February 2023

S M T W T F S
   12 34
567891011
12131415161718
19202122232425
262728    

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags
Thursday, February 7th, 2013 10:16 pm
Le sigh.

[livejournal.com profile] brokenrecord_ pretty much laid out my feeling on this episode here and I think tumblr has pretty well covered what’s not working about this section of the narrative. Speaking personally, I am not traught with any of the choices being made

but I feel like the format (five minutes twice a week, resolution to come in 2-4 weeks) and the secondary narratives (for my own enjoyment, I’m avoiding the secondary videos and twitter feeds) deeply acerbates what’s not working. If I could (and fandom could) power through these episodes in a half an hour and move on to Lizzie and Darcy's faces once more interacting... I mean, it wouldn't make these choices good, but there could be less attention paid to them. Additionally, I’m starting to question if the writers are directly responding to viewers in the videos or they’d always planned to have, for example, Jane explicitly stating that Wickham is responsible for all his actions, not Lizzie.

Speaking of, Jane telling it like it is was the only good part of this week’s episodes.

The rest was not awesome. The problem with a sex tape is that while it matches the sexual aspects of book!Lydia’s running off with Wickham, it really, really doesn’t match the way that book!Lydia’s actions effected the rest of the Bennets. Basically, the sex tape has NOTHING to do with Mr. Bennet or Lizzie or Jane. It hurts Lydia. An embarrassing sibling just doesn’t have the same social/economic consequences in modern times. I feel like a drug over dose, a criminal charge, or a gambling debt, would have been VASTLY superior choices because all of those options would have been both a.) personally devastating to Lydia and b.) hugely effect the rest of the Bennets. Imagine if Lizzie had to take out another loan to finish grad school or even take a personal loan to help pay for the consequences of Lydia’s actions. Or if there had been a more pressing reason for Jane to need to be back at the Bennet’s house. (Callous that I am, part of me was going, ‘Jane, you can’t do anything at home – don’t lose your job!’)

Sidenote: While I understand there was probably extra-textual reasons for why Lizzie isn’t filming in her bedroom, textually, I was boggled by the cruelty of Mrs. Bennet redoing Lizzie’s room while she was house-sitting out of town. Ouch.

I’m really glad I’m most invested in the Lizzie/Darcy stuff, which is the thing that has been done the best in recent episodes.



In a change of tone, I do want to recommend two LBD fanworks:

In Our Own Pretty Ways in which Gigi and Lydia exchange music and don't talk about things (with bonus fanmix!) and this fanvid:

Sunday, February 10th, 2013 10:24 am (UTC)
That said, it has been phenomenally weak. Jane coming home and losing her job? Totally unnecessary. The stuff they're putting on the internet these days? Problematic! Textually confusing!

Yep. I wish they'd drop all the secondary narratives and just focus on doing Lizzie's vlogs RIGHT.

This adaptation has been including almost all the Lizzie/Darcy stuff, so I'm kind of looking forward to several more Darcy/Lizzie videos (since in the book - and I forgot about this - there are a few good chapters of them just being googly eyed in their own way before they get married).

THAT WOULD BE SO AWESOME. Ugh, I just want to watch Lizzie and Darcy be amazing together.