How did you feel about Season 9?

[Onion Terror]

(19-11-2010 11:15 AM)Belle Wrote:  When Lucas was released he told Harry something in the line of: if you are surrounded by people who don't trust you, you aren't home. So maybe he never trusted himself, hence the impersonal flat(s), the clingy need to feel cared about, to feel trusted. He needed other people to trust him because he could not trust himself, he didn't know who he was and it's hard to trust a stranger. I wonder, if his ex wouldn't have difforced him or if he encountered someone who really loved him, he would have been able to eventualy love himself, because I feel like all the selfsacrifice we saw in s7 & 8 was a tool to feel needed, to prove to his colleagues he could be trusted, to prove to himself he was worth it, hell, just to feel (alive)! When people are traumatised they sometimes do the weirdest things to feel something, maybe they cut themselves, maybe they withdraw from real life, maybe they become someone really different.
But said all that, that doesn't explain to me why someone who spend 8 years in prison for his country and to protect his fellow officers, carrying all the trauma on his shoulders, would suddenly be as selfish as they portrayed John.
I mean when he was first imprisoned, he was 'Lucas' for 6 years or so, surely you don't forget in 6 years who you really are (John) and therefore it's hard to believe that 'John' would spend all that time in captivaty to protect others. The story just doesn't work for me in that way.
John would never sacrifice all that time of his life 'for queen and country', but Lucas did!
I could believe that Lucas finally cracked under all the bad he went through and no one would argue with the fact that eventually he would take his own life, but the whole 'John' thing just doesn't add up!
Am I making sense?

Without wishing to sound like a teacher marking someones work, this is a really good point well made, Belle. I completely agree. Yes, you are making sense!

[Belle]

Thanks to HellsBells and Onion Terror for commenting! It means a lot to me that I can share my points of view with you all on this forum!

[bruwitch2]

the best of s9 : the beautiful and wonderful Lucas/RA

[Belle]

(20-11-2010 12:47 PM)bruwitch2 Wrote:  the best of s9 : the beautiful and wonderful Lucas/RA

I can only say YES to your statement!!!! RA = !

[BravoNine]

(20-11-2010 01:15 PM)Belle Wrote:  

(20-11-2010 12:47 PM)bruwitch2 Wrote:  the best of s9 : the beautiful and wonderful Lucas/RA

I can only say YES to your statement!!!! RA = !

Yes RA and his amazing acting =

[Kirayuki]

(18-11-2010 08:16 PM)binkie Wrote:  

(18-11-2010 12:03 AM)Kirayuki Wrote:  

(17-11-2010 11:12 PM)binkie Wrote:  History, I’m afraid. Even worse ... History of Ideas. Any questions about the manifestation of evolutionary theory in 19th-century visual culture, I’m the woman of the moment!!

You're not the only person here releasing their inner essay monster

Ha! I'm applying for History at university! (Not quite history of ideas but still).
I think liking History might be a common trait amongst people who pick apart absolutely everything.

Good luck with your application, Kirayuki. I heartily endorse your choice, obviously! Where are you hoping to go? You are quite right about History lending itself as an analytical tool to the service of those with restless interests. I’m convinced (though, admittedly, biased) that History is absolutely the humanities equivalent of Mathematics: the key to the resolution of the universe and its operation. If your favourite question is ‘Why?’, then you have made the right decision for your university career.

Haha. Biased or not i agree with you on that.
Thanks for your support!

__________________________________________

Best of series 9 for me = Ruth development and Lucas screaming in the car with the flashbacks. (That scene was outstandingly good film-making!)

[Belle]

(20-11-2010 01:20 PM)BravoNine Wrote:  Yes RA and his amazing acting =

Haha, your smiley is hilarious!!

(Seriously off topic here)

[binkie]

Okay. I have a new question concerning what has come to be known by all residents of the binkie household as the season-of-shame. Nevertheless, it is a genuine question, and I am genuinely interested to see how it might be addressed.

I have spent some time since the end of season 9 trying to make sense of a particular theme followed by the writers, and I simply cannot make it make sense on its own terms. Inside the principal theme of identity which formed such a major part of this season, there was a distinct sub-theme about - for want of a better word - suitability: how much of what you do is who you are? And how far does who you are render you suitable for what you do?

In ep1, Harry tells Beth that she was rejected from the Service on her initial application because of character flaws apparent at her interview. Her little-girl insistence in ep2 that she "didn't think [her mercenary background] would come up" indicates the Service was correct in its identification of these flaws. In ep4, Kai has it made plain to him that the work he knows he is doing on behalf of the Chinese Secret Service is, in fact, only part of the work he is doing for the Chinese Secret Service. Kai's aptitude for one type of secrecy renders him eminently suitable for another kind of secrecy, just not one to which he is consciously party. In ep7, we see confirmation that MI5 was correct in its repeated rejection of Mr Denny on the grounds of suitability. At the same time, we are shown that Ruth has reconciled herself to a version of the suitability she has, for some time, assumed to be something beyond her character. (A side note here: this reminded me of the moment in 2.5 when Ruth tells Tom she has realised she is "just [her] job, that without it she would "go completely to pieces" and that she is "happy with that". She has spent a long time trying to convince herself this is true, I think.) The Service was right about Mr Denny and, for different reasons, it was right about Ruth.

So what are we to make of the purpose of this sub-theme when it comes to John/Lucas? Presumably, the Service was right about Lucas - he passed all the background checks which did for Mr Denny. But John made it through the interview that undermined Beth's application. We must assume, for the sub-theme to make sense, that John would have been rejected outright if he had applied on his own account. We are presumably to conclude that this would have been another correct decision on the part of the Service. However, John has apparently spent 15 years as one of the best field officers Harry can recall, has endured and - more or less - survived eight years of brutal detention in a foreign country, and has kept London from the brink of destruction on several occasions. Whose, then, was the suitability? And why? And what is the point of the suitability sub-theme if it is not to reconcile the storyline with the narrative conceit that identity is what you make (of) it? Because if the purpose of this sub-theme was honestly intended to support the conclusion that Lucas didn't know he was John (his secret suitability test), it surely undermines itself. Or is that just me being a bit dim? Help me!!

[Belle]

Jeez, Binkie, this is a hard one!
I hope I understand your question right, if not excuse me and elaborate, please.
In the meantime, here are my thoughts.

I get what you mean on the suitability: 'quote'how much of what you do is who you are, and how far does what you are render you suitable for what you do. 'unquote'.
(I think it's pretty amazing that you compute these great insights just by looking at a series!)

As far of what I think about it: No, you are not dim at all, the whole storyline just does not add up!
You are right when you question who's suitability it was that got John/Lucas through the years of hardship in Russia, who it was that got through the tests and who kept London safe.
I fear the answer to these questions is that there is no right answer, just because none of it makes sense!

It starts already messed up at the begining of this story.
If we are ment to believe that Lucas passed the background checks and John got through the interview(s), than we must assume that John took the whole identity of Lucas over: his maners, his way of speaking, his way of living, etc... but that must mean that
a) John would be a master impersonator to fool everyone at the Service(there must be a lot of psycological tests, i think, not so easy to be someone else), or,
b) the Service is crap! (I know Harry told the HS that he(John) was a natural, but, c'mon, how silly do they take us to be! To fool a whole secret service agency!?)
So, whose suitability got him in the service? I have no idea what so ever.

The time spend in prison is the next thing that doesn't make sense, i said elsewere that John would NEVER give up 8 years of his life, so it had to be Lucas in there.
Whose suitability played here? I think Lucas'.
But that would be in conflict with the John story arc!
So, again, I do not know.

The same goes for saving London, John would never risk his life for strangers, so again, it had to be Lucas, but in conflict with the story again!
So suitability: Lucas for sure, but since Lucas does not really exists (according to the story)?????

Unless John/Lucas suffered from split personality disorder non of this makes sense, because they are are not the same person!
And we have no reason to assume that he was suffering from it.

Identity IS what you make of it, i firmly believe that you are what you do.
I don't really think the sub-theme had a purpose, maybe in Harry and Ruth's story(Harry becoming softer and in doubt of his abbilities and Ruth hardening up but also in doubt), but certainly not in Lucas' case, because the 'Lucas didn't know he really was John' makes no sense at all. They are two different people who the writers melted together to get their story. And we all know how we feel about that!

Hope I'm not the dim one now!

[Kirayuki]

I think in answer to the question you posed, it would be Lucas' suitability that got him into the service. John was not suitable.

This works out so much more simply if you look at the character split of Lucas and John in the light that I do.

When John decided to become Lucas North, he 'became' Lucas North. John Bateman failed to exist anymore. He only returned to existence later in series 9 and we all saw how un-suitable for the job he was. It is perfectly possible for the human mind to adapt in such a way that he would forget all about John Bateman. (Possibly from trauma of what he had done).
Someone such as Vaughn, who was a skilled manipulator before the whole identity crisis came about, would find it easy to become a trigger to remembering what the mind had shut off. Vaughn was also a key figure in the events that made John become Lucas. If he wasn't around in his life for over 15 years, then it would be like removing an important factor and bending your beliefs so that you forgot it existed altogether. The re-appearance of him would metaphorically smack you in the face and shout 'wake up!' in that case.

I know that's probably bending the question a little but i had to at least try to explain the way i view it before answering it fully. Sorry if it makes little sense.

So back to the suitability sub-plot and putting how i see it simply as i can to save space and time...

- Lucas was suitable for the job.
- The old (Uni student) John may have been suitable.
- New 'Lucas' was suitable for the job.
- New (post murder/post new 'Lucas') John was not.

If you want me to try and clarify or expand on my view more please feel free to poke me and i shall attempt to do so.