a tale of two romances
Jan. 19th, 2013 09:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
intrikate88There are two shows, each with a couple that makes me ship them so much that I make embarrassing noises in my open-plan office at work and I don't know if all the engineers think this is just something those people who get English degrees do, or if they're all too tired to hear me. Probably the latter; on Wednesday, one student fell asleep on her desk the other day and the janitor taped an 'out of order' sign to her back.
But back to my two couples: Belle and Rumpelstiltskin, on Once Upon a Time, and Lizzie and Darcy, on the Lizzie Bennett Diaries.
It took me until about episode 70 to get around to watching Lizzie Bennett Diaries, as, although I have read all her books, Jane Austen and I have a feud going due to her grave betrayal of my feelings in Northanger Abbey. But I find the updated, video-blog format lends the story of Pride and Prejudice a unique point of view that lends a new depth to characterization, and how each character relates to each other.
But let's start with Belle and Rumpelstiltskin.
You all know I'm a total sucker for everything Beauty and the Beast, and a few months ago I thanked Jane Espenson to her face for writing a Beauty and the Beast story about two adults for an audience of adults. Some of you have heard me talk about my thesis-length thoughts on the BATB story and I'm not getting into that today but basically: more than a story about looking beyond appearances (as LBD/P&P are as well), this story is about two people who have their own unique power over each other, and have to progress to the point where, when they are asked to choose power or love, they choose love. In the first episode with Belle and Rumpelstiltskin, Rumpelstiltskin had physical and magical power over Belle to imprison her or to send her away. Belle had the power to break his "curse" and remove his power and ability to proceed with his goals. They grew affectionate with each other, but not to the point where they were willing to let go of power: Belle attempted to take away his resources (without asking why he held on to them in such a lonely, unhappy life), Rumpelstiltskin pushed her away and imprisoned her away from him and then told her to leave (without asking if she had made an innocent mistake or really was the Queen's pawn).
So now, we skip ahead, they're back together in Storybrook, and they've acknowledged that they love each other, that things should have gone differently, but they haven't gotten to the roots of their problems yet. That's okay! They've had like three episodes focused on them? That's barely a start, and they have a looooooong way to go.
Rumpelstiltskin has progressed, a little. He has started being more open with her, and admitting that he needs magic both because he needs to find his son and because he is a weak man who is too long in the habit of looking for a crutch. He has given her a library with its own apartment so that she can have a domain of her own, her own identity, her own life. But he would also have her lock herself in there, for her own protection, instead of discovering that she has learned ways to protect herself. She shows interest in standing by his side as a partner (in confronting Hook, in finding Bae) and he acknowledges her but doesn't make that partnership happen. He is nicer to her: but she wants more than that, she wants a good man she can respect and she believes that he is there, but seldom comes out.
And Belle has had even less opportunity for development on her side of their relationship.
In other versions of Beauty and the Beast, the Beast falls in love with Beauty long before the feeling is mutual; in addition, she holds the power, because she is the key to unlock the magic binding him. But Rumpelstiltskin doesn't want to be freed from his magic just yet, because it suits his purposes, and for him Belle is a pretty but useless trinket-- she has no use as a key for the curse of being bound in magic, not yet. However, that doesn't mean she is powerless over him, because while she holds the unwanted curse-breaking, he also admits his love for her, and she has her love, which she can either grant to him or withhold. Right now, the curse he needs her to break is his loneliness, not his magic.
But she makes him earn the love she gives him. She leaves when he lies to her and tells him not to speak to her when he tries to tell her what to feel. She offers her company again when he tells her the truth. She can give him her love, if he complies (or at least seems to) with her requests for his vulnerability.
And conversely: if he gives up his magic power and guidance of her life and forfeits to her, he loses his influence, he loses the ability to keep anyone safe, and he loses any way of finding his son. If she gives up her grasp on love and forfeits it to him, he can go on being a terrible person making terrible decisions and she will just stand by, the picture of a trapped woman.
They still have an exchange, a deal, between them. This one just doesn't have the details spelled out like most of Rumple's other deals, and while it lasts, they can't consciously and purposefully be equals. They still have to hold onto power until they mutually can decide to lay it down.
Now, let's switch to another couple: Darcy and Lizzie. Darcy is rude and condescending and has the social skills of an agoraphobic lobster. Lizzie decides what people are like and is very difficult to persuade otherwise. Darcy falls for her, she spends at least sixty videos talking about how strongly she dislikes him, he confesses his love and doesn't understand her shock at that, she says WELL THEN WHY DON'T YOU JUST WATCH MY VIDEOS AND FIND OUT OOOOPS SHIT.
So he watches her videos, he sees exactly what she finds wrong with him, and he does not go back to her and try to convince her he's honest, he doesn't bring up the fact that she spends so much time talking about him that maybe there's a reason she can't get him off her mind, he doesn't beg her to give him a chance.
He doesn't do anything, except listen.
It's another situation where yes, there are superficial impressions that turn out to be not that simple, and there are social influences mostly think they should stay apart. Darcy is wealthy and influential and runs a company in Lizzie's field of study, and does actually have the power to bring happiness to her family or take it away (re: his interference with Jane and Bing's relationship; the fact that he can get Charlotte fired or sue Lizzie for slander) and he has the power to help Lizzie with her career. Lizzie has the ears of thousands of people and can shape Darcy's reputation, but mostly, she can love him or she can break his heart.
But he doesn't stay the sameasshole person.
glamaphonic on tumblr put it really well:
It’s just… everything he does, every choice he makes, he respects the fact that she has rejected him SO MUCH.
He is desperately, near obsessively in love with her and she violently rejects him and outside of briefly letting her know pertinent facts she’s gotten wrong, he leaves her alone.
He leaves and he accepts it and he uses the things she pointed out to engage in self-improvement, not in an effort to win her, he genuinely believes that he will never see her again, but because he acknowledges that she was right.
And when she does appear, he’s charming and kind because he has CHANGED and he still doesn’t expect her to ever love him, but he has come to a better understanding of the kind of respect that he owes the people he interacts with.
Lizzie isn't making him earn her love. She has an impression of him as a rude douchenozzle and as she learns more about Darcy she is revising that opinion, slowly, because she wants to get things right. He isn't trying to be a Nice Guy and make changes for her in the expectation that he can win her like a prize; he just respects her as a person with views and he gives those views due consideration and thinks they are worth changing his behavior over.
Back to Rumbelle. In the latest episode, we saw Belle and Gold be supportive of each other's goals (finding Bae, opening the library) and Belle ask for honesty and Gold, despite having reservations due to her safety, mostly give it to her (minus the small detail that Milah died because he crushed her heart into kitty litter). However, we also saw the continuation of the first ep this season, where Belle tells Gold she returned because he is still a monster (though that statement leaves room for interpretation) in that even as Hook is telling Belle what Rumpelstiltskin truly did to Milah, she protests that she knows he has a good heart. She sticks with Gold and asks him to be the man she wants him to be, a man who doesn't beat Hook to death.
And he does it, not because he wants to be a better man, but because he wants Belle. And Belle sticks with him despite knowing his ex got her heart ripped out, because she thinks she can change him, or at least make him see the light and change himself.
While Belle does really love him, and believes that he needs to know that in order to accept her love and be capable of change, she also uses love like it is something to barter with; he loves her presence but he doesn't value her perspective and experience enough to embrace them for himself. I love them together, but I also want to see them walk this journey together. To get to the part of the story where the Beast lets Beauty go entirely, certain that she will never return, and to the part where she does return only to watch him give up his life and die before her eyes because he knows it's time to stop being beastly, and he becomes the man he could have been.
With the way she's lost her memory now, she still has all her curiosity and kindness and cleverness and courage, but she has lost the experiences that have kept her locked up so much and the things that tell her monsters are there for her to save them. Now, it is up to Rumpelstiltskin, who officially has no one anymore, to decide who he wants to be. Belle hasn't got any love to give or withhold; now he has to decide if he will treat her like a prize or if he will let the Dark One die in him because whether or not he ever finds Bae or Belle ever remembers him, does he want to be the Dark One or does he want to consider Belle and Bae's values of worthy of respecting, because he respects them?
In any case, I will continue to love both Belle and Lizzie to an enormous degree and can't wait to see each detail of how their stories play out.
But back to my two couples: Belle and Rumpelstiltskin, on Once Upon a Time, and Lizzie and Darcy, on the Lizzie Bennett Diaries.
It took me until about episode 70 to get around to watching Lizzie Bennett Diaries, as, although I have read all her books, Jane Austen and I have a feud going due to her grave betrayal of my feelings in Northanger Abbey. But I find the updated, video-blog format lends the story of Pride and Prejudice a unique point of view that lends a new depth to characterization, and how each character relates to each other.
But let's start with Belle and Rumpelstiltskin.
You all know I'm a total sucker for everything Beauty and the Beast, and a few months ago I thanked Jane Espenson to her face for writing a Beauty and the Beast story about two adults for an audience of adults. Some of you have heard me talk about my thesis-length thoughts on the BATB story and I'm not getting into that today but basically: more than a story about looking beyond appearances (as LBD/P&P are as well), this story is about two people who have their own unique power over each other, and have to progress to the point where, when they are asked to choose power or love, they choose love. In the first episode with Belle and Rumpelstiltskin, Rumpelstiltskin had physical and magical power over Belle to imprison her or to send her away. Belle had the power to break his "curse" and remove his power and ability to proceed with his goals. They grew affectionate with each other, but not to the point where they were willing to let go of power: Belle attempted to take away his resources (without asking why he held on to them in such a lonely, unhappy life), Rumpelstiltskin pushed her away and imprisoned her away from him and then told her to leave (without asking if she had made an innocent mistake or really was the Queen's pawn).
So now, we skip ahead, they're back together in Storybrook, and they've acknowledged that they love each other, that things should have gone differently, but they haven't gotten to the roots of their problems yet. That's okay! They've had like three episodes focused on them? That's barely a start, and they have a looooooong way to go.
Rumpelstiltskin has progressed, a little. He has started being more open with her, and admitting that he needs magic both because he needs to find his son and because he is a weak man who is too long in the habit of looking for a crutch. He has given her a library with its own apartment so that she can have a domain of her own, her own identity, her own life. But he would also have her lock herself in there, for her own protection, instead of discovering that she has learned ways to protect herself. She shows interest in standing by his side as a partner (in confronting Hook, in finding Bae) and he acknowledges her but doesn't make that partnership happen. He is nicer to her: but she wants more than that, she wants a good man she can respect and she believes that he is there, but seldom comes out.
And Belle has had even less opportunity for development on her side of their relationship.
In other versions of Beauty and the Beast, the Beast falls in love with Beauty long before the feeling is mutual; in addition, she holds the power, because she is the key to unlock the magic binding him. But Rumpelstiltskin doesn't want to be freed from his magic just yet, because it suits his purposes, and for him Belle is a pretty but useless trinket-- she has no use as a key for the curse of being bound in magic, not yet. However, that doesn't mean she is powerless over him, because while she holds the unwanted curse-breaking, he also admits his love for her, and she has her love, which she can either grant to him or withhold. Right now, the curse he needs her to break is his loneliness, not his magic.
But she makes him earn the love she gives him. She leaves when he lies to her and tells him not to speak to her when he tries to tell her what to feel. She offers her company again when he tells her the truth. She can give him her love, if he complies (or at least seems to) with her requests for his vulnerability.
And conversely: if he gives up his magic power and guidance of her life and forfeits to her, he loses his influence, he loses the ability to keep anyone safe, and he loses any way of finding his son. If she gives up her grasp on love and forfeits it to him, he can go on being a terrible person making terrible decisions and she will just stand by, the picture of a trapped woman.
They still have an exchange, a deal, between them. This one just doesn't have the details spelled out like most of Rumple's other deals, and while it lasts, they can't consciously and purposefully be equals. They still have to hold onto power until they mutually can decide to lay it down.
Now, let's switch to another couple: Darcy and Lizzie. Darcy is rude and condescending and has the social skills of an agoraphobic lobster. Lizzie decides what people are like and is very difficult to persuade otherwise. Darcy falls for her, she spends at least sixty videos talking about how strongly she dislikes him, he confesses his love and doesn't understand her shock at that, she says WELL THEN WHY DON'T YOU JUST WATCH MY VIDEOS AND FIND OUT OOOOPS SHIT.
So he watches her videos, he sees exactly what she finds wrong with him, and he does not go back to her and try to convince her he's honest, he doesn't bring up the fact that she spends so much time talking about him that maybe there's a reason she can't get him off her mind, he doesn't beg her to give him a chance.
He doesn't do anything, except listen.
It's another situation where yes, there are superficial impressions that turn out to be not that simple, and there are social influences mostly think they should stay apart. Darcy is wealthy and influential and runs a company in Lizzie's field of study, and does actually have the power to bring happiness to her family or take it away (re: his interference with Jane and Bing's relationship; the fact that he can get Charlotte fired or sue Lizzie for slander) and he has the power to help Lizzie with her career. Lizzie has the ears of thousands of people and can shape Darcy's reputation, but mostly, she can love him or she can break his heart.
But he doesn't stay the same
glamaphonic on tumblr put it really well:
It’s just… everything he does, every choice he makes, he respects the fact that she has rejected him SO MUCH.
He is desperately, near obsessively in love with her and she violently rejects him and outside of briefly letting her know pertinent facts she’s gotten wrong, he leaves her alone.
He leaves and he accepts it and he uses the things she pointed out to engage in self-improvement, not in an effort to win her, he genuinely believes that he will never see her again, but because he acknowledges that she was right.
And when she does appear, he’s charming and kind because he has CHANGED and he still doesn’t expect her to ever love him, but he has come to a better understanding of the kind of respect that he owes the people he interacts with.
Lizzie isn't making him earn her love. She has an impression of him as a rude douchenozzle and as she learns more about Darcy she is revising that opinion, slowly, because she wants to get things right. He isn't trying to be a Nice Guy and make changes for her in the expectation that he can win her like a prize; he just respects her as a person with views and he gives those views due consideration and thinks they are worth changing his behavior over.
Back to Rumbelle. In the latest episode, we saw Belle and Gold be supportive of each other's goals (finding Bae, opening the library) and Belle ask for honesty and Gold, despite having reservations due to her safety, mostly give it to her (minus the small detail that Milah died because he crushed her heart into kitty litter). However, we also saw the continuation of the first ep this season, where Belle tells Gold she returned because he is still a monster (though that statement leaves room for interpretation) in that even as Hook is telling Belle what Rumpelstiltskin truly did to Milah, she protests that she knows he has a good heart. She sticks with Gold and asks him to be the man she wants him to be, a man who doesn't beat Hook to death.
And he does it, not because he wants to be a better man, but because he wants Belle. And Belle sticks with him despite knowing his ex got her heart ripped out, because she thinks she can change him, or at least make him see the light and change himself.
While Belle does really love him, and believes that he needs to know that in order to accept her love and be capable of change, she also uses love like it is something to barter with; he loves her presence but he doesn't value her perspective and experience enough to embrace them for himself. I love them together, but I also want to see them walk this journey together. To get to the part of the story where the Beast lets Beauty go entirely, certain that she will never return, and to the part where she does return only to watch him give up his life and die before her eyes because he knows it's time to stop being beastly, and he becomes the man he could have been.
With the way she's lost her memory now, she still has all her curiosity and kindness and cleverness and courage, but she has lost the experiences that have kept her locked up so much and the things that tell her monsters are there for her to save them. Now, it is up to Rumpelstiltskin, who officially has no one anymore, to decide who he wants to be. Belle hasn't got any love to give or withhold; now he has to decide if he will treat her like a prize or if he will let the Dark One die in him because whether or not he ever finds Bae or Belle ever remembers him, does he want to be the Dark One or does he want to consider Belle and Bae's values of worthy of respecting, because he respects them?
In any case, I will continue to love both Belle and Lizzie to an enormous degree and can't wait to see each detail of how their stories play out.
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no subject
Date: 2013-01-20 04:25 am (UTC)oh?
Darcy is a snappy dresser. Except for that hat, ye gods
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Date: 2013-01-24 11:48 pm (UTC)It was years before I got around to picking up a copy of Northanger Abbey, since I forgot every time I put away the CD and maybe I was a little hesitant to find out. But then there was a college course, and it was one of the books we had to read.
And the secret passageway? Was nothing, just a spare part of the house renovations. The foreshadowed dragging her away from the Tilneys'? Not a kidnapping, just the regular boring thing of seeing she wasn't all that rich and packing her off home. Every promise of excitement, completely unfulfilled.
Oh, but it was because Jane Austen was satirizing the gothic novels so popular at that time, you see. See how clever Austen was, not doing the expected hauntings. See how she makes her heroine the sort of girl who loves those silly gothic romances and lives so much in her imagination instead of the real world where secret notes are actually laundry bills and secret passageways are actually poor architecture.
I DON'T CARE ABOUT YOUR SATIRE, JANE, I WAITED LIKE SIX GODDAMN YEARS FOR KATHERINE MORELAND TO GET PROPERLY MENACED BY VILLAINS AND YOU FUCKING LET ME DOWN, YOU LED ME ON AND THEN LET ME FALL, DAMMIT JANE. YEEEEEEEEARS I WAITED.
And THAT is why I am bitter at Jane Austen and her betrayal of my feelings because she knew exactly what she was doing.
Oh, Darcy. You and your hat. I am pretty sure he brought the tie and hat and stuck it in his desk drawer the day he found out Lizzie was in his office JUST for that moment. Lawd.