rose_griffes (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
rose_griffes) wrote2011-03-17 10:35 pm
rose_griffes) wrote2011-03-17 10:35 pm
Entry tags:
TV: Fringe: Peter Bishop meta?!
Happy St. Patrick's Day! I totally forgot about it when I was getting dressed this morning.
I'm still talking about Fringe. Gah.I'm seriously tempted to order the DVD's, because now I have questions and I want to rewatch some of the episodes and I'm also curious about the other features available and... talk me out of this?
Never mind. Just ordered them, both seasons one and two.
Anyway! Speaking of useless talking, I'm going to write about a character that almost no one on my f'list truly likes: Peter Bishop. Apparently that "No one likes him, so I will!" defense has been activated.
My own guesses on what motivates some of the Peter Bishop disdain:
1. He looks like Joshua Jackson--who looks like Pacey from that show Dawson's Creek. Apparently the role was fairly iconic, plus Jackson has that young face and it's hard to imagine him as a (former) con artist. TV and movies establish certain visual standards; Peter Bishop is not sharply handsome enough to be the villain we're all supposed to find attractive, yet he's not plain enough on the show to be a low-life criminal. (Again, I'm talking about the visual shorthand used in a lot of cinema and television. Devilishly handsome Evil Dude or plain/unattractive thug.)
Joshua Jackson could manage a thug role, though. Make him a bit less pretty and he can take care of the menacing and creepy, I'd bet.
2. He has two very incongruent key elements: loveable rogue andfather caretaker. It's an unusual mix. Plus we haven't been given many glimpses of the rogue side, other than a few tech-oriented contacts now and then.
3. The character of Peter is ambiguous enough that it's easy to love and defend him (and overdo it), and easy to hate him (and overdo it). Harder to find middle ground about him.
I like Peter. I don't love him. He's interesting. At this point (early season two) I like the balance in what we see. This is Olivia's show; her agency matters the most. So I'm not fuming about how Peter has been left out of the action. Well, not any more than I'm irked about Olivia's sister and niece being ignored, or how Astrid has almost no history, or how we're just now finding out something about Broyles and his family.
Since Peter is not from our 'verse, I'm reasonably certain we'll get more of his backstory anyway, because being kidnapped by your father's duplicate from another world seems to be a guarantee for future plot points, yeah?
Back to the loveable rogue role. Harrison Ford as Han Solo displayed a pattern. (Patterns!) Peter Bishop has some elements of the pattern: he seemed to be conning his way through life, surrounded by debt and problematic acquaintances, when something happened to awaken a sense of moral responsibility. In Han's case it was Luke and Leia and their struggle against the Empire. (Not a clear case of "I'm doing this for the girl," though that was certainly a part of it.) In Peter's case it was his father being taken out of a mental institution and in need of a caretaker. Was Olivia a part of Peter's motivation early on? I tend to think not--at least not in a sexual/romantic way.
I rewatched the first episode and was struck by how willing he was to annoy her ("sweetheart") and yet how emphatic he was that she shouldn't be letting his father push her into (reprehensible) experiments. His strong reaction to Walter Bishop's plan to drug her and link her conscious to John Scott's seemed very motivated by a sense of "This is wrong and a really bad idea" instead of a personal connection to Olivia herself.
(I don't think he ever called her sweetheart again once he realized that she had managed to bluff him. Soon I'll have the season one disks and I'll be able to watch again and see if I'm right.)
And then he couldn't let his father go back to the mental hospital, and he couldn't ignore what else is coming. It's a huge responsibility, and one that he takes a bit begrudgingly, but he still takes it.
At any rate, Peter's 'good' side gets played up more than the rogue side. He's competent at assisting Olivia--even while my logical brain says, "Why is this civilian running around with an FBI agent?" He's also done very well with his father; not only is he capable of taking care of him (and it's not an easy responsibility), he and his father have improved their relationship. Probably a matter of giving up expectations that his dad will ever been sane/normal/act like a father. It's been a bit too easy, Peter's path, and I'm guessing it will stay that way (in the redemption aspects), since the story of his childhood will probably take precedence.
As for Olivia and Peter, the Epic Romance... well. The pilot episode pushed the "I will talk right into your face and stare intently at you" thing* and then it was dropped for a long time. Which is fine. I'm okay with the theoretical aspect of Olivia/Peter, but I'm not in a hurry for it to happen.
*That was partly an alpha dog contest anyway. Olivia won. Obviously.
If the show goes in a Peter/Olivia direction--and there have been hints for a while that this is certainly a possibility--I hope that Olivia Dunham is still the center. She can share the spotlight, but no one else should take it from her. And please let them hit the right notes and keep Olivia in character.
(Side note related to that: some of the Olivia/Peter fic out there doesn't work for me, because the Peter we've seen on the show isn't the dominant male. I would guess that even when he was running cons, he wasn't doing them alone. Smartest guy in the room? Sure, but he wasn't the leader of the pack. So the stories that give him a clearly dominant role to Olivia as a submissive female do nothing for me. She has the gun and the swagger.)
Back to the non-romance aspects... interesting how the show has avoided most of Peter's shady past, instead showing Peter now, trying to do what's right. We didn't get to see much of a struggle there. Walter's past reflects onto the present without giving Walter forgiveness for it. (Or maybe that's just me.) Redemption doesn't appear to be the theme of the show; instead it's all about repercussions of (Bell and Bishop's) past actions.
And now: fun with Joshua Jackson! "Peter is a really dumb smart guy." (very short clip, not spoilery at all)
More: "Peter is a shallow, venal, hedonistic, nihilistic man." (Heee! Oh, Joshua Jackson. Vaguely spoilery for mid-season one.)
I'm still talking about Fringe. Gah.
Never mind. Just ordered them, both seasons one and two.
Anyway! Speaking of useless talking, I'm going to write about a character that almost no one on my f'list truly likes: Peter Bishop. Apparently that "No one likes him, so I will!" defense has been activated.
My own guesses on what motivates some of the Peter Bishop disdain:
1. He looks like Joshua Jackson--who looks like Pacey from that show Dawson's Creek. Apparently the role was fairly iconic, plus Jackson has that young face and it's hard to imagine him as a (former) con artist. TV and movies establish certain visual standards; Peter Bishop is not sharply handsome enough to be the villain we're all supposed to find attractive, yet he's not plain enough on the show to be a low-life criminal. (Again, I'm talking about the visual shorthand used in a lot of cinema and television. Devilishly handsome Evil Dude or plain/unattractive thug.)
Joshua Jackson could manage a thug role, though. Make him a bit less pretty and he can take care of the menacing and creepy, I'd bet.
2. He has two very incongruent key elements: loveable rogue and
3. The character of Peter is ambiguous enough that it's easy to love and defend him (and overdo it), and easy to hate him (and overdo it). Harder to find middle ground about him.
I like Peter. I don't love him. He's interesting. At this point (early season two) I like the balance in what we see. This is Olivia's show; her agency matters the most. So I'm not fuming about how Peter has been left out of the action. Well, not any more than I'm irked about Olivia's sister and niece being ignored, or how Astrid has almost no history, or how we're just now finding out something about Broyles and his family.
Since Peter is not from our 'verse, I'm reasonably certain we'll get more of his backstory anyway, because being kidnapped by your father's duplicate from another world seems to be a guarantee for future plot points, yeah?
Back to the loveable rogue role. Harrison Ford as Han Solo displayed a pattern. (Patterns!) Peter Bishop has some elements of the pattern: he seemed to be conning his way through life, surrounded by debt and problematic acquaintances, when something happened to awaken a sense of moral responsibility. In Han's case it was Luke and Leia and their struggle against the Empire. (Not a clear case of "I'm doing this for the girl," though that was certainly a part of it.) In Peter's case it was his father being taken out of a mental institution and in need of a caretaker. Was Olivia a part of Peter's motivation early on? I tend to think not--at least not in a sexual/romantic way.
I rewatched the first episode and was struck by how willing he was to annoy her ("sweetheart") and yet how emphatic he was that she shouldn't be letting his father push her into (reprehensible) experiments. His strong reaction to Walter Bishop's plan to drug her and link her conscious to John Scott's seemed very motivated by a sense of "This is wrong and a really bad idea" instead of a personal connection to Olivia herself.
(I don't think he ever called her sweetheart again once he realized that she had managed to bluff him. Soon I'll have the season one disks and I'll be able to watch again and see if I'm right.)
And then he couldn't let his father go back to the mental hospital, and he couldn't ignore what else is coming. It's a huge responsibility, and one that he takes a bit begrudgingly, but he still takes it.
At any rate, Peter's 'good' side gets played up more than the rogue side. He's competent at assisting Olivia--even while my logical brain says, "Why is this civilian running around with an FBI agent?" He's also done very well with his father; not only is he capable of taking care of him (and it's not an easy responsibility), he and his father have improved their relationship. Probably a matter of giving up expectations that his dad will ever been sane/normal/act like a father. It's been a bit too easy, Peter's path, and I'm guessing it will stay that way (in the redemption aspects), since the story of his childhood will probably take precedence.
As for Olivia and Peter, the Epic Romance... well. The pilot episode pushed the "I will talk right into your face and stare intently at you" thing* and then it was dropped for a long time. Which is fine. I'm okay with the theoretical aspect of Olivia/Peter, but I'm not in a hurry for it to happen.
*That was partly an alpha dog contest anyway. Olivia won. Obviously.
If the show goes in a Peter/Olivia direction--and there have been hints for a while that this is certainly a possibility--I hope that Olivia Dunham is still the center. She can share the spotlight, but no one else should take it from her. And please let them hit the right notes and keep Olivia in character.
(Side note related to that: some of the Olivia/Peter fic out there doesn't work for me, because the Peter we've seen on the show isn't the dominant male. I would guess that even when he was running cons, he wasn't doing them alone. Smartest guy in the room? Sure, but he wasn't the leader of the pack. So the stories that give him a clearly dominant role to Olivia as a submissive female do nothing for me. She has the gun and the swagger.)
Back to the non-romance aspects... interesting how the show has avoided most of Peter's shady past, instead showing Peter now, trying to do what's right. We didn't get to see much of a struggle there. Walter's past reflects onto the present without giving Walter forgiveness for it. (Or maybe that's just me.) Redemption doesn't appear to be the theme of the show; instead it's all about repercussions of (Bell and Bishop's) past actions.
And now: fun with Joshua Jackson! "Peter is a really dumb smart guy." (very short clip, not spoilery at all)
More: "Peter is a shallow, venal, hedonistic, nihilistic man." (Heee! Oh, Joshua Jackson. Vaguely spoilery for mid-season one.)