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note: many of the thoughts here arrived to via various conversations with ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lierdumoa ::glomps::
Been rewatching SGA eps for vids.
God. God I say, because I love my show.
And I can't even believe I'm saying that, because I didn't ever think there would be a show or a fandom that fit me so *well* but...dude.
It's the morbid and the horrific and the absurd and the ridiculous, all wrapped up together. And I've said it before how much the show feels like it was made to utterly suit my brain alone, except it suits other people so well too and it's like a call saying, hey, you're not alone.
I'm frankly a little shocked that SGA even exists because it's not only a show about misfits, but it's a misfit show. It's a tv show acting like it's a movie. It's a sci-fi series made along the tempermental lines of NYPDblue. It's on the surface a genre show that, if you look closer, is really all about the characters. It's making fun of sci-fi and critiquing it, while at the same time paying it homage. It's in a genre that's all about "saying something" and "social critique" and instead refusing to say anything at all, only reflecting back a world that is very familiar and almost too close.
It is...space. If that makes any sense. It gives you *space* for your mind.
If it helps to explain, I think SGA is a very post-modern series. Where modernist art is densely filled and opaque to the audience, to force the audience to look closer and to force them to divine the author's meaning, post-modernist art tends to push notice away from the author's intent and the author's subjectivity. It is a space for the *audience's* sake and the audience's subjectivity, and not a place for the author to provide meaning; it is a space for the audience to meditate.
In that regard SGA is not only a "space" but an entire universe for the audience to fill.
I really think that SGA might've only been possible with the Sci-Fi channel; that without BSG and SG1, SGA would not have been made, because the show is not only self-reflexive, but reflecting every which way, on the genre (ie. "Sanctuary"), on the structure of a show (ie. "38 min"), on the structure of playacting (ie. "The Tower"), and perhaps even, if you wish to look at it , on the current political and social and cultural structures that we are all living in (ie. "Suspicion", "The Gift", "Siege II", "Trinity", "Critical Mass"). And it doesn't judge, only reflect. How awesome is that? And how rare?
'cause like, it doesn't present choices like, say, saving 2,000 people versus saving 200 people. It's sort of like that choice, but not quite.
With SGA, instead you get two black boxes. In one box you might save ~200 people (and you don't know how many), in the other box you might also save ~200 people (and you don't know how few), but they are different people. You don't get to know who is in which box. You sometimes get to know if choosing one box might condemn the other. Half of the time, you don't even know if you're choosing a particular box for a positive or negative effect.
THAT, folks, is SGA.
And I don't think I've seen it ever done so consistently and so well in a tv show (instead of a movie) that's popular and that's run for so long, 'cause maintaining that sort of tone is insane if you want an audience. People funding a project back away hella quickly if a show isn't escapist, and I think SGA's saving grace is that it's funny. And really, comedy is needed to cut the morbid, and what's more? Morbid things, are as a whole, often funny and ridiculous and absurd. The best of the horrific is intensely facinating and often comedic, and I'm so glad that SGA's providing essentially a place, also, to laugh.
It's post-modernist in a "Butterfly Effect", the theatrical release, kinda way, where the guy wins and loses simultaneously; instead of the Director's Cut, which is more modernist in intent. It's post-modernist in an "Eternal Sunshine" kinda way, it's we're so fucked, but we'll still give it our all and we're still gonna smile, it's you kinda suck, but I love you anyways, it's forgiveness. It's characters who are trying hard and fucking up immensely and trying again, it's a show deeply aware of it's own flaws and playing off them, it's ...a home made on conflict.
And I resonate to that. Or SGA resonates to me. Or something.
[edit]
::headsmack:: so I realized that I should probably define post-modernism as I understand it and am using it in this entry, 'cause it has a bit of a twisty definition and is always wrapped up with and juxaposed against the concept of modernism. Both of these refer to elements of style and elements of intent; in this entry I'm referring more to intent than to style.
Anyhoo, to understand post-modernism, one sorta have to see it against modernism.
modernist: universal truths, fear/sadness/mourning in the midst of dissolution, subjectivity of the author, order out of chaos, search for the fundamental/stable, knowledge for knowledge's sake
post-modernist: diversity/contradiction of truths, celebration in the midst of dissolution, subjectivity of the audience, chaos out of chaos, acceptance of the provisional/temporary, the application of knowledge
Here is it's wiki entry for post-modernism, the part I'm referring to for SGA is this:
lierdumoa ::glomps::Been rewatching SGA eps for vids.
God. God I say, because I love my show.
And I can't even believe I'm saying that, because I didn't ever think there would be a show or a fandom that fit me so *well* but...dude.
It's the morbid and the horrific and the absurd and the ridiculous, all wrapped up together. And I've said it before how much the show feels like it was made to utterly suit my brain alone, except it suits other people so well too and it's like a call saying, hey, you're not alone.
I'm frankly a little shocked that SGA even exists because it's not only a show about misfits, but it's a misfit show. It's a tv show acting like it's a movie. It's a sci-fi series made along the tempermental lines of NYPDblue. It's on the surface a genre show that, if you look closer, is really all about the characters. It's making fun of sci-fi and critiquing it, while at the same time paying it homage. It's in a genre that's all about "saying something" and "social critique" and instead refusing to say anything at all, only reflecting back a world that is very familiar and almost too close.
It is...space. If that makes any sense. It gives you *space* for your mind.
If it helps to explain, I think SGA is a very post-modern series. Where modernist art is densely filled and opaque to the audience, to force the audience to look closer and to force them to divine the author's meaning, post-modernist art tends to push notice away from the author's intent and the author's subjectivity. It is a space for the *audience's* sake and the audience's subjectivity, and not a place for the author to provide meaning; it is a space for the audience to meditate.
In that regard SGA is not only a "space" but an entire universe for the audience to fill.
I really think that SGA might've only been possible with the Sci-Fi channel; that without BSG and SG1, SGA would not have been made, because the show is not only self-reflexive, but reflecting every which way, on the genre (ie. "Sanctuary"), on the structure of a show (ie. "38 min"), on the structure of playacting (ie. "The Tower"), and perhaps even, if you wish to look at it , on the current political and social and cultural structures that we are all living in (ie. "Suspicion", "The Gift", "Siege II", "Trinity", "Critical Mass"). And it doesn't judge, only reflect. How awesome is that? And how rare?
'cause like, it doesn't present choices like, say, saving 2,000 people versus saving 200 people. It's sort of like that choice, but not quite.
With SGA, instead you get two black boxes. In one box you might save ~200 people (and you don't know how many), in the other box you might also save ~200 people (and you don't know how few), but they are different people. You don't get to know who is in which box. You sometimes get to know if choosing one box might condemn the other. Half of the time, you don't even know if you're choosing a particular box for a positive or negative effect.
THAT, folks, is SGA.
And I don't think I've seen it ever done so consistently and so well in a tv show (instead of a movie) that's popular and that's run for so long, 'cause maintaining that sort of tone is insane if you want an audience. People funding a project back away hella quickly if a show isn't escapist, and I think SGA's saving grace is that it's funny. And really, comedy is needed to cut the morbid, and what's more? Morbid things, are as a whole, often funny and ridiculous and absurd. The best of the horrific is intensely facinating and often comedic, and I'm so glad that SGA's providing essentially a place, also, to laugh.
It's post-modernist in a "Butterfly Effect", the theatrical release, kinda way, where the guy wins and loses simultaneously; instead of the Director's Cut, which is more modernist in intent. It's post-modernist in an "Eternal Sunshine" kinda way, it's we're so fucked, but we'll still give it our all and we're still gonna smile, it's you kinda suck, but I love you anyways, it's forgiveness. It's characters who are trying hard and fucking up immensely and trying again, it's a show deeply aware of it's own flaws and playing off them, it's ...a home made on conflict.
And I resonate to that. Or SGA resonates to me. Or something.
[edit]
::headsmack:: so I realized that I should probably define post-modernism as I understand it and am using it in this entry, 'cause it has a bit of a twisty definition and is always wrapped up with and juxaposed against the concept of modernism. Both of these refer to elements of style and elements of intent; in this entry I'm referring more to intent than to style.
Anyhoo, to understand post-modernism, one sorta have to see it against modernism.
modernist: universal truths, fear/sadness/mourning in the midst of dissolution, subjectivity of the author, order out of chaos, search for the fundamental/stable, knowledge for knowledge's sake
post-modernist: diversity/contradiction of truths, celebration in the midst of dissolution, subjectivity of the audience, chaos out of chaos, acceptance of the provisional/temporary, the application of knowledge
Here is it's wiki entry for post-modernism, the part I'm referring to for SGA is this:
"incredulity toward metanarratives", meaning that in the era of postmodern culture, people have rejected the grand, supposedly universal stories and paradigms such as religion, conventional philosophy, capitalism and gender that have defined culture and behavior in the past, and have instead begun to organize their cultural life around a variety of more local and subcultural ideologies, myths and stories.
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Even if you hadn't convinced me to watch it yet, though, I would definitely have to start after this. Besides, the way you describe it... this misfit show that says we're not alone, that it's self-reflexive and reflexive of the genre...
And I really appreciate how you offer insight on it through the perspectives of modernism and post-modernism, and how you explain those. Although I was taking a major in English before the accident forced me to drop out of university, I never did manage to get to the classes that covered those periods/schools of thought/whatever, so I appreciate the definitions. The perspectives aren't new to me, though, they're things I've noticed and thought about on my own without knowing the academic terms for them -- or perhaps more importantly, terms to simply share with others so that for the sake of the discussion, we're using the same vocabulary, whether they're the most academically accepted ones or not. (Yes, I'm fascinated by the debate of what is postmodernism in this context, even if I don't know enough to join in.)
I think I started being a huge SF fan when I was about 10 or 11, and Star Trek: The Next Generation began airing. I obsessed over it, I really wanted to like it, but I felt like it kept betraying me. Too many episodes that would just have me squirming in my lack of suspension of disbelief, doing the how-stupid-do-you-think-we-are facepalm, or just left feeling alienated and uncomfortable at the forced Messages, and eventually deciding that whatever seed of Something Special I'd first connected with was being betrayed too often. And since then I "started" being a huge SF fan with various other shows (and books and such), but I almost always run into that squirmy feeling sooner or later.
So far, I've had none of that squirmy feeling with SGA, and I'm beginning to trust that it won't happen. Sure it will make me squirm in other ways, and I have yelled "Agh you dork!" aloud at the characters and probably will do so again, but no squirming in the insulted disbelieving way.
It does make me wish I'd stuck with watching more of those squirm-inducing other SF shows, though, so I could catch even more of the references in dialogue, and better appreciate how they're taking those tired plot themes and finally doing something right with them. ~_^
(I've now watched up to the end of The Eye, btw. And I need to go find myself some SGA icons, without spoilering myself....)
no subject
And in a way, I think I enjoy it more by having things explained to me (for instance how "red shirts" connotate some's gonna die because so much cannon fodder have been wearing red shirts in sci-fi)