IceonFire7

Well, we had mentioned doing a chat about Charlie's brand and Bass's thoughts on it. But we never really decided, so I wasn't sure what we were doing exactly...sorry, focusing isn't at a premium for me right now. I hate winter...if only for the cold and flu season.

mlreeve1

No worries Ice unfortunately I know where you're coming from I have been fighting sinus infection for about two weeks now, and it's really starting to get old.

ILuvMyThesaurus

Glad I didn't drive anyone away.

Don't worry about it Icicle. Just feel better! We could wait and do the brand discussion until next week if that would work better for everyone. I'm having fun just discussing whatever tonight.

Did we lose Lemon?

I have no idea what 'Name that Thing' is...living overseas for years really cuts a person off from pop-culture. I'm obviously back in the US now, but I'm still so behind. There are so many actors/shows/movies I'm completely clueless about. I also don't really watch TV anymore other than the BBC international news. I'm quite boring these days. I don't trust TV shows or networks anymore. What shows are you all enjoying? Perhaps I'll tune into some on Netflix when they've had five or 6 seasons.

I'm a bit like Lemon in that I write/work on numerous stories at once. However, that's where the similarities end, as she posts continuously and quite promptly, whereas I sit and stare at my work and have issues with posting at all. Plus, I write a lot in RL and I get burned out on it.

I understand wanting to work on your original work, and I wish you luck with it! Just don't leave us and think of writing a one-shot once in awhile to spoil us with your talent.

Such a bummer about whynotitsfun, as she's amazing at Charloe and so creative. I really hope she takes your advice about AUs, but understand if she needs a break. She's written so much...just like Lemon. I'm in awe of how prolific Lemon and Whynot are...

Connor...still hate him. Some fics have done a really good job of making him interesting (far better than the show ever did, he really had no purpose), and likeable. That really shows your talent, as I just tend to ignore both Connor and Rachel in my fic. He just doesn't usually exist and Rachel is just conveniently gone (or dead).

LemonSupreme

I'm here, but just barely.

Heading to bed soon. Early day tomorrow and lunch with bosses. ugh

My writing will probably slow down for a couple months. The nature of my job has changed which will allow less free time. Oh well, I'll still be plugging away.

Hope you all have a good week.

IceonFire7

Yeah, wildirish, as long as you stay with us in the fandom. That's really the important part.

And yeah, I hope whynot will consider it. I feel like I always have future Charloe fanfic ideas in my head. I'm just not as fast at writing as Lemon is.

Here's my thoughts on Connor...I didn't like even the idea of him the first time Emma ever opened her mouth and mentioned him. I kept hoping that since Bass was now a deposed leader and had no possible access to finding his son, that the entire storyline would drop.

I seriously think that is the reason that Miles had to know where he was. Cause that was the only way Bass could ever find Connor. Because there is no other reason for the f-ed up storyline (excuse is more like it) where Miles found out about Connor and sent him away...nothing about that makes sense and the timeline of it makes it even more confusing and stupid. Bad writing....grumble, grumble...

ILuvMyThesaurus

OMG Icicle, don't even get me started on Connor's existence. It's completely nonsensical! The only way I would have been okay with the storyline, is if Bass had been unable to find any leads on his kid until the end of the show. It could have ended with him finding a new lead or actually finding his son, as a sort of reward for his redemption. The way the writers wrote it was just shoddy, awful writing, and it just crapped on the already shaky timeline. And as for Miles's part in it...WTF was Emma thinking sending her son off with the Butcher of Baltimore to Mexico? Seriously? Beyond horrible.

Good night Lemon. Good luck with the lunch and also with the party.

More bad news...Lemon's slowing down her writing! Just as long as you don't leave it completely. Charloe needs you!

BTW, I don't think I ever told you how wonderfully fitting and convenient your ending to 'Lies' was...just shoving Dead!Rachel down a well...LMAO! Seriously, the best...

wildirish

Lemon, good night! And good luck tomorrow. Another job change, huh? Good luck with it! And also with that upcoming un-RSVP'd birthday party.

Luv, I had no idea about "Name that Thing" until tonight. I only watched Kimmel because I knew Stephen Amell was going to be on. It's a game where celebrities compete where they have to come up with the name of whatever object is on display. Points for accuracy and such. Anyway, I slayed them both. Hehe.

And I promise I won't ever leave. Not only because I love Charloe but because I really treasure the really wonderful people I've come to know in the last year because of it.

It was mentioned last week and earlier tonight, so I wrote this up:

My thoughts on Charlie’s brand: I don’t want it to seem like I have any kind of insightful or revolutionary concept of the brand. But the brand fascinates me for man of the same reasons it irritates me because it’s a clear example of lazy and we’ll-miss-every-opportunity-imaginable-to-tell-a-good-story-so-we-can-give-you-more-crap-about-Nano-tech-that-we-honestly-have-no-idea-where-we-are-going-with-it.

The brand is a tangible plot piece; the Nano is not. This is where I think Revolution really floundered, when it drifted far, far off into the sci-fi (without, again, a clear plan as to what they were going to do with it). I like fanfic writers (and writers in general) who construct plots and stories and then execute them. Well I especially love that level of detail in the showrunners of my favorite TV shows. They spent all that time building up the Nano into this unconquerable entity (another huge misstep, but that’s for another time) and it seemed to shift more and more as the show went on. It felt like they were just throwing things at the wall and seeing what would stick. Therefore the Nano plot always bored me (though I adored Aaron) and continues to frustrate me (though I do love its use in the current trend of time travel stories because they have thus far proven to be so good. Thank you Lost, missdee, and Ice’s “Dreams” *was* great once-upon-an-update. Sorry, Ice, I just couldn’t resist needling you. It’s only cause I love ya.)

Yes, I love Charloe. Yes I think the writers were stupid for not exploring their obvious chemistry that clearly would translate well into romantic tension as there was clearly sexual tension between them. However, even if Charloe had been kept platonic (don’t run Lemon!), they could have still explored and used the chemistry between them. One example of their failure to do so was in not showing us even a little bit of the weeks alone (that Miles mentioned in the finale) they spent alone together road-tripping to Willoughby. We had that great climatic shot of them riding side-by-side together on the wagon, this most unlikely duo in the history of ever. And then next we are in Willoughby and it’s all about what Whah-Whah wants coupled with crazy insertions of useless Nanocrap. Snore and I’m bored.

Essentially, Revolution forgot that its story was about humans who were adapting to this new-old way of life and how even though the world changes people stay the same. The things that matter to us remain the same: love and family and all of the myriad complications that come with both. This was a bildungsroman of a girl on a quest to save the only family she had left and in the process discovered she had more family than she gave herself credit for; she also discovered she was stronger and capable of being more than just a fanciful dreamer. Charlie Matheson got lost in her own story and that bugs me for a variety of reasons and in a variety of ways and will until the day I’m pushing up daises (also another topic for another time). The truth is that two of the biggest key elements of Charlie’s story were her discovering her relationship with Miles; also, how the decisions that a strange man, Sebastian Monroe, kept influencing her life.

But before all that uselessness began in Season 2, we had great moments where we saw glimmers of redemption underneath Monroe’s rusty façade. He had been undone in the season 1 finale; he was scrapping the bottom of the barrel after living high on the hog of power (and in the quest for more of it, literally and figuratively) and now he was face-to-face with a girl whose life he had a hand in destroying. I do not subscribe to the idea that all of the blame for the despair in Charlie’s life falls at Bass’ feet. I thoroughly believe Miles, Rachel, Ben and Danny (he did decide to soldier up when he clearly was no fighter) all hold a certain amount of culpability. Not to mention Tom Neville. But I don’t wipe Bass’ slate clean either. Just because I love the character doesn’t mean that my eye glasses have suddenly tinted a rosy shade of red.

The brand was a tangible reminder of the damage that Monroe’s madness inflicted on Charlie’s life. It was a testament to the courage that a young, small town girl showed in marching to her enemy’s front door to face him head-on in defense of her brother and how that fortitude played a hand in demolishing a madman’s dictatorship.

The fact that the show never once addressed the brand between Charlie and Monroe irked me. There’s no excuse for why he could have missed it. He carried her from a bar and took care of her for twenty-four hours, not to mention all the time he had riding shotgun next to her. The brand was noticeable. Charlie never kept it hidden. Monroe’s own “brand” (his burned off tattoo) was concealed; however, it was not done by the band of cloth that was wrapped around his wrist during much of season 2. I have another theory about what that was for.

I said earlier that Miles and Bass both played vital roles in the progression of Charlie’s coming-of-age story. I mentioned that Bass’ decisions had a kind of butterfly effect on her life. He moved one chess piece and something in Charlie’s life reacted in kind. There is an irony in this because Charlie’s story is a story of loss and rediscovery. But at the start of season 2, she is very parallel to who she was in season 1 in that she was also without family once again. Her mother having driven her away from Willoughby (who can blame her), but in the process has also separated her from Miles, Charlie’s truest link to family. Bass is a story of loss too, and what season 2 should have been was the story of his rediscovering who he was before everything went to hell. So at the start of season 2, when Charlie and Bass come across each other, there was a really growth and change in that relationship that played out in the first nine episodes that showed honest to God true potential growth for the characters (and I don’t mean the implication of a romantic Charloe).

If Miles stayed on his path of being absorbed with Rachel, but the writers hadn’t screwed up Charloe by driving Bass away and into Connor’s corner, there could have been great, compelling stories told about how those two ended up working together and coming to a truce, maybe even bonding eventually, as they worked together alongside a blindsided Miles. Or, maybe Miles doesn’t turn a blind eye to Rachel’s bad influence and the writers don’t screw up Charloe, we could have had equally great stories of watching these very broken people learning how to rebuild themselves up—saving themselves and each other—as they save the country from the Patriots. An external war mirrored by their internal ones.

Bass has some sort of link to Charlie from the beginning (that unwavering stare while Strausser held her a gunpoint is another topic). Then of course there is the fact that he honed in on her to save her life in the tower. The man was despicable and there is no reason why he didn’t just promise to Rachel to save Charlie if she got them out of the room in the tower and lied. He could have gotten out and then just focused on saving his own ass first. But he didn’t. He went and saved Charlie.

Then when Charlie attacks him in episode 2.02, Bass hits her once just to get away from her. But he could have killed her or done actual damage to her but he doesn’t. He also saves her life. Clearly this is a man making inroads toward redemption and Charlie seems to be the key. The irony is that Charlie is also linked to the very things that ruined him (not excluding his own poor choices): Her parents created the devices that turned off the power. It is safe to assume that if Shelley had been pregnant with all the modern medicine tools available that she would still be alive because doctors could have known there was an impending problem and done surgery. Then there is her Uncle Miles, who started them down the path of dolling out justice and being the voices of power (despite the season 2 rewrite of that particular piece of history) and then abandoned him when Bass became too consumed by the darkness inside of him. Charlie saved Miles. I truly believe that season 2 was to be how Charlie could inspire Bass’ own deliverance, albeit differently than her bond with Miles.

Anyway, the fact that the show never once explored the brand and what learning the truth about it could mean to Bass drove me nuts. It probably always will. I think the more he came to know Charlie and care about her (let’s not forget the way he wanted to—and ultimately did—protect her from Neville at the end of the season) that the brand could have really weighed on him. It would be a constant reminder of all his failures, but also a kind of reminder to do better. To be better.

Anyway, I’m very tired and I don’t know if any of this made a lick of sense but I tried. And did I miss the post about next week's assignment(s)?

IceonFire7

Irish, close your eyes...I'm gonna talk timeline.

The timeline is the thing that pisses me off the most...if he was 25, which Miles guesstimates on, in S2...and we are now 16 years after the Blackout...he was what 9 at the time of the Blackout...and we know Bass isn't a bad guy at the beginning of the Blackout...and it was three years later that he lost Shelly, so Connor is already 12...and even then, Miles is still buddies with Bass. No hiding kids at this point.

Plus, there is no way Emma would have found a way to contact them until they became the leaders of the country cause she couldn't have found them. So that's at least 5 years after the Blackout...so now Connor is 14, a little less likely for him to have to be hidden away and not quite the little kid they made him out to be when he went down to Mexico.

And Miles wasn't exactly thinking Bass was out of it when he was going around as the Butcher of Baltimore, was he? So we were led to believe that Bass had one act that finally pushed Miles away from him...5 years before Revo begins...but before that...makes no sense for Miles to be hiding his best friend's kid away from him. None at all.

I accept my lumps for the slow update....but the Nano didn't cause my Bass to go back in time...there...that's all I'm telling you...

And yes, I'm sorry. I posted the new story list several posts back...I'm sorry, Irish.

wildirish

Dear God, don't even get me going on timelines and whatnot. Especially before bed. Which is where I'm off to now, ladies. Amell is off Kimmel and I need to be up in a few hours. I will, however, check back later today to see anybody's comments I missed and reply back. Also to check for the stories for next week's reading list.

And no lumps about the update. I am not a pot calling the kettle if you get my drift. I was just joshing because well I can read faster than I update. But now that you've said that you HAVE to update and 'splain. Everything. Pronto. (And then don't forget Devo, where I'm still dying for that Charloe conversation...'cuz she catches up with Bass right?!!)

mlreeve1

Going to say goodnight while I can my internet keeps kicking me off hopefully I will have better luck next week. I will try and get back on tomorrow to catch up on everyones posts.

Hope you all have a good night.

IceonFire7

Good night, Lemon, Michelle, and Irish...well, Thessie, just you and me again.

Although, I'm not sure how much longer I'm gonna be able to hold on here. I can't actually breath through my nose, so I've become a mouth-breather And just in general head clogging makes me all fuzzy. May have to take some Nyquil and hit the hay.

ILuvMyThesaurus

*stares dumbly at Irish's post, in complete and utter awe*

There's really nothing for me to add...just wow Irish! The only tidbit perhaps is the dichotomy of Bass being conflicted about the brand, which I would think to be natural for him, fighting his shame, but also his grasping/needy nature.

Tossing Connor into the story really served no purpose and just screwed a lot of things up for no reason, as he had little actionable impact on the show. It was just an awful writer insertion, that really served no purpose. He also got in the way of Bass's redemption and eliminated room for further Charloe scenes, platonic or otherwise.

Your post was just beautiful! Good night Irish...


Good night Michelle -- sorry about the internet issues! See you next week...


Definitely looking forward to your updates Icicle!

You have summed up everything about the madness of the timeline. I honestly think the writers shifted things around and rewrote so much of the show on whims of fancy, not paying attention to simple things like COMMON SENSE at all.

The entire story of sending Connor to Mexico is utterly nonsensical. It makes no sense for Emma to contact the man she cheated on (and who was then known as the Butcher of Baltimore) to hide her one-night-stand kid from the crazy baby daddy when neither of the men even knew the kid existed. How would she even get a letter through to General Matheson anyways? And neither Miles or Bass were models of morality and sane choices. Besides, wouldn't Bass have noticed Miles taking off for MONTHS and MONTHS on end to go get the kid and sneak him into Mexico and make his way back to Philly again? It's just so awful, hence why I pretty much ignore the Connor-crap, as it makes so little sense.

BTW, why is it never mentioned that Gene blames Rachel for her part in rendering the world back to the dark ages? As a doctor you would think he'd hate the way the world is. Also, does he blame her at all for his wife's death? She likely would not have died had it not been for the blackout. It's not solely Rachel's fault, but she had a hand in it and I found it odd that Gene never voiced even a hint of displeasure at what his daughter had helped create and unleash on the world.

Completely understandable if you want to go to bed Your Iciness! Just let me know when you want to go make a date with the Nyquil dreams.

IceonFire7

Yes, I think Gene just lets his daughter off the hook, cause like the rest of the Porter family, he has a way of seeing what he wants to see when he wants to see it.

And yes, sending Connor to Mexico (when he's already at least 14) with the Butcher of Baltimore, who I didn't think had anything against Bass and what he was doing with the militia at this time, is dumber than dumb.

First off, how about this...IF, and that's a big if, Miles or Bass come sniffing around Jasper for anything, lie about the kids age and say he's a year younger and that he was from a fling she had after they had both enlisted and were away. But back to the big if...it seemed Emma was no longer a blip on either of their radars, so why the hell would Miles or Bass even bother with looking her up...until she contacts Miles, they had NO clue that kid existed. So as a mother, she takes a chance with her ex-boyfriend, who is not the dad, to send her kid away to keep him safe...really? What if Miles had betrayed her to the militia and turned the kid over to Bass.

Actually, I would buy the Miles from that time turning that kid over to Bass WAAAYYYY before I'd ever see him hiding that kid away from him. I mean, he held Rachel prisoner for years! And she was the big love of his life, supposedly. So they want me to believe he'd protect Emma's kid and yet kidnap Rachel and not allow her to go home to her family?

Whatever...

BTW, I've been meaning to ask you...where exactly are you in the US? Just curious.

ILuvMyThesaurus

Very good way to summarize the Porters we saw on screen. Since we never got to see Grandma Porter, we can't really say anything about her. But Gene and Rachel really did have a way of overlooking their own hypocrisy, although Gene at least did try to make up for his mistakes to some extent, unlike Rachel, who seemed to be absolved of all wrong-doing.

It just doesn't make any sense and is rather mind-boggling. Emma was off both Miles and Bass's radar; they didn't even know if she was alive or not, so why would she go out of her way to not only tell the Butcher of Baltimore of her continued existence, but let him know exactly where she was, all about the affair with his best friend, and the resulting kid. Did she just assume he'd be oh so happy and wouldn't do anything to her for her betrayal? Because, that didn't work for Rachel all that well. That's a whole lot of trust for Emma to have without much of a plausible reason.

Miles seemed to have no problems with Bass until after he killed that rebel's family. So where in there did he sneak off and hide Connor because of Bass's craziness? If he waited until after the rebel's family was killed, okay, that would make sense on one hand, but by that point Connor would have been like 19 years old...WTF?! Anyway you slice it, the situation is just awful.

In the context of what he did to Rachel, it makes even less sense for Miles to keep Connor from Bass. Miles did terrible things to Rachel (and as I've said before, I find what he did much worse from the standpoint of the love that was between them than anything Bass did), all the while knowing she had a husband and children waiting for her return. That didn't stop him from hurting her and locking her up for years, showcasing his own lack of rational thinking, but we're supposed to accept that Miles went racing off to hide Bass's long-lost son from him...just cause?

Miles knew how important family was to Bass. If his best friend's sanity was slipping, it would make more sense for him to hear from Emma and convince her and Connor to come to Philly for their own safety AND to help give some stability and sense of family to a floundering Bass. But no, instead he hides a nearly grown up teenager away in Mexico, tortures his sister-in-law, and tries to shoot his best friend in the head.

Miles = Me dumb...me no use words...or brain.

Don't get me wrong, I do love Miles, but if you go by the writer's shoddy plot-holes and inept backstory and awful whitewashing rewrites, he really comes off as a crummy friend to Bass, a terrible lover to Rachel (not excusing what she did), and a crappy brother to Ben. Oh Miles...these writers really didn't do anyone any favors. Except perhaps Rachel. Ugh.

I'm currently in Minnesota...but who knows for how long, haha. Where are you located?

IceonFire7

I was just curious about which time zone you were in. I'm in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (so smack dab in the middle of the Monroe Republic )

Yeah, there were so many things wrong with the timeline...for so many different reasons. What I can't believe is that a group of professional writers could just let that slide like that. I get paid nothing and I can't stand it to not have something gel with something I wrote in an earlier chapter.

And yes, I feel that it was possible that family could have pulled Bass back from the brink. Although, I love my S2 bearded, beaten-down, redemption-seeking, anti-hero Bass, so I would have missed him if he'd gotten better, but still...

I wonder sometimes if Miles gets a pass because of Billy Burke and the wonderful things he did with that character. Maybe a lesser actor is in that part and I don't like Miles very much. But same with Bass. I know Lemon has mentioned would we be all for Charloe if a guy like Strausser had been playing Monroe. I say I doubt it, but at the same time, that chemistry may have not been there like that, so there would have been no call for it. And again, a lesser actor may not have been able to give Bass so many layers and make him more than just an evil dictator. Maybe he wouldn't have lived to the second season.

As it was, we have to take the characters with the actors we had, so that means Miles gets a bit of a pass, as does Bass because they were fleshed out so well by the men portraying them. Sometimes, I think the actors did a better job developing those characters than the writers ever did with them.

Well, Thessie, I could talk to you about this all night, but I'm really losing steam here. I feel like crap and I need to get to bed. I came home from work and napped until right before book club started. Luckily, I'm off tomorrow, so I'm going to get in some serious sleep, and then do my best to work on all those updates I owe.

If you post any other thoughts, I'll pop back in and read them tomorrow afternoon and respond. I really hope your week goes better and that all is clear with your sister to get out of the hospital. Talk to you real soon.