juushika

This is just a quick review for Weeds, season 1 & 2 (Showtime).

Weeds opens with Nancy, a suburban housewife who has begin selling marijuana in order to support her sons and lifestyle after the sudden death of her husband. Weeds begins well with an unusual, intriguing premise, and (with the exception of the child actors) well-cast quirky characters. The writing is sharp, balancing the absurdity of the concept against a fair bit of emotional character development. Between the premise, characters, and too-slick writing, the show tends towards over-the-top, but those instances are played as humor and so the first season of Weeds is a smart, sharp comedy in compulsively watchable, bite-sized half-hour episodes. Mary-Louise Parker as Nancy simply shines—she's a great actor and takes to the show's style with aplomb and surprising depth. All in all the first season is enjoyable, and I recommend it.

The second season however is far less successful, and I'm not sad that I won't continue on to the third. As Nancy goes from a widowed suburban dime-bag dealer to a marijuana farmer dating a DEA agent, the plot simply outscales the show's capabilities: everything is larger, more unbelievable, more dramatic, but it's still conscribed to half-hour episodes. Secondary characters become cameos, character development is overshadowed by dramatic plot twists, and humor is no longer able to explain away the unbelievable plot. It's like watching a soap opera trying hard to be a primetime show. The second season is frantic, fragmented, and wholly unrealistic. There's still some clever writing and Parker is an unflappable lead, but the show starts a swift downward spiral and at the end of the season, doesn't show potential for improvement.

The first two seasons are the only ones currently available on Netflix's instant service, and I have no desire to expend the effort to borrow disks—so that's all I'll ever see of Weeds. I enjoyed it more than I expected, so for some snappy entertainment that still has depth, I moderately recommend the first season. But stop there—as it goes on the show crumples under its own weight, and the loss of the intriguing premise and strong characters is a real disappointment.

I've been dealing with a lot of (entirely generalized, e.g. unprovoked and unpredictable) anxiety the last few days, which is dying off now thank goodness. As a result, I was in search of some mindless activity for when I wasn't calm enough for active consumption (reading) or production (reviews, posts). And I was up to date in all my favorite TV shows.

So I watched Firefly, because it was available and I had never seen it before.

I'll admit that (not a sin unique to me) I have a habit of doubting popular media. In part because I distrust majority opinion, in part because (the guilty bit) I want to be unique and special and not love the same things as everyone else. So I came to Firefly with some doubts simply because so many folk love it so much. I also had doubts because I've lately been running into a high number of feminist critiques and discussions on rape, some in reference to fiction, or science fiction, or Whedon's work specifically. Who knows why all of this at once—a combination of stumbled upon links and discussion triggering more discussion and the controversies over Dollhouse, no doubt. (That and the fact that Whedon, a self-professed feminist, invites such discussions.)

A partial list of those essays:
A Rapist's View of the World: Joss Whedon and Firefly by allecto / Allecto
Taboos and Tropes: Part II "Rhetoric and Writing about Rape" by Rae Bryant at Fantasy Magazine
Dear Genre Fiction Writers: Quit This Sh*t by K. Tempest Bradford on Jeff Vandermeer's blog
Working in the Dollhouse by Shannan Palma at Feminist SF

I don't agree with the complete contents of all those essays; since I'm not watching Dollhouse, I can make even less comment there. Nevertheless they're all food for thought and having read them I came to Firefly with worries and open eyes.

I found the show just above average in most ways. I've never seen the huge appeal to Whedon, so perhaps I'm just not the ideal audience for his shows. The dialog is clever, Kalyee is a entirely lovely, and the plot had promise—River's story in particular makes me wish that the series had run longer that we might find out more about her in a less frantic and trite method than the film Serenity. On the other hand, the space cowboy theme is patched together (better to take the Cowboy Bebop route, cowboy mentality in a scifi setting; actual cowboy aesthetics are hokey on a space ships), many of the characters are two-dimensional (and some, like Zoe, barely manage that), and the episodic format is wearying: episodic can be done well but here, where a routine starting point undergoes an unexpected twist by the opening credits, then turns into a frolicking adventure, and is tied up within forty minutes, continuing for fourteen episodes in a row, it's not well done—indeed, it's unbelievable.

For the most part, Firefly is witty, unusual pulp, fun if not groundbreaking, and largely harmless. But yes, there are issues of gender and sexism which bother me a bit. They're characters, sections, little niggling things, not the majority of the show. But they're still there, and they bugged me.

There's Zoe, who appears to be a powerful black woman but actually has no personality of her own: she's defined as Mal's second in command and as Wash's wife. As Mal's second, she's a plot point, supporting him and bringing his plans to frutition. As Wash's wife she's a source of contention between Wash and Mal, she's Wash's motivation, and she's wife and sex object which humanizes and sensualizes—no, better, sexualizes—the ship. And that's all she is. Even when Wash directly confronts her (in "War Stories") about the difference between her personal opinion and Mal's opinion, she cannot make one. Zoe totes guns and she makes a clever quip or three about Mal's judgement, but she makes near enough no decision which is strictly her own. (One of the only ones she does make, to return for Mal in "Out of Gas," occurs entirely off screen.) She's powerful only in appearance. In reality, she's barely a character and has no autonomy.

But what really got me is Inara (who is a Companion, akin to a courtesan) and her relationship with Mal. When she first comes on the ship (in flashbacks from "Out of Gas"), she makes it clear to Mal that he is not to enter her shuttle without express invitation and that he is to treat her with respect (specifically: not refer to her as a whore). He agrees and then consistently betrays both of these edicts. This is part of Mal's character as an equal-opportunity asshole, but he claims, in "Shindig," that he respects her even if he doesn't respect her career—not that that stops him from invading her privacy. Inara always has a sharp retort to Mal's disrespect but as the show progresses it becomes obvious that they both harbor affection for the other, culimating in a scene where Inara cries after Mal has sex with another sex worker ("Heart of Gold"). So, get this: an independent, educated, employable woman who has chosen and enjoys her career as a paid companion and a sex worker rightly demands that a man treat her with respect; when he intentionally treats her with disrespect not only is it a sign that he actually cares for her, she also proceeds to fall in love with him.

That doesn't seem so "shiny," to me.

There are other little things, like stupid sexist Jayne who functions as a flimsy foil for asshole but good at heart Mal; con artist Saffon's confrontation with Mal, where he threatens her with sexual violence in guise of a "wedding night" ("Our Mrs. Renyolds"), like Wash's poorly concealed and would-be humorous desire for an wife as subservient as Saffron (Ibid.), the fact that Inara uses "whore" to describe non-Companion sex workers even though she takes offense when called it herself ("Heart of Gold"), and no doubt others which I'm forgetting now.

Is Firefly the scariest anti-feminist show I've ever seen? Goodness, no. It wasn't quite as bad as I was expecting, either, coming to it as wary as I was. And I want to say "feminist issues aside, it can be an enjoyable if mediocre show"—but that's just the point. I know that tearing media to pieces can seem to pull all the fun out of it, but feminist issues should never be set aside, even if they make entertainment somewhat less entertaining. Ignore them, and you tolerate them and allow them to persist. And where sexist media persists, sexist mentality is free to thrive. It doesn't mean boycotting and hating every questionable show or book. It means keeping eyes and mind open and being wary of sexism (and indeed any form of discrimination) and how easily it can slip in, even in the work of a would-be feminist writer, even in the guise of humor or ensemble casts or bickering romances. Being aware of those issues and speaking on them helps to prevent them, in the long run, and that's worth the cost of a little less fun.

(But was Firefly and feminism the best choice for my anxious brain? Not so much. I almost wish I'd been able to take it at face value, for the sake of entirely mindless occupation. Next time I should stick with My Little Pony.)

Under the cut is a review of the DivaCup, an alternative menstrual product. If you're uncomfortable with talk of vaginas, menstruation, and girl issues, you may want to ignore this entry. Hopefully you won't have to. I encourage all women to read it, because I love my DivaCup and I think it's a wonderful product that others should learn something about. Men may find it interesting to read. Plus, the world will be a better place when we can all discuss or in the very least read about menstruation without shame, fear, or icky feelings. So, without further ado...

( My review of the DivaCup. )