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ladybug_archiveSo I decided I wanted to watch Gotham as soon as I learned that it is indeed part of the Batman mythos. Originally, when I just knew the name, I wasn't sure and figured it wasn't related, since Gotham is sometimes used as a nickname for New York and I didn't think a Batman show would air on FOX now that there's the CW and Warner Brothers has such grabby hands about their programming.
I was surprised and excited to learn otherwise! I guess FOX probably had to pay a pretty penny to air a series about Warner Brothers characters. And I'm guessing maybe Warner actually wanted it on FOX, so it would be seen as more mainstream and adult, since the CW is known for programs catering to teenagers.
(I find it amusing that I roll my eyes and scoff at teenage programming while happily enjoying children's programming. I suppose that's because children's programming will usually have friendship and family stuff, plus it can involve characters or brands I've loved for years, whereas teenage shows tend to focus on romance problems and that makes me eyeroll.)
Anyway, so Hulu has the show and I don't have the greatest relationship with Hulu, but I struggled to watch the episodes there anyway. I may try FOX Now for the next one and see if it will play any better for me. I will be amused if it does, since network websites usually play the worst for me. So much memory....
To discuss my thoughts on the show, I will repost some of the contents of a couple of emails I wrote and add some more thoughts to them. Behind the cut in case anyone else is watching it and hasn't seen all available episodes yet....
I'm intrigued to see a series that presents kind of a clash of time periods, the way I tend to write! There's a definite feeling of Prohibition-era gangsters and such, with Fish Mooney and the gang wars and whatnot, yet it's the relative present-day and cellphones exist.
I hope to see more of Selina's kitties! There's a brief glimpse of a black-and-white one in the first episode; she steals some milk for it. And she's holding a gray one in a promo pic.
James Gordon's partner (Harvey Bullock) is aggravating. Yet on some level he intrigues me, wondering how he became so cynical. Still, I don't see how Wikipedia can say he only appears corrupt and isn't really. He tried to get Gordon to murder The Penguin, for goodness sake. He may still have some goodness in him, but he is definitely corrupt on some level.
They seem to be going with the idea from the movie Batman Returns that The Penguin is a homicidal maniac. I never liked that idea for him; he's not that way in any other carnation I've seen. He's supposed to be one of the few sane villains. He seriously gives me the creeps here.
The Riddler is a cutie. I'm hoping for more spotlight on him in future episodes.
I'm anxious to see more of Alfred and Bruce and where that goes. I'm having a terrible time understanding Alfred sometimes, though. I suppose that's why I've never thought of Ginger as Cockney; the stereotypical Cockney seems to have a higher-pitched voice and a very thick accent that isn't always easy to understand. Although I know there's Cockneys with lower voices, it isn't what I tend to think of. I'm assuming Ginger probably is meant to be Cockney, though; he uses Cockney vernacular and rhyming slang, but his voice is deep and gravelly and he doesn't drop H's.
The show is a bit graphic, particularly in the second episode, but not too much so. Usually they seem to infer the really gory things, instead of clearly displaying them. They did show one bad guy scratched up from being attacked by Selina in self-defense. But honestly, I was expecting a lot worse from a FOX show, so I'm pretty satisfied.
I no longer like Commissioner Gordon's fiancee. She expects him not to keep any secrets from her, even work secrets. That doesn't seem fair at all, considering his job. She's threatening to leave him if he won't tell her everything.
I suppose maybe she wouldn't be so insistent on knowing if her friend and former lover didn't keep telling her things that Gordon's doing that aren't right, but she already said she knew he wouldn't be capable of doing those things, and she seemed to mean it. Now, suddenly, she's switched her attitude. I suppose it was Penguin's surprise appearance on their doorstep, and Gordon's reaction, that made her wonder. The report was that Gordon killed Penguin, but in reality he just pretended to because he was being forced into it by crooked cops yet couldn't do it. He warned Penguin not to come back, but he has anyway, and Gordon is understandably shaken and upset. And Penguin used an alias, so the fiancee doesn't know he's the guy Gordon was being accused of killing.
But still ... it makes me upset that her trust would waver to that extent so quickly, just from Gordon's reaction to the visit. I wonder if she's really the one he ends up marrying. I know he must name his daughter after her, since the daughter's name is Barbara too, but I don't know at all if she's the mother.
There's a definite feeling of the series firmly being part of the Batman mythos, even with the elements that are a little different than I'm used to. (Hey, I was surprised by some of the stuff in my beloved The Batman cartoon too, and I rolled with it.) Locales like Wayne Manor and Arkham Asylum look just like they're supposed to. I'm thrilled.
Overall, at this point, I think I'd rather watch this than see the trainwreck they've been turning Once Upon a Time into. Every time I think I might be up for trying the show again, each episode seems to get worse than the one before and I am just so upset at how they've been ruining such wonderful characters and relationships! Rumpel is spiraling more and more out of control, and the tidbits I've been learning from available interviews on future plot twists make me less and less happy. I stopped being able to accept the goings-on as canon after last year's winter finale. I don't think I will ever feel different, judging by how it's going. Part of me still wants to write my own version of season 3B, continuing from my Christmas oneshot last year, but there are some Once characters I really don't connect with and don't want to write for, and the desire to write a long multi-chapter Once fic is a lot less than the desire to work on some of my other projects. And fics that are supposed to actually encompass a whole season of events are extremely difficult to write. My Sailor Moon fic is that way and it is a bear sometimes, especially since I want to focus more on character relations and interactions then fighting the new villain.
Maybe what would appeal to me instead, since I keep wanting to do something with Once, would be to just write little oneshots or something about events in Storybrooke in my version of season 3B and beyond, and mostly focus on the characters I especially like. Thoughts?
I was surprised and excited to learn otherwise! I guess FOX probably had to pay a pretty penny to air a series about Warner Brothers characters. And I'm guessing maybe Warner actually wanted it on FOX, so it would be seen as more mainstream and adult, since the CW is known for programs catering to teenagers.
(I find it amusing that I roll my eyes and scoff at teenage programming while happily enjoying children's programming. I suppose that's because children's programming will usually have friendship and family stuff, plus it can involve characters or brands I've loved for years, whereas teenage shows tend to focus on romance problems and that makes me eyeroll.)
Anyway, so Hulu has the show and I don't have the greatest relationship with Hulu, but I struggled to watch the episodes there anyway. I may try FOX Now for the next one and see if it will play any better for me. I will be amused if it does, since network websites usually play the worst for me. So much memory....
To discuss my thoughts on the show, I will repost some of the contents of a couple of emails I wrote and add some more thoughts to them. Behind the cut in case anyone else is watching it and hasn't seen all available episodes yet....
I'm intrigued to see a series that presents kind of a clash of time periods, the way I tend to write! There's a definite feeling of Prohibition-era gangsters and such, with Fish Mooney and the gang wars and whatnot, yet it's the relative present-day and cellphones exist.
I hope to see more of Selina's kitties! There's a brief glimpse of a black-and-white one in the first episode; she steals some milk for it. And she's holding a gray one in a promo pic.
James Gordon's partner (Harvey Bullock) is aggravating. Yet on some level he intrigues me, wondering how he became so cynical. Still, I don't see how Wikipedia can say he only appears corrupt and isn't really. He tried to get Gordon to murder The Penguin, for goodness sake. He may still have some goodness in him, but he is definitely corrupt on some level.
They seem to be going with the idea from the movie Batman Returns that The Penguin is a homicidal maniac. I never liked that idea for him; he's not that way in any other carnation I've seen. He's supposed to be one of the few sane villains. He seriously gives me the creeps here.
The Riddler is a cutie. I'm hoping for more spotlight on him in future episodes.
I'm anxious to see more of Alfred and Bruce and where that goes. I'm having a terrible time understanding Alfred sometimes, though. I suppose that's why I've never thought of Ginger as Cockney; the stereotypical Cockney seems to have a higher-pitched voice and a very thick accent that isn't always easy to understand. Although I know there's Cockneys with lower voices, it isn't what I tend to think of. I'm assuming Ginger probably is meant to be Cockney, though; he uses Cockney vernacular and rhyming slang, but his voice is deep and gravelly and he doesn't drop H's.
The show is a bit graphic, particularly in the second episode, but not too much so. Usually they seem to infer the really gory things, instead of clearly displaying them. They did show one bad guy scratched up from being attacked by Selina in self-defense. But honestly, I was expecting a lot worse from a FOX show, so I'm pretty satisfied.
I no longer like Commissioner Gordon's fiancee. She expects him not to keep any secrets from her, even work secrets. That doesn't seem fair at all, considering his job. She's threatening to leave him if he won't tell her everything.
I suppose maybe she wouldn't be so insistent on knowing if her friend and former lover didn't keep telling her things that Gordon's doing that aren't right, but she already said she knew he wouldn't be capable of doing those things, and she seemed to mean it. Now, suddenly, she's switched her attitude. I suppose it was Penguin's surprise appearance on their doorstep, and Gordon's reaction, that made her wonder. The report was that Gordon killed Penguin, but in reality he just pretended to because he was being forced into it by crooked cops yet couldn't do it. He warned Penguin not to come back, but he has anyway, and Gordon is understandably shaken and upset. And Penguin used an alias, so the fiancee doesn't know he's the guy Gordon was being accused of killing.
But still ... it makes me upset that her trust would waver to that extent so quickly, just from Gordon's reaction to the visit. I wonder if she's really the one he ends up marrying. I know he must name his daughter after her, since the daughter's name is Barbara too, but I don't know at all if she's the mother.
There's a definite feeling of the series firmly being part of the Batman mythos, even with the elements that are a little different than I'm used to. (Hey, I was surprised by some of the stuff in my beloved The Batman cartoon too, and I rolled with it.) Locales like Wayne Manor and Arkham Asylum look just like they're supposed to. I'm thrilled.
Overall, at this point, I think I'd rather watch this than see the trainwreck they've been turning Once Upon a Time into. Every time I think I might be up for trying the show again, each episode seems to get worse than the one before and I am just so upset at how they've been ruining such wonderful characters and relationships! Rumpel is spiraling more and more out of control, and the tidbits I've been learning from available interviews on future plot twists make me less and less happy. I stopped being able to accept the goings-on as canon after last year's winter finale. I don't think I will ever feel different, judging by how it's going. Part of me still wants to write my own version of season 3B, continuing from my Christmas oneshot last year, but there are some Once characters I really don't connect with and don't want to write for, and the desire to write a long multi-chapter Once fic is a lot less than the desire to work on some of my other projects. And fics that are supposed to actually encompass a whole season of events are extremely difficult to write. My Sailor Moon fic is that way and it is a bear sometimes, especially since I want to focus more on character relations and interactions then fighting the new villain.
Maybe what would appeal to me instead, since I keep wanting to do something with Once, would be to just write little oneshots or something about events in Storybrooke in my version of season 3B and beyond, and mostly focus on the characters I especially like. Thoughts?
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no subject
Date: 2014-10-16 07:20 pm (UTC)As far as OUAT goes, I would be behind your idea of a 3B AU 100%. If the idea of a long-winded fic puts you off it, you can do a series of inter-related snapshots/vignettes, like I'm doing for my Legacy-verse DW timeline; this lets me skip over parts of the game's plot I find dull, or not have to deal with characters I don't know how to write or simply don't want to write for, while keeping an underlying quest/plotline tying everything together. The only hiccup is that I will have to deal with that one character I'm "meh" about taking center stage, but I'll cross that bridge when I get to it.
no subject
Date: 2014-10-16 11:29 pm (UTC)Yeah, the idea of vignette-type things, like I did with Lux Aeterna for Perry Mason, sounds much more appealing than an actual season or half-season length fic. Although I'll probably still have to figure out how to deal with writing for Hook a bit, and I don't really want to write for him at all.
That definitely is a hiccup for you. Good luck when you get to that point!