alias_sqbr (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
alias_sqbr) wrote2013-11-12 10:05 pm
alias_sqbr) wrote2013-11-12 10:05 pm
Entry tags:
Watching a Person of Interest
So! After YEARS of Cam squeeing about the show to me I finally got around to giving Person of Interest a proper go.
The reason I took so long is that it is, at heart, yet another Two White Guys show. Specifically, two white guys invade the privacy of random strangers in order to Save Them from whatever trouble they've gotten into. This skeeved me out so much watching the pilot when it came out I couldn't continue.
But Cam kept showing me scenes of the secondary female characters being badass and eventually I was bored enough to give it a proper go and now I'm all caught up to the start of season 3 and excited for more!
The premise, if you don't know: Harold Finch is a reclusive nerdy billionaire who has access to the social security numbers of people who are about to be either the victim and/or perpetrator of premeditated murder. He hires the badass but burned out ex-CIA operative John Reese to do the beating-up-bad-guys part of investigating and helping these people (and/or their victims) while Finch uses his connections and surveilance techniques to watch (mostly) from a distance. Every episode is a new number (or numbers!) Over time they form connections and/or come into conflict with an ensemble of other characters, including police, hackers, mobsters and government operatives.
So! Things I like about the show:
-Pretty much every episode has a happy ending, and almost all the characters I like turn out ok in the end. Even the charismatic bad guys!
-unlike most procedurals, doesn't pretend the world is just or that the System can be trusted. The police, government, banks etc are riddled with corruption and even the people who are doing their job are often complicit with terrible things. Yet it remains weirdly optimistic about the power of individuals doing their best to make small differences where they can.
-A really good balance of single episode cases and longer character/plot arcs, also of tension with humour/happyiness/calm etc. Poses and answers Big Questions at a nice rate. Not infrequently makes me laugh/squeal/eek out loud.
-Takes the female and POC characters seriously, and if anything makes them more central as the story goes on (while still definitely being a Two White Guys show)
-Reese and Finch can be paternalistic and have lots of Angst but aren't Genius Arseholes: they're basically decent guys who want to help people, and don't see themselves as Better than everyone else.
-there is basically no sex in this show, and no objectification. The female characters are prettier and more dressed up than entirely makes sense, but even when being purposefully Sexy (which has happened, like, twice) there's no lingering shots and saxaphones etc. The main character's relationship arcs are about trust and friendship etc, not generally romance. Yet it's not anti-sex, two characters are subtly but unambiguously shown to be having an on going friends with benefits relationship without ever so much as holding hands on screen.
-the women are hot like burning :D So many badass 30-40 somethings with long dark hair and dark eyes :D :D And a variety of personalities, from no nonsense cop to morally ambiguous information broker to Azula level terifyingly cheerful.
-surprisingly morally complex, given the cheesy premise. Has sympathy for drug dealers and communist assassins and the Forces Opposed To Our Heroes. The basic moral is that everyone matters (excpet for the odd Evil Person who doesn't)
-one of the characters is an AI figuring out it's/her place in the world :D :D (this takes a while to be a thing though)
-Finch is mildly disabled, it affects him like it should but nobody makes a big deal about it. The actor is able bodied, but we see lots of pre-disability flashbacks and the show isn't all OMG LOOK A DISABLED GUY so I don't mind too much. (Though I'd be happier if there were some OTHER disabled characters...)
-Show doesn't go OMG LOOK HOW PROGRESSIVE WE ARE in general, despite doing moderately well on most fronts, and doesn't go OMG A DISABLED/POC/QUEER/FEMALE CHARACTER. For example, Reese and Finch don't bat an eye when a female character turns out to have a wife, nor do they even mention the possibility of one of the female characters helping out when they find themselves in charge of a baby.
-They constantly lampshade the invasion of privacy and make it clear that while Finch and Reese can be trusted with this information, most people (including the government) can't, and that even from Reese and Finch it's pretty weird and creepy.
Downsides/things I have mixed feelings about:
-did I mention it was about two white guys? And had a cheesy premise? If you can't handle 80% of the show being MacGuyver/Pretender/Quantum Leap-ish stories about Reese and Finch tracking down and saving some random stranger you are not going to enjoy yourself. Luckily I have a soft spot for this kind of show but YMMV.
-ignores explicit discussions of race entirely. Even when the bad guys are neo nazis. On the plus side, there's no painfully awkward Social Commentary By White Guys/false accusations of racism etc, and the writers are obviously making some attempt at diversity and writing POC characters who are real people rather than stereotypes. On the down side it's a pretty obvious elephant in the room sometimes and they don't entirely avoid stereotypes nor are they as diverse as they could be.
-Also weirdly obsessed with Russians. Everyone else, their ethnicity isn't a Thing, but people of Russian descent are all immigrants and/or involved with the Russian Mob and Not Really American (but still possibly sympathetic)
-Rather obviously written by guys who are TRYING to write Strong Female Characters, and often succeeding, but still default to the white middle class (or upwardly mobile lower class) male POV.
-First season fridges too many women, has lots of background Perfect Wives who exist only to motivate male characters. Second season improves on this a lot, including a bunch of male fridging :D Still waiting for a woman to have a background Perfect Husband though.
-First season has a lot of BEING MARRIED IS AWESOME EVERYONE WANTS A ""NORMAL"" LIFE, thankfully this has toned down a bit. The thick miasma of heteronormativity is undercut by a VERY few one-off (white, cis, well off...) background characters in same sex relationships, who are at least sympathetic and don't die. There is a sympathetic aromantic sexual woman (though of course she doesn't exlicitely identify that way), but she doesn't really do ANY positive feelings and while she's currently learning the Power of Friendship I can see her learning the Power of Love at some point.
-the major female characters don't really talk to each other much until season 3. And then I started shipping them like burning OMG.
-the characters are good but the dialogue is pedestrian, the plots sometimes predictable and the acting mixed.
-the constant invasion of privacy is still a thing, and while Reese and Finch aren't the type to perve on women it's still uncomfortable.
Also: Carter/Reese is the best romantic ship but in the meantime Reese/Zoe/Shaw would be a happy Zoe sandwich and Shaw/Root is a glorious f/f kismesis :D
*ponders making a "Joss Carter is my Master Now" icon*
The reason I took so long is that it is, at heart, yet another Two White Guys show. Specifically, two white guys invade the privacy of random strangers in order to Save Them from whatever trouble they've gotten into. This skeeved me out so much watching the pilot when it came out I couldn't continue.
But Cam kept showing me scenes of the secondary female characters being badass and eventually I was bored enough to give it a proper go and now I'm all caught up to the start of season 3 and excited for more!
The premise, if you don't know: Harold Finch is a reclusive nerdy billionaire who has access to the social security numbers of people who are about to be either the victim and/or perpetrator of premeditated murder. He hires the badass but burned out ex-CIA operative John Reese to do the beating-up-bad-guys part of investigating and helping these people (and/or their victims) while Finch uses his connections and surveilance techniques to watch (mostly) from a distance. Every episode is a new number (or numbers!) Over time they form connections and/or come into conflict with an ensemble of other characters, including police, hackers, mobsters and government operatives.
So! Things I like about the show:
-Pretty much every episode has a happy ending, and almost all the characters I like turn out ok in the end. Even the charismatic bad guys!
-unlike most procedurals, doesn't pretend the world is just or that the System can be trusted. The police, government, banks etc are riddled with corruption and even the people who are doing their job are often complicit with terrible things. Yet it remains weirdly optimistic about the power of individuals doing their best to make small differences where they can.
-A really good balance of single episode cases and longer character/plot arcs, also of tension with humour/happyiness/calm etc. Poses and answers Big Questions at a nice rate. Not infrequently makes me laugh/squeal/eek out loud.
-Takes the female and POC characters seriously, and if anything makes them more central as the story goes on (while still definitely being a Two White Guys show)
-Reese and Finch can be paternalistic and have lots of Angst but aren't Genius Arseholes: they're basically decent guys who want to help people, and don't see themselves as Better than everyone else.
-there is basically no sex in this show, and no objectification. The female characters are prettier and more dressed up than entirely makes sense, but even when being purposefully Sexy (which has happened, like, twice) there's no lingering shots and saxaphones etc. The main character's relationship arcs are about trust and friendship etc, not generally romance. Yet it's not anti-sex, two characters are subtly but unambiguously shown to be having an on going friends with benefits relationship without ever so much as holding hands on screen.
-the women are hot like burning :D So many badass 30-40 somethings with long dark hair and dark eyes :D :D And a variety of personalities, from no nonsense cop to morally ambiguous information broker to Azula level terifyingly cheerful.
-surprisingly morally complex, given the cheesy premise. Has sympathy for drug dealers and communist assassins and the Forces Opposed To Our Heroes. The basic moral is that everyone matters (excpet for the odd Evil Person who doesn't)
-one of the characters is an AI figuring out it's/her place in the world :D :D (this takes a while to be a thing though)
-Finch is mildly disabled, it affects him like it should but nobody makes a big deal about it. The actor is able bodied, but we see lots of pre-disability flashbacks and the show isn't all OMG LOOK A DISABLED GUY so I don't mind too much. (Though I'd be happier if there were some OTHER disabled characters...)
-Show doesn't go OMG LOOK HOW PROGRESSIVE WE ARE in general, despite doing moderately well on most fronts, and doesn't go OMG A DISABLED/POC/QUEER/FEMALE CHARACTER. For example, Reese and Finch don't bat an eye when a female character turns out to have a wife, nor do they even mention the possibility of one of the female characters helping out when they find themselves in charge of a baby.
-They constantly lampshade the invasion of privacy and make it clear that while Finch and Reese can be trusted with this information, most people (including the government) can't, and that even from Reese and Finch it's pretty weird and creepy.
Downsides/things I have mixed feelings about:
-did I mention it was about two white guys? And had a cheesy premise? If you can't handle 80% of the show being MacGuyver/Pretender/Quantum Leap-ish stories about Reese and Finch tracking down and saving some random stranger you are not going to enjoy yourself. Luckily I have a soft spot for this kind of show but YMMV.
-ignores explicit discussions of race entirely. Even when the bad guys are neo nazis. On the plus side, there's no painfully awkward Social Commentary By White Guys/false accusations of racism etc, and the writers are obviously making some attempt at diversity and writing POC characters who are real people rather than stereotypes. On the down side it's a pretty obvious elephant in the room sometimes and they don't entirely avoid stereotypes nor are they as diverse as they could be.
-Also weirdly obsessed with Russians. Everyone else, their ethnicity isn't a Thing, but people of Russian descent are all immigrants and/or involved with the Russian Mob and Not Really American (but still possibly sympathetic)
-Rather obviously written by guys who are TRYING to write Strong Female Characters, and often succeeding, but still default to the white middle class (or upwardly mobile lower class) male POV.
-First season fridges too many women, has lots of background Perfect Wives who exist only to motivate male characters. Second season improves on this a lot, including a bunch of male fridging :D Still waiting for a woman to have a background Perfect Husband though.
-First season has a lot of BEING MARRIED IS AWESOME EVERYONE WANTS A ""NORMAL"" LIFE, thankfully this has toned down a bit. The thick miasma of heteronormativity is undercut by a VERY few one-off (white, cis, well off...) background characters in same sex relationships, who are at least sympathetic and don't die. There is a sympathetic aromantic sexual woman (though of course she doesn't exlicitely identify that way), but she doesn't really do ANY positive feelings and while she's currently learning the Power of Friendship I can see her learning the Power of Love at some point.
-the major female characters don't really talk to each other much until season 3. And then I started shipping them like burning OMG.
-the characters are good but the dialogue is pedestrian, the plots sometimes predictable and the acting mixed.
-the constant invasion of privacy is still a thing, and while Reese and Finch aren't the type to perve on women it's still uncomfortable.
Also: Carter/Reese is the best romantic ship but in the meantime Reese/Zoe/Shaw would be a happy Zoe sandwich and Shaw/Root is a glorious f/f kismesis :D
*ponders making a "Joss Carter is my Master Now" icon*
