Old words from Joss that are worth another look

[ari23]

What really gets me about this whole thing is how Joss seems to act as though the only emotions that are worth eliciting from his audience are negative ones. He seems to measure the worth of his show by how much it makes the audience cry. Maybe this should be in the angry rant thread, I don't know. But since when was happiness so commonplace that it became a boring emotion?

I think it takes a whole lot more talent and creativity to put joy on a screen than tragedy, personally. Making a sympathetic character and then killing them seems to be a writer's easy way out. Can't we just watch the news and all the terrible things that happen every day to realise that nobody's safe?

[Epicurus]

[b:66eff2a334]...making us all think that Willow had finally found her soulmate. Hell, he even made Willow think she'd found her soulmate[/b:66eff2a334]

I have been thinking a lot about this statement since yesterday. You are exactly right.

When I heard Joss speak so fondly of Willow and Tara's relationship I thought that he loved them together. When he so obviously hit home the fact that these two were soul mates I felt that he (Joss) himself believed they were and thus he showed it to us on screen.
I was deluded enough to think that Joss felt the way I did. It excited me to know that the "God" in Willow and Tara's world (so to speak) was rooting for them. I loved it that Willow and Tara had Joss on their side.
But now? I know that there was no way Joss saw them as soulmates.
He threw that out idea out there not because he believed it but because it was easier to hurt us if we believed it.

[melissande]

Someone here (sorry, I don't recall who) has a sig that quotes Joss saying "I'm giving you what you need, not what you think you need." As a sort of epigraph, that person writes beneath: the perfect excuse to be an asshole.

I've been thinking of those words a lot lately, because I happen to have had them said to me just scant days ago, by someone I confided to about feeling low. She replied with an e-mail about how my personal faults contributed to my condition, and how she'd suffered far more than I and so didn't have patience for my sad-sackiness. When I told her how cruel she'd been, she delivered the famous line, and I went looking for the breath that got knocked out of my stomach.

It's funny: unless someone's judgment is truly incapacitated (by drugs, or active mental illness, or head injury), what they THINK they need is generally what they DO need. That's why of all the quotes here, that stays the most powerful indictment for me.

If you've ever been in an unpopular minority -- and of course many of you have been -- then you know all too bitterly what sort of intention lies behind that phrase. You think you need love, acceptance, sympathy, kindness. They know what you need is to be patronized, judged, beat up, punished. You think you need access to civil rights and protection from assaults based on hatred for your core identity. They know that you don't deserve employment, or marriage benefits, or "special rights" like breathing a painless breath. You think you need to see a positive reflection of yourself in a starved landscape. They know you need a slap of cold, hard reality: people like you go crazy, get killed, and reply to hate with even greater and more burning hate. Aren't you glad you've been given what they know you need, so that you understand that?

Joss was a geek in high school. He was immersed in a dog-eat-dog culture where the majority visited pain and suffering on the outcast minority, and the system did nothing, because that's how real life works, and you "need" to be ready for it. His brilliance, what attracted me to his vision, was that he picked the perfect metaphor to describe that experience: it's a horrorshow. Better yet, he turned the metaphor upside down: the Scoobies were geeks and outcasts, but cosmically, the most powerful. What were liabilities to the top dogs -- smarts, goofiness, following one's heart -- kept them alive and helped them save the world. A lot.

So how ridiculous and sad that such a person would make the choices he's made. How sad, that he would choose to justify them with words he should know from harsh experience that no one who means you well, who respects you, ever utters.

How much sadder it is, even than that, to feel betrayed by someone who you thought would understand you, and who you called a friend.

Edited for misspellings. Teary eyes and all that.

[Prophecygal]

I think Joss has already proven that he has issues with sexuality (both his own and others).


ps: Very well put Melissande.

[b:b7b2c32371] *instead of double posting, edit your first post and add anything new to that one.[/b:b7b2c32371]

[Ben Varkentine]

Said it before, say it again: I'll criticize Whedon for a lot of things (and I have), but I think we're really getting into "kettle/black" stuff when we start accusing him of having "issues with sexuality."

[melissande]

Each of us may well have sexual issues, but there's something disturbingly adolescent and punitive about the attitude toward sexuality on Buffy that applies to both straight or gay characters. My sexuality issues affect only me and anyone sexually involved with me. If I were to write them large for cultural consumption, I wouldn't merely think of myself, but of how my "issues" might affect or be interpreted by others.

It's an interesting general philisophical question: what does an artist owe his or her public? I'm usually far more likely to side with the artist, the main reason I was intially hostile to the point of view outlined by the FAQ. But, goodness, for such a popular show with young people of every sexual stripe, moving beyond the limitations of one's personal issues re: sex = pain or punishment or death would be a welcome change from the current Buffyverse. Isn't there enough of that in the culture aimed at young folks anyway?

I'd like to apologize to DrG for misrembering the exact quote and source in my earlier post. What you need, not what you think you need. Same idea, slightly different wording, but these small things are important.

[Ben Varkentine]

"What does an artist owe his or her public?"

Depends on the art. In the case of a TV producer/writer/creator, I'd say good stories of engaging characters with interesting things to say.

You know, like "Buffy" used to be.

I guess I'm just more comfortable criticising Whedon and the other ME writers on their work, not them as people, though I think I can understand the temptation. Maybe I'm just choosing not to take that extra step. For one thing, keeping our focus on the work makes it less easy to play the "nobody likes me, everybody hates me" card, know what I mean? Let's not give too many chances to dismiss the protest...

[melissande]

Ahh, now I see the problem. I don't mean to criticize anyone as a person (though the "Joss was a geek, he should know better" definitely steps over the line, and you're right, it's unfair to do that). I don't have to criticize them as people. I criticize the writing, and all the instances of sex = destruction it contains. How that relates to the writers' personal lives I don't know, nor care. But I think there are enough instances that have been pointed out here that reveal a negative attitude toward sexuality in general. And that's a problem for me, in any medium.

[BBOvenGuy]

[quote:22ede15ab1][b:22ede15ab1][i:22ede15ab1]Quote:[/i:22ede15ab1][/b:22ede15ab1]

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"What does an artist owe his or her public?"

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[/quote:22ede15ab1]

I've been getting this question a lot from the people writing to me about my essays. So far I've been sticking to the specific facts of the case and not trying to answer the question in general.

In this instance, Joss owes the public more with Willow and Tara because Joss promised the public more with Willow and Tara. When Joss started talking about how important Willow and Tara were and how much he valued the storyline's ability to help people, when his staff talked about the clich and promised not to do it, and when Marti talked about "pushing the frontiers" with what they could show of the relationship, they themselves were setting Willow and Tara apart from everything else.

When more is promised, more is owed. Joss made the promise in order to hold our attention (and hold up his ratings), then tried to renege on what he said. That's what makes Willow and Tara different.

[the kat whisperer]

I came across this as I was looking through one of my old notebooks recently, I'm probably too late for this to be useful to your essay, Bob, but here it is anyway.

From the [i:d75e8d01be] Welcome to the Hellmouth[/i:d75e8d01be] DVD commentary by Joss Whedon, right at the beginning as we watch Willow and Xander walk toward the school then meet Jesse at the entrance.

[quote:d75e8d01be][b:d75e8d01be][i:d75e8d01be]Quote:[/i:d75e8d01be][/b:d75e8d01be]

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...And we're about to see Eric Balfour, their friend Jesse, who I originally wanted to put in the opening credits because I was gonna kill him. And I thought that would shake people up and really confuse them if I had somebody who appeared to be a regular get killed right in the first episode. It just seemed too time consuming and expensive to do two credit sequences so we never had a chance to do it. I did end up doing it later on Angel and it made everybody really angry, so perhaps it wasn't such a good idea after all.

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[/quote:d75e8d01be]

And to think, this was one of the things that keep me going when I first heard that AB was going to be in the credits for [i:d75e8d01be] Seeing Red[/i:d75e8d01be], I actually believed that Joss couldn't possibly do it again! So, anyhoo, he was either lying then when he said he didn't think it was a good idea to put a doomed character in the credits, he didn't care that people got angry about Doyle and decided to go ahead and do it again for Tara, or he's got a [i:d75e8d01be] really[/i:d75e8d01be] bad memory when it comes to audience reaction about his little shock tactics.

Probably all three...

kw

[Adelus]

Isn't Joss just the weirdest person, with all that flip-flopping. Is it compulsive lying, Munchausen syndrome, or what?

If this "whedoning" of his had only started a few months ago, I'd say it was probably because he's fed up with being under so much scrutiny for his every move. But to see that these contradictions go back for years, well now, that's really spooky.

Kat Whisperer, I just love your sig! I'm a Bab5 fan, I really admired Delenn's character. Seems to me we need some of her integrity in the Buffyverse.

Adlus
++sig-less in cyberspace++

[BBOvenGuy]

Actually, kat whisperer, I just might be able to fit that in. Thanks!

[the kat whisperer]

[b:5766466200] Adelus[/b:5766466200] wrote:
[quote:5766466200][b:5766466200][i:5766466200]Quote:[/i:5766466200][/b:5766466200]

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Isn't Joss just the weirdest person, with all that flip-flopping. Is it compulsive lying, Munchausen syndrome, or what?

If this "whedoning" of his had only started a few months ago, I'd say it was probably because he's fed up with being under so much scrutiny for his every move. But to see that these contradictions go back for years, well now, that's really spooky.

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[/quote:5766466200]

I think you're right, the evidence seems to point to the fact that Joss is just a complusive liar. He just can't help himself, really. We should feel sorry for him...

[quote:5766466200][b:5766466200][i:5766466200]Quote:[/i:5766466200][/b:5766466200]

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Kat Whisperer, I just love your sig! I'm a Bab5 fan, I really admired Delenn's character. Seems to me we need some of her integrity in the Buffyverse.

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[/quote:5766466200]

Oooo, thanks Adelus. I'm a huge Babylon 5 fan too. And I agree with you again, Delenn's sense of integrity was definitely something to admire. Actually, she reminds me a lot of Tara. Delenn never judged another, instead always offered support, she had the guts to stand up for what she believed in, no matter if it hurt her, she was also willing to fight for those she loved, despite the fact that she wasn't a 'fighter' (not physically anyway). Most importantly of all, she was compassionate.

Yep, Delenn was always right up there as one of my favourite characters from B5 (after Ivanova, but that's for [i:5766466200] entirely[/i:5766466200] different reasons... )

kw

edited to add: You're welcome, Bob!