Blakes7 June 2001

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61 participants
258 discussions

Re: [B7L] Lost Causes
by Mac4781＠aol.com 14 Jun '01

14 Jun '01

In a message dated 06/14/2001 2:46:46 AM Eastern Daylight Time, smanton(a)hotmail.com writes: > Oh come on, I'm sure we could between us all come up with Ten Good Things > About Power surely ... Tarrant scolding Dayna for being reckless (when she challenged Gunsar). Talk about the pot calling the kettle... The way Tarrant quietly nudges Dayna and Vila away at the end of the Dayna-Gunsar fight. Time to get moving, boys and girls. Vila grabbing Tarrant about the waist and pulling him back to prevent him from getting zapped by the door to the silo. Carol Mc

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Fwd: FW: [B7L] Lost Causes
by Sally Manton 14 Jun '01

14 Jun '01

Una wrote: <Defence of doomed causes looks in danger of becoming fashionable. I may soon have to start taking a more populist line in my posts in order to remain unfashionable.> We could try and start a Society for The Defence of Shadow. That's about as un-doomed as I can think of (nice easy job, too :-) _________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com.

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Re: [B7L] Duel (was Re: 20 moments that make us cringe)
by Sally Manton 14 Jun '01

14 Jun '01

'Nother good thing about Duel :-) Sinofar's 'no one asks to be chosen' line, when you apply it to *both* of the crews overhead ... _________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com.

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Re: [B7L] piece of pure silliness
by Sally Manton 14 Jun '01

14 Jun '01

Joanne wrote: <(as long as it's not a bad one, right, Sally?)> It's probably a lovely little hobbit, how could it be anything else? :-) _________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com.

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Re: [B7L] re: 20 moments that make us cringe
by Helen Krummenacker 14 Jun '01

14 Jun '01

Just because I wasn't keen on the aliens doesn't mean I didn't like Duel. Great moments from it include: the ramming manuever, and the arguing on board ship Travis trying to have a conversation with the Mutoid... and his apparent interest in her past. It's interpretaable so maany ways. I always thought he knew her before she'd been altered. Avon's decision not to stay up and watch them sit in trees all night Blake's decision not to kill Travis under the cicumstances.

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Cross-fandom
by Kathryn Andersen 14 Jun '01

14 Jun '01

I know, this was weeks ago, but I thought it was an interesting subject anyway... what other shows are we fans of, and why? (And 'scuse if I ramble, blame it on the flu/medication) Well, obviously, Buffy (since I did edit Staked Blake after all) Things they have in common are doom and gloom and wit... though I like the juxtaposition of the mundane and the fantastic in Buffy. (Though I've kinda given up on Buffy for now... sigh) I really consider myself a fan of something if I've written fanfic or poetry for it... which could mean that I'm not actually a fan of Buffy... (shrug). So my list is rather too long to bother (just go and look at my web page to see the universes I've written things for, but also consider that it's about a fifteen-year coverage, and some things I may no longer be a fan of...) Babylon 5 it isn't really much of a surprise why B7 fen liked it -- it treated its viewers as being more intelligent than 12-year-olds. It was intelligent and not preachy. But I only liked the first two seasons, really. Doctor Who, well, it's a British classic, innit? Highlander... I actually liked Highlander before Methos came on the scene, but any Avon fan simply has to like Methos, he's irresistable. "The alternative is unthinkable" (grin). Apart from that, there's a lot of appeal with (a) the visuals (from the handsome blokes, the period costumes and the really cool swordfights) (b) the angst (Who Wants To Live Forever?) (c) the moral dilemmas -- hey, we've got more Doom and Gloom, don't we? Are B7 fen angst addicts, then? Then again, most of us wear black, don't we? Forever Knight... was my Highlander substitute. Still got the period costumes, the moral dilemmas and the angst, though no nifty sword fights; I didn't like it quite as much, and not the last season. Sapphire & Steel... was a little like some episodes of Doctor Who, but dark and mysterious, with the lead characters being the most mysterious of all. Spooky. Atmospheric. Hmmmm. Tomorrow People... was unlike any of these, being relentlessly optimistic and simplistic... but I really liked the concept; I wanted to be a Tomorrow Person when I was a kid. So I guess there's a large dollop of nostalgia too. VR.5... was so cool it had icicles. Ignore the techno crap - it was a fantasy, not SF. Very psychological, mysterious, things not being as they seemed (more doom and gloom, hmmmm). And a dark and brooding Englishman (but then I've already written an article on Avon and Oliver) Space: Above and Beyond... like VR.5, started off looking like one thing, and turned into something a bit more dark and dangerous. Gritty. Very good character ensemble. Stargate... has its ups and downs. Some cool concepts, some very stupid concepts, a good ensemble cast. No dark and brooding Englishmen, but I'll take an innocent angsty Archaeologist and a sarcastic noble Colonel instead, quite happily. Yeah, sometimes it's a little too up-beat, they win too easily (unlike B7) but I still like it. Sentinel... is about as far from B7 as I can think of, really. (Well, not as far as The Tomorrow People) But it seems to be right up the top there with me at the moment. The fanfic is better than the show was. (Well, the fanfic that I *like* is). The good parts of the show are (a) the friendship between the two leads, the more so because it is improbable, a chosen friendship rather than the friendship of comrades; (b) the SF concept (lots of interesting potential) (c) the mystical stuff (as long as they don't go overboard) (d) I do like detective/cop/action shows -- but the strength of this show is that it isn't *just* a detective/cop/action show. I'll happily watch such shows, but I wouldn't write fanfic for them... The weaknesses of the show were that (a) the Powers That Be thought of it more and more as just a detective/cop/action show (or maybe the writers simply couldn't write anything else) (b) many of the plots were stupid, the last episode being the stupidest of all (c) the Babe of the Week phenomenon (d) they had little continuity... So why would a B7 fan like it? Hmmmm. Strong characters? Some very good episodes? No technobabble? (Mind, there was a bit of psychobabble...) Kathryn Andersen (sniff, cough, ache) -=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Blair: Okay, um...my name is Blair Sandburg. And I'm working on my doctorate in Anthropology and you just may be the living embodiment of my field of study. If I'm correct, Detective Ellison, you're a behavioral throwback to a pre-civilized breed of man. Jim: Are you out of your mind? You dragged me all the way over here to tell me I'm some sort of caveman? (The Sentinel: Switchman) -- _--_|\ | Kathryn Andersen <kat(a)foobox.net> / \ | <http://www.katspace.com> \_.--.*/ | v | #include "standard/disclaimer.h" ------------| Melbourne -> Victoria -> Australia -> Southern Hemisphere Maranatha! | -> Earth -> Sol -> Milky Way Galaxy -> Universe

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Re: the Waifing of Cally
by Helen Krummenacker 13 Jun '01

13 Jun '01

> Interesting idea that Cally got waif-ized to make her more appealing to > Avon....how sexist of them. Why alter *her* to fit *him* rather than vice > versa > I didn't take Ellynne's post to mean Cally was 'Waifed' to *make* her more appealling to Avon, by the writers. Although that's not unthinkable, an attempt to parrallel Blake and Jenna with the new lead couple, except that they weren't really written as a couple. It's the audience that sees it in the apparent chemistry. Others have said they saw Avon being attracted to Cally in her first few (pre-Waif) episodes, and later he became disinterested. What I got from what Ellynne was saying is this-- a person with trust issues will be more inclined to trust someone who is a bit needy. That's a simplified way of looking at it of course-- my sister-in-law, for instance, appears to be very needy, but she is also trustworthy as a politician. Still, it's easier to feel at ease in a relationship if you believe yourself to be the more powerful personality. I don't think the series weakened Cally's personality to make her more attractive to Avon; however, they may have believed it would make her more attractive to the male fans, or more sympathetic to the females. Or, it may be that the Tarrant-Avon rivalry was being played up by the writers to the point they didn't know what to do with the other members. Dayna and Soolin rarely got parts that were any better, although Dayna was cast as the 'bloodthirsty' one.. and perhaps it is Dayna's introduction that was ultimately responsible for Cally's softening. After all, there had to be some definite marks of distinction. Dayna was introduced as a warrior; Cally had been too, once, but in the season and more-than-a-half after, had been given a kinder side and a mystic-race background. Dayna could not be changed radically between her first and third appearences; on the other hand, they could sweep Cally's "May you die alone and silent!" side under the rug. Without a definite new direction for Cally, then, she comes across as a Waif.

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re: 20 moments that make us cringe
by Betty Ragan 13 Jun '01

13 Jun '01

Helen wrote: > 19. The self-important aliens in Duel Surely I can't be the only one who *likes* the aliens in "Duel"? Or even just "Duel" in general? The episode always strikes me as a nifty, subversive take-off on _Star Trek_ (whether entirely deliberate or otherwise), and the aliens are part and parcel of that. If you watch TOS' s "Arena," the alien in it is downright sickening (and I say this as one who *does* actually consider herself a TOS fan). It's this shiningly beautiful young man in a toga giving Kirk a metaphorical pat on the head and saying "Ah, give you a few million more years and you may be as shiny and advanced and perfect as we are!" Whereas the B7 aliens *aren't* more "advanced," morally, than humans -- heck, they destroyed themselves in a horrible war! And the individul specimens we see are as cynical and prone to squabbling between themselves as anybody else in the B7 universe. Giroc, in particular, is a nasty piece of work, and ugly, to boot. Even the "super-advanced aliens" in B7 are corrupt and petty! How can you not love that? :) -- Betty Ragan ** bragan(a)nrao.edu ** http://www.aoc.nrao.edu/~bragan Not speaking for my employers, officially or otherwise. "Seeing a rotten picture for the special effects is like eating a tough steak for the smothered onions..." -- Isaac Asimov

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Re: [B7L] piece of pure silliness
by J MacQueen 13 Jun '01

13 Jun '01

>From: Kathryn Andersen <kat(a)foobox.net> >"Kathryn Andersen" becomes "Esmerelda Knotwise of Michel Delving" >I am secretly related to Kerr Avon. Well, what's new? (-8 Glad to see you here again, ill or not. Or Knot. Um. I suspect something in my brain is still puzzling over how Sally and I get to be the same hobbit... Regards Joanne (as long as it's not a bad one, right, Sally?) _________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com.

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Re: 20 moments that make us cringe
by Sally Manton 13 Jun '01

13 Jun '01

Helen suggested: <20. Blake and Avon laughing about the intelligent flea (with snide glances referring over to Vila). It was forced, unfunny, and out of place.> *All* the would-be chummy lets-share-a-laugh scenes are dire: this one, Breakdown, and Children of Auron (the worst IMO). OTOH, somehow it fits that our ironic doom-n-gloom saga can't do sitcom moments :-) _________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com.

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Blakes7 June 2001