Hey, you're welcome, and it gave me a choice to ramble about TV, which isn't something I can complain about! I also absolutely empathise with your attitude to spoilers.
To indulge myself again, more rambling!
The John Scott storyline wraps in 1x13, so yes I think you'll enjoy that more (and I also loved that he was the one who got fridged!) But I also had the benefit of always having enjoyed Walter - I never found him irritating. But I hope that as they complexify his background and challenge the "adorable madness" aspect with scary stuff he's done, he'll get better for you?
I've never bought into the Peter/Walter relationship from Peter's side, but I have always thought that the true love story of Fringe is Walter's love for Peter. But I did start caring a bajillion times more when I realised what Walter had DONE to get Peter back in the first place.
Regarding Peter's character, I would agree with you if the show were doing it half as well or with as much self-awareness as TSCC did with John. But they're miles off of pulling off anything as interesting as subverting our expectations by revealing John knew about Riley, which managed to crystalise John's passive/patient/thoughtful nature in an interesting way that didn't undercut Sarah, and more importantly, we did always get emotional beats with John. We got to see how he was feeling, even if our perspective was more firmly with Sarah. We don't get to see how Peter's feeling. He nearly never gets those scenes that are about playing out intense emotional beats. Even in someone else's POV.
As a result I get the impression that he's incredibly closed off, and is only really comfortable when grifting his way through socially scripted riffs and situations because he's a charmer, but he never stays anywhere long enough to form a human connection to the point I wonder if he doesn't actually know how. Which also explains why he connected so much better and more quickly with Fauxlivia whose more aggressive and carefree attitude (or at least surface attitude) falls much more squarely within his comfort zone. Except I can no longer believe this is intentional?
Seriously, watch out for an episode called Northwest Passage towards the end of S2. It ought to be the Emotional Peter-centric Episode to End Them All, but instead he gets amazingly upstaged by an fantastic Martha Plimpton in a freaking GUEST SPOT.
So I genuinely am torn between the fact I'm glad that for once the character the writers under-serve is the boy, and worrying about what it's starting to mean for parts of the story that require me to at least not be annoyed by him.
As to the mythic narrative, I agree, but also a part of me thinks that Peter is actually being set up not as a Classic Hero, but as the fairytale princess? I'm not the genius who first noted that Olivia has the Superhero's origin story while Peter has the fairytale (stolen away in the dead of night by a man who was his father, but not, to another world: a changeling child). But he also really is the male version of "The Mad Scientist's Beautiful Daughter" which might as well be the mad wizard or the mad king.
Even now, when they're trying to put the fate of two worlds in his hands, it's not being posited as a conscious choice on his part, he's being framed as part of a chemical reaction, in which his subconscious is a participant. And once again (like with the revelation that he is not his father's son) we are essentially completely cut out of his POV.
Which makes the F/M/F DEAD WOMAN LOOMING thing all the worse, since I don't even understand the guy Fauxlivia is in danger of dying for.
The main thing that gives me hope is that if they plan to continue the parallel universe thing into season four (and I think they have to?) then without Fauxlivia they don't really have an altverse protagonist, there'd just be Walternate, who I don't believe can function as an effective longterm protagonist because of his narrative role and in-universe the way he's the Big Picture guy, not the guy who Goes Investigating and Adventuring.
In conclusion: I subscribe to your theory of Manpain for Women and hope Fringe continues to provide it in the quantities I have become accustomed to. ;)
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Date: 2011-02-17 07:17 pm (UTC)To indulge myself again, more rambling!
The John Scott storyline wraps in 1x13, so yes I think you'll enjoy that more (and I also loved that he was the one who got fridged!) But I also had the benefit of always having enjoyed Walter - I never found him irritating. But I hope that as they complexify his background and challenge the "adorable madness" aspect with scary stuff he's done, he'll get better for you?
I've never bought into the Peter/Walter relationship from Peter's side, but I have always thought that the true love story of Fringe is Walter's love for Peter. But I did start caring a bajillion times more when I realised what Walter had DONE to get Peter back in the first place.
Regarding Peter's character, I would agree with you if the show were doing it half as well or with as much self-awareness as TSCC did with John. But they're miles off of pulling off anything as interesting as subverting our expectations by revealing John knew about Riley, which managed to crystalise John's passive/patient/thoughtful nature in an interesting way that didn't undercut Sarah, and more importantly, we did always get emotional beats with John. We got to see how he was feeling, even if our perspective was more firmly with Sarah. We don't get to see how Peter's feeling. He nearly never gets those scenes that are about playing out intense emotional beats. Even in someone else's POV.
As a result I get the impression that he's incredibly closed off, and is only really comfortable when grifting his way through socially scripted riffs and situations because he's a charmer, but he never stays anywhere long enough to form a human connection to the point I wonder if he doesn't actually know how. Which also explains why he connected so much better and more quickly with Fauxlivia whose more aggressive and carefree attitude (or at least surface attitude) falls much more squarely within his comfort zone. Except I can no longer believe this is intentional?
Seriously, watch out for an episode called Northwest Passage towards the end of S2. It ought to be the Emotional Peter-centric Episode to End Them All, but instead he gets amazingly upstaged by an fantastic Martha Plimpton in a freaking GUEST SPOT.
So I genuinely am torn between the fact I'm glad that for once the character the writers under-serve is the boy, and worrying about what it's starting to mean for parts of the story that require me to at least not be annoyed by him.
As to the mythic narrative, I agree, but also a part of me thinks that Peter is actually being set up not as a Classic Hero, but as the fairytale princess? I'm not the genius who first noted that Olivia has the Superhero's origin story while Peter has the fairytale (stolen away in the dead of night by a man who was his father, but not, to another world: a changeling child). But he also really is the male version of "The Mad Scientist's Beautiful Daughter" which might as well be the mad wizard or the mad king.
Even now, when they're trying to put the fate of two worlds in his hands, it's not being posited as a conscious choice on his part, he's being framed as part of a chemical reaction, in which his subconscious is a participant. And once again (like with the revelation that he is not his father's son) we are essentially completely cut out of his POV.
Which makes the F/M/F DEAD WOMAN LOOMING thing all the worse, since I don't even understand the guy Fauxlivia is in danger of dying for.
The main thing that gives me hope is that if they plan to continue the parallel universe thing into season four (and I think they have to?) then without Fauxlivia they don't really have an altverse protagonist, there'd just be Walternate, who I don't believe can function as an effective longterm protagonist because of his narrative role and in-universe the way he's the Big Picture guy, not the guy who Goes Investigating and Adventuring.
In conclusion: I subscribe to your theory of Manpain for Women and hope Fringe continues to provide it in the quantities I have become accustomed to. ;)