sexual love.

And unconditional love is quoting a guy's own brain-damaged love confession back at him (six months later), and then offering him sex on a plane to make him shut up.

I have no boyfriend! I HAVE NO LOVE! What do I do??? My life is empty! Meaningless!

*cue total fucking mental breakdown*

Okay, now I'm going to do my best to forget this episode ever happened. There's been other eps I haven't enjoyed, but this is the first one that's seriously in danger of spoiling my fanning. It pretty much ruined Rodney's character for me even when I was ignoring the McKeller (I swear, I'd've been almost as outraged if the ep had gone the same way only with John instead of Keller, though at least then I'd have some McShep making out), and now that I am meant to think that banging Keller on the plane is the most significant and important event of Rodney's life in the past five years - yeah. Someone tell me how to hold onto my SGA love, because I don't want to lose this fandom, but the show seems pretty determined to use its dying breath to drive me away.

ETA: I gotta say, SGA these days is really making me appreciate NCIS. NCIS has one s5 ep that is explicitly the 100% opposite theme as this.

Comments

[xparrot.livejournal.com]

but for me fiction is a reflection of reality; a conversation with it.

Thinking this over, I misspoke myself when I said my feelings on romance in RL have no bearing on my feelings in fiction. I was dead wrong about that. However, what I like in my fiction is not what I necessarily like in reality. Rather, my fictional tastes are a distorted reflection of certain ideals and impressions about reality.

So I often have favorite characters that are nothing like the people I like in real life, characters that I'd never even want to meet, but adore reading and writing about. (Current example, my favorite character in NCIS is Tony, but if I were actually going to meet or befriend one of the characters, it would be McGee. McGee is much like my real friends, the kind of person I like to know, but Tony is the kind of char I like to read about.) And I sometimes like relationships that are nothing like the kind of relationship I have or would want to have in real life. For example, I have a kink for dysfunctional, obsessive, co-dependent relationships (not all the time; this is not, for example, how I like to see McShep written; but some of my anime fandoms had some twisted stuff I loved, and Clex can be like this) - in reality, I see such relationships as unhealthy and get very upset if my friends find themselves trapped in one; but in my fiction I can find such to be incredibly compelling. I'm not sure why I have this kink, though I suspect it's because I like/appreciate devoted friendship/love in reality, and on one level am fascinated by the absolute obsessive proof of devotion in fiction where it's "safe" and there's no real people to be hurt by it.

So when I look at John & Rodney, I'm not comparing them to anyone I know in reality, but rather an ideal of friendship/love. (Though it kind of amuses me that you see Rodney doing best with an unambitious partner, because that's actually one of the reasons McShep works for me - I see John as quite laid-back and unambitious in most areas; he doesn't feel competitive with Rodney's brilliance, and Rodney's successes wouldn't hurt his ego...)

A healthy real life is a balancing act between many competing urges and needs and ideals; while as fiction can focus on a particular trait to the exclusion of others, and I enjoy that focus. I like my fiction to reflect certain aspect of reality, but don't need or want it to be an exact mirror image.

The "forever" thing is the same deal - in reality, I am one of those sedentary people who hates change. Change can be very good for me, and I need it sometimes; like anyone I can get stuck in negative ruts. But change is uncomfortable for me. So in fanfic and fandom, which I go to for comfort and relaxation, I prefer a status quo, relationships that stay largely unchanged - that might advance by becoming closer, but that don't split up or end. In real life, I like making new friends, and I'm not totally heartbroken by losing old ones - but I don't want the same for John & Rodney; they're a comfort place for me, in their fictional world, and I want them to remain the way I like them. While as some people love change, love new things, and find the idea of a fixed relationship or life unsettling and stifling, in reality or in fiction.

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Glad you've enjoying the conversation, and thanks for contributing - your thoughts helped clarify some things for me!