Okay, my last word on the subject. And I'm *not* trying to be offensive, forgive me if I am, I'm just trying to put it plainly. (Anyone who wants to skip this, go ahead - it ain't my usual brand of burbling).
Wendy wrote: <Fair enough, but I'm kind of confused about what I'm being accused of here. First I'm accused of attacking Avon for saying hes' less than nice, then I'm accused of attacking the plot (grumble grumble).>
No, what *I* (and I can only speak for myself) saw was that you were insisting that my interpretation was invalid - and ideologically suspect!! - because it wasn't in accordance with what you'd decided the facts of the episode were.
You seemed to be saying - repeatedly - that your version is *the facts* (and I quote: "the story stands: A woman needs a man to fire off her rocket and fertilise her race. A man comes along, fulfils this need, then smegs off, leaving her on a radiation-soaked planet without even asking if she, or anyone else she knows for that matter, wants his number." This is *not* canon, this is your embellished version of the story. You have a perfect right to your version, but you don't have to insist that if others don't agree to it it's purely because they've "imagined in their own minds to fill the plot holes for themselves to make them feel better, and/or to whitewash Avon." (Which is distinctly patronising, BTW).
There's no need for some insidious Meegating to explain why I said I liked to believe that that Gan, Jenna and Cally - none of whom are bastards - or Blake - who unquestionably is, but not in that way - would also not have chosen to dump Meegat to die whether she wanted to or not (it's Blake's ship, and Gan is always ready to argue for what he thinks should be done), and that it's entirely possible that she did not wish to leave her home for god-only-knows-what. That's my interpretation, which is entirely consistent both with the facts of the episode as I see them, and *with the characters* - all of the characters - as I understand them, which I have always maintained is equally important *to me*.
<it's very surprising that, if they did do it, there wasn't some mention or other indication that they had done so.>
So how does that invalidate the assumption that they were asked, and didn't want to go? Why *can't* I assume that if I want to, and if it makes way more sense to me than your version?
<But the point is, the end is still loose.>
Agreed. You appeared to be arguing that it *wasn't* loose, it was firmly tied, and only one version of the unseen facts was acceptable. If that wasn't what you meant, I apologise, but that was how it appeared to me.
If we both agree that that is not true - that each of our versions is valid to ourselves, *without* imputing dubious personal reasons why the other doesn't see the subtext our way, then there's no problem ...
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--- Sally Manton smanton@hotmail.com wrote:
Okay, my last word on the subject. And I'm *not* trying to be offensive, forgive me if I am,
OK, mine too then. And ditto.
No, what *I* (and I can only speak for myself) saw was that you were insisting that my interpretation was invalid - and ideologically suspect!! - because it wasn't in accordance with what you'd decided the facts of the episode were.
Funny, but that's exactly my prblem with some of the arguments that have been put forward. At least one person put it forward *as fact* that Meegat was asked to go and didn't; another put it forward *as fact* that Avon was awed and humbled at the responsibility he was given. Neither of which, we both agree, are *facts.*
So I take it that you mean that it is OK for certain people whom I will not single out (but who share *your* opinion) to present an inference as fact, but I can't defend my own arguements with anything less than hard-boilde, set-in-concrete-and-signed-by-Terry-Nation fact.
There's no need for some insidious Meegating to explain why I said I liked to believe that that Gan, Jenna and Cally - none of whom are bastards - or Blake - who unquestionably is, but not in that way
- would also not have
chosen to dump Meegat to die whether she wanted to or not (it's Blake's ship, and Gan is always ready to argue for what he thinks should be done), and that it's entirely possible that she did not wish to leave her home for god-only-knows-what. That's my interpretation, which is entirely consistent both with the facts of the episode as I see them, and *with the characters*
- all of the characters - as I understand them,
which I have always maintained is equally important *to me*.
I agree with your analysis of Blake, Jenna, Gan and Cally's characters, and Meegat's possible response. But none of them are at issue here. Of course the story would have been different if Jenna had been the rocket launcher. But she wasn't, so there's not much point in arguing about it.
And for the record, none of the characters you named seemed too broken up about leaving people on Cygnus Alpha, the planet in Web, Horizon, and so forth. Once they had got what they wanted, they're not interested about what happens next. Why should it be different here?
<it's very surprising that, if they did do it, there wasn't some mention or other indication that they had done so.>
So how does that invalidate the assumption that they were asked, and didn't want to go? Why *can't* I assume that if I want to, and if it makes way more sense to me than your version?
Nobody's stopping you :-). If you have your version, and you've thought it through and you still think it makes more sense, go ahead. Just don't go blindly accepting that an episode is good just because some people say it is.
If we both agree that that is not true - that each of our versions is valid to ourselves, *without* imputing dubious personal reasons why the other doesn't see the subtext our way, then there's no problem ...
For the record, I agree that I may have come across kind of more extreme at times than the arguement needed. But it is only by challenging a theory and seeing if it holds up to all the possible arguments that you know it's valid. Quite a few theories that came up on this thread have developed a few holes.
Wendy
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"Penberriss Wendy S." wrote:
Funny, but that's exactly my prblem with some of the arguments that have been put forward. At least one person put it forward *as fact* that Meegat was asked to go and didn't; another put it forward *as fact* that Avon was awed and humbled at the responsibility he was given. Neither of which, we both agree, are *facts.*
Sorry, no. I'm the person who originally said that Avon was humbled by the responsibility, in this paragraph:
There are, IMO, two things going on in this ep. One is to set up the 'Orac' plot, which can be discounted because it could have been easily folded into the next episode. The other, and far more important, is to characterize Avon - he is more human by the end of the ep; he is the character in this story that changes and grows. He has been humbled by a new awareness of the responsibility inherent in leadership and power. (He's annoyed that Blake has noticed that he's learned it, but he's learned it nonetheless. And yes, he does seem to keep trying to unlearn it; but I don't think he ever quite succeeds.) That final exchange with Blake is where, for me, Avon became a sympathetic, three-dimensional character.
Do you see the IMO? That's _in my opinion_. Not presented as fact at all.
And of course, we all understand that we're just stating our opinions, so it isn't necessary to constantly throw in qualifiers and dilute the clarity of one's arguments. However, directly stating one's opinion, even without qualifiers is IMO significantly different from battering one's fellow participants with repeated insistences of _opinions that are still in dispute_ as if they were self-evident.
Or to put it another way: if I think the lump in the river is a crocodile, and you think it's a rock, I'm not going to use it as a stepping-stone just because you say so until you _convince_ me it's a rock. It doesn't matter how many times you jump up and down and shout that it's a rock; that approach is not effective. It's also tedious.
Mistral
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Mistral -
Penberriss Wendy S. -
Sally Manton