Now, don’t get me wrong there’s a lot of trivial differences and deep similarities between Soc’s and Greasers … but I’m thinking of clothing again. It’s largely their style, how they wear it and what they can afford that divides them. As nothing will exactly keep a soc from wearing jeans and a shirt if need be but it’d be different- it’d be clean, there wouldn’t be holes etc. Where as to a greaser dressing like a soc they both can’t afford and wouldn’t be caught dead as it doesn’t appeal to them.
For example this is Madras:
This is flannel:
On its surface it takes a moment to notice the difference but it’s striking. Greasers are blue collar - they’re working. They’ll have your heavy, flexible and made to last in a physical job style shirts. They’ll also tend to have the snap together style buttons as opposed to the but through the hole… if someone knows like button terminology that’d be great.
Madras is also well made, but more breathable, typically short sleeve and expensive. It’s plaid yes but a different type, also styled differently. Worn more to a boat or socially(ahaha) — short sleeve or button down — which is still different than a work flannel. I’ve seen it referred to as “the surfer shirt” too if that gives you any further class indication.
The differences in plaid pattern become more apparent when you know what to look for, madras seem to be much larger and more spread out? Or you’ll notice nicer but far less durable material etc.
—
Honestly this did surprise me as for some reason I thought Madras was another brand name (it might be) instead of a style of shirt, I was thinking like Lacoste or vineyard vines or Polo— which they’d still wear as Soc -> Prep.
It’s so interesting as it can also further show how similar … how at the end of the day both groups are a bunch of teenagers but also their divide- the money, the attitudes. As there is something to be said that they look so similar but there is also some clear key differences— if this wasn’t a quick post off the top of my head perhaps I’d make a better examination but this was more on their literal clothes lol.
So looking at the musical costumes, Soc’s are in madras! I believe? Someone more familiar fact check me.
On Gideon and Archetypes, As Seen Through Lenses of 16th Century Theater and A TTRPG.
Hi, it’s me, I aten’t dead yet. Nor have I even given up all hope of regaining the ability to relatively easily engage in the writing of fiction! But I am out of practice, and an attempt to accommodate for that is why I sat down two days ago and worked out a TTRPG character sheet for Gideon Gleeful based on Pulp Cthulhu, and that’s also why I now know a bit about commedia dell’arte and want to expand on thoughts I’ve expressed previously about archetypal characters and storytelling.
Although the characters in Gravity Falls have enough potential depth to write books about [1], I concluded several years ago that one of the things that makes the franchise successful is its ability to write in ‘bold strokes.’ When Mr. Hirsch planned an episode, he knew what he was saying and just said it, without any effort to provide nuanced counter-arguments or even nuanced initial arguments. Mr. Hirsch did not give two flips about the extended implications of things; he told the stories he wanted to tell and occasionally seems a bit baffled that some of us are so adept at drawing so many other things out of them. Part of the charm of GF is in the way these complicated characters navigate through classic film-school story arcs – how the characters serve in archetypal roles (the Weirdmageddon trilogy essentially puts Dipper through the steps of the Hero’s Journey pretty close to in order and on 5x speed) while not coming across as generic themselves. That’s where my experiment from the other day comes in.
So, Gideon and Call of Cthulhu. I’ll leave it to the reader to decide how intuitive that pairing seems, but the first step in hero creation in the Pulp Cthulhu rulebook is picking a pulp archetype for your player character. Since I was working with an established character, I ended up doing this rather backward – instead of building a character around an archetype, I was looking for an archetype that fit a character. This renders everything that followed definitely academically invalid, but I ended up debating between two archetypes: the femme fatale and the harlequin.
The femme fatale is described in the rulebook as
“a deadly woman or man whose outward beauty usually masks a self-centered approach to life; one who is ever vigilant. By constructing an alluring and glamorous persona the femme fatale is akin to a spider. She draws others to her web in order to possess what she desires or destroy her target. Brave and cunning, the femme fatale is not shy of getting her hands dirty and is a capable foe. Neither is she foolhardy, and she will wait until her web is constructed before dealing out a sudden and well-timed assault (be it mental or physical). A classic pulp archetype, the femme fatale could as easily be termed homme fatale if so desired.
Core characteristic: choose either [appearance] or [intelligence]. Add 100 bonus points divided among any of the following skills: Art/Craft (Acting), Appraise, Charm, Disguise, Drive Auto, Fast Talk, Fighting (Brawl), Firearms (Handgun), Listen, Psychology, Sleight of Hand, Stealth. Suggested occupations: Actor, Agency Detective, Author, Cat Burglar, Confidence Trickster, Dilettante, Elected Official, Entertainer, Federal Agent, Gangster, Gun Moll, Hit Man, Hooker, Investigative Journalist, Musician, Nurse, Private Investigator, Reporter, Spy, Zealot. Talents: any two (Smooth Talker recommended). Suggested traits: alluring, glamorous, wicked, deceitful, cunning, focused, fraudulent” (Mason et al, 18-19).
Quite a lot of this stacks excellently with Gideon; he even, to one extent or another, engages in a surprising number of the suggested occupations simultaneously, especially in season one, where he acts as part of his role as an Entertainer, is a confidence trickster, and attempts to be a cat burglar at least once. To put a cherry on top, he even tries, indirectly, to become an elected official in Season Two. He also arguably is a gangster of sorts at the end of the series, both as the leader of a prison gang and as a collaborator with Bill. As for the traits – he attempts to be a sort of folksy-glamorous, at least, and is close enough to at least temporarily draw Mabel in; he’s unambiguously wicked, deceitful, and fraudulent for the vast majority of his time on screen; he is cunning enough to occasionally get the better of Stan; and he is definitely focused on his goals: acquiring the Mystery Shack, acquiring the remaining Journals, and acquiring Mabel’s affections. I suppose one could even argue that he Drives Auto, if we count the Gideon-Bot.
Nevertheless, the image doesn’t fit him perfectly. Perhaps it’s merely a function of his age, but he isn’t especially subtle: he lures Dipper into a trap once in his first appearance, but his total lack of subtlety with regards to his crush on Mabel ultimately backfires on him, and he makes no effort at all to engage in subtle or sophisticated manipulations with his parents. He perhaps comes closest to it in his dealings with Stan, but even then, his aims are always overt and he takes delight in Evil Gloating when he thinks he is close to success, and in the end, the methods that work best for him are dynamite, a mecha suit, and a prison gang of violent enforcers. Even more critical, however is how flat he falls in one area in particular: allure. People who don’t know what a nasty little piece of work he is can find him adorable, if they have a taste for the super-saccharine, but half of his story happens because he’s not alluring. He’s short, fat, has a piggish aspect due to his upturned nose, and wears a hairdo that would have been absurd in the seventies, never mind the 2010s. His wardrobe is partially attributable to the character he plays in the public eye, but we see from his playdate with Mabel in Season One and the rhinestones all over his suit in Season Two that he genuinely does seem to like looks that remind me of a famous Dolly Parton quote – “it takes a lot of time and money to look this cheap, honey.” Perhaps it is something along those lines, combined with his live shows taking place in what looks like a circus tent and the way his cover is blown before his roles in the series are resolved, that drew my attention also to a second archetype.
“While similar to the femme fatale, the harlequin does not like to get their hands dirty (if they can help it). Usually possessing a magnetic personality, although not necessarily classically beautiful, such types find enjoyment in manipulating others to do their bidding, and often hide their own agendas behind outright lies or subtle deceptions. Sometimes they are committed to a cause (personal or otherwise), or act like agents of chaos, delighting in watching how people react to the situations they construe” (Mason et al., 19).
Sounds more like Bill than Gideon at first glance, but bear with me here and look at some of the adjustments made for that character type in the game:
“Adjustments…[include] the following skills: Art/Craft (Acting), Charm, Climb, Disguise, Fast Talk, Jump, Language Other (any), Listen, Persuade, Psychology, Sleight of Hand, Stealth. Suggested occupations: Actor, Agency Detective, Artist, Bartender/Waitress, Confidence Trickster, Cult Leader, Dilettante, Elected Official, Entertainer, Gambler, Gentleman/Lady, Musician, Reporter, Secretary, Union Activist, Zealot…suggested traits: calculating, cunning, two-faced, manipulative, chaotic, wild, flamboyant” (ibid).
Several points that describe him well were already described in the paragraphs about the femme fatale: he’s a cunning, manipulative actor/entertainer, confidence trickster, and would-be (sort of) elected official. Here, though, we have the additional occupation of Cult Leader and traits of being calculating, two-faced, and flamboyant. His domination of the Discount Auto Warriors (who might not worship him as a prophet, but certainly follow him as devotedly as any cult leader could wish) indicates at least a degree of natural magnetism, despite his lack of conventional physical beauty. And, of course, although Pulp Cthulhu itself makes no mention of this, the word ‘harlequin’ has unavoidable associations with flamboyantly bad taste in clothes: the Fool in motley [2], the participant in the Carnival, the puppet in a Punch and Judy show, the Joker’s and/or Poison Ivy’s garishly-clad girlfriend.
The Harlequin is definitely a highly recognizable character, but it had never occurred to me to think of it as an archetypal one before I stumbled across this entry in the rulebook. That sent me off down the Google rabbit hole, searching for whether or not that’s an actual archetype outside of the game, and that’s where we come to commedia dell’arte, the early form of Italian theater which I mentioned back in the introduction. In the Encyclopedia Brittanica, Harlequin is described as
“one of the principal stock characters of the Italian commedia dell’arte; often a facile and witty gentleman’s valet and a capricious swain of the serving maid…in the early years of the commedia (mid-16th century), the Harlequin was a zanni (a wily and covetous comic servant).”
Britannica describes how the character developed a more respectable side as the three-century span during which the commedia occurred went on, but he is still noted as “amoral” even in later portrayals where he doesn’t hold grudges or seek revenge the way early Harlequins would. The article on commedia dell’arte itself also adds additional nuance, noting that the zanni “had already been differentiated as comic rustic and witty fool.” The character generally fits Stan better than Gideon, right down to using a bat as a weapon, but Gideon’s “folksiness” is played up from the beginning; we know from “Blendin’s Game” that Gideon was born in Oregon, but he and his father sound more like McGucket than they do like other townspeople, which both potentially uses viewer bias, both in-universe and out, to aid in him being 'cast' in certain 'roles' and which adds a hint of the Other to him, in keeping with the early reveal that he is a villain [3]. Gideon leans into looking even more rural than he is (which, as a resident of a place like Gravity Falls, is already pretty darn rural) and uses this to disarm his audiences, partially through seeming more naïve than he is and also occasionally through light deliberate comedy. Sources admittedly less scholarly than the Encyclopedia Britannica [4] also cast Harlequin in a somewhat different light:
“while most clowns live for the pleasure of seeing others laugh, Italy’s harlequin has a slightly more sinister side. Originally created as a stage character as part of the late 16th century’s commedia dell’arte, the nimble harlequin has gone on to become a modern archetype – the cunning clown…while employed as a servant, harlequin is often seen plotting against his master and undermining him to comic effect. The character has a long-standing rivalry with Pierrot, the melancholy clown, as they both court the love of Colombina.”
The idea of a long-standing rivalry with the sad clown cannot fail to make any Gravity Falls fan think of Gideon’s long grudge match with Stan, who he also clashes with over a girl, albeit not in a romantic sense: after “The Hand That Rocks the Mabel,” Gideon seems to see Mabel’s affection as something which can only either belong to her family members (Stan and Dipper) or to him, and he raves in occasionally unhinged fashion about how they turned Mabel against him.
Photographer Steven Townshend also created a series of pictures of a harlequin figure as part of his work as a fine art photographer, and he writes about how he conflated the roles of the Fool, the Clown, and the Harlequin for the photos, although “they are distinct things…both wear what we often think of as jester’s motley, though Harlequin’s origins are more shadowy and diabolic.” This article goes on to cite Wikipedia’s assertion that the harlequin figure originated partially in French passion plays as a “masked, club-wielding giant…depicted as a black-faced emissary of the devil, roaming the countryside with a group of demons chasing the damned souls of evil people to Hell. The physical appearance of Hellequin offers an explanation for the traditional colors of Harlequin’s red-and-black mask.” Townshend then resumes writing, noting that the passage
“serves to somewhat justify what seems to be a widespread fear of clowns beyond the terrors of Stephen King’s novel It. The idea that the character of Harlequin came from an encounter with black-and-red demons – and that theses are the colors of Harlequin[5] – contextualizes that fear. It also invites some deeper thought into devilish trickster/fool characters like DC Comics’ Harley Quinn (who was originally depicted in black and red) and the psychotic clown Joker.”
Mr. Townshend’s conclusions suffer from issues other than being backed only by Wikipedia; he overlooks here, for instance, the role of the uncanny valley phenomenon in coulrophobia, where the revulsion and sense of unease are created by how a clown in full regalia and make-up looks only almost human. This is more likely to have inspired King to write It than It is to have inspired an uneasiness in people about clowns. Mr. Townshend’s biography asserts that he has “a background in theater, written narrative, and award-winning game design” and that he toured the United States and Canada as a Shakespeare actor when he was younger, but does not refer to any specific credentials he might have, much less credentials which would qualify him as an authority on commedia dell’arte. The Tuscan cigars have even fewer credentials, as no name is attached to the piece of text I selected for inclusion here, and both of these sources run counter to the Britannica’s much ‘softer’ depiction of the Harlequin character. They do, however, fit well enough with Pulp Cthulhu’s Harlequin archetype, and provide interesting lenses to look at Gideon through, because they both emphasize the character’s role as an untrustworthy servant motivated by self-interest. Gideon wishes to dominate (perhaps one reason why he might have had the idea for an enormous, mobile, weaponizable statue of himself on gigantic scale) as a rule, and is enough of a leader that his (admittedly…quirky) gang members fall in behind him without question, but his role in the climax of the story hinges on how he has gone from attempting to command Bill (“Dreamscaperers”) to attempting to partner with Bill (end of “Stanchurian Candidate”) to outright acting as Bill’s servant during Weirdmageddon and then turning against his master once he is convinced that doing so will get him at least closer to a goal he finally seems to accept he will never fully achieve, at least not while alive.
Why is any of this relevant? No reason, really, except that I started the exercise as an attempt to develop Gideon as a potential protagonist for a future work. That made it interesting to realize that his most lasting impact on the series occurred while he was instead cast in the role of the servant who turns against his master, with this move of his contributing significantly to both the elimination of a major threat (Bill) and dramatic changes in his own situation, when, after being pardoned and released from prison, he at least partially drops the mask of Lil’ Gideon, mini-televangelist and person constantly concerned more with how he is perceived than with what he really is, in favor of at least attempting to be a normal kid for a while [6]. This role is one he only momentarily engages in on screen [7], but it is the one thing he does in the entire series which isn’t undone by the end of the episode it happens in, which arguably makes it his true purpose/function in the story. This has interesting implications for trying to write him as a main character, since it implies I’m to some extent trying to stick an archetype into a situation where the structure that archetype relies on doesn’t exist, which must be either
not a viable plan, or
What would actually make the experiment interesting.
No idea which one it is at the moment, of course. I’m also very, very confident that Mr. Hirsch did not do…whatever I just constructed on purpose; Gideon’s not deliberately cast as or even inspired by an archetypal or stock Harlequin of any kind, likely including Harley Quinn, and I doubt it would have ever occurred to me to regard him that way if I had been building a conclusion from evidence instead of fitting evidence to a preestablished conclusion. Still, it was an amusing exercise; the document I typed this in took up six pages, including a couple of extra footnotes I cut from the final product here. Do with the results as you will.
Notes
[1] Maybe it’s not a proper book, but I’ll stand by the assertion that this thing is at least long and involved enough to call a monograph.
[2] An interesting basis for comparison could exist between him and Clopin, the harlequin-like character/narrator of the Disney animated film The Hunchback of Notre Dame, who puts on a dramatic, cheery circus act in public…and then continues the ‘magic show’, for the most part with full manic energy, even when exulting over how “the dead don’t talk/so you won’t be around to reveal what you found” during the pitch-black comedy that makes up most of the ‘Court of Miracles’ scene. With Clopin, however, the character gains some depth for reasons similar to GF’s own Stan: he’s committed to a mission (protecting the Court, his ‘family’ which may also include literal family), and he's a social underdog whose ruthlessness is at least in part an understandable response to the harsh conditions of the world he lives in (some of Chopin’s glee at the thought of executing Frollo’s henchmen is…at least understandable if one assumes he knows anything about what happens when Frollo lays hands on one of the Roma, which seems like a safe enough assumption, all things considered).
[3] Are rural Oregonians also stereotyped in part with a particular accent? Bud has been living in Gravity Falls for quite a while, long enough to have a reasonably prosperous business before Gideon was born, but everything about him and Gideon reads as strongly Southern-coded to me: in the end, before his momentary redemption, Gideon is practically a caricature of Boss Hogg. My default assumption is that Bud is a transplant to the region and that Gideon partially picked up the accent from his parents and partially exaggerated it to go with his show despite being a lifelong northerner himself. It is, however, worth noting that I’ve never yet had the opportunity to meet anyone from rural Oregon, so for all I know they do sound like that as well. Again, academic rigor is not being granted much ground in this one.
[4] The first description used after this comes from a website apparently about cigars from Tuscany (ftp.toscanocigars.com), and the second from an article apparently written by a photographer who specializes in old-fashioned-looking pictures (traveller.distantera.com/the-people-of-light-and-shadow-the-harlequin/)
[5] Notably, these are also Stan’s colors: although he has a surprising amount of variety in his wardrobe, his most common public appearance involves a red fez, a red tie, and a black suit,** and that’s aside from the incident allegedly taken out of context which involved Stan for some reason literally dressing up as a demon. Gideon, on the other hand, is mainly, at least in season one, associated with blue and white – colors historically associated less with demons than with the Virgin Mary, who falls at rather the opposite end of the moral spectrum. This may perhaps be a nod to the main alignments of the characters; Stan, who ends up as a heroic figure, is remarkably honest, for a career liar and identity thief, about what he’s like when he’s not actively on the clock, but Gideon usually only drops his ‘mask’ in the most private of settings, when he feels confident that behaving awfully will not have consequences for him and can be hidden from anyone whose opinion he actually cares about. Neither is exactly a moral exemplar, but Stan, who doesn’t try to look especially innocent even when it would be to his advantage, is ultimately a better person than the elaborately-self-presenting Gideon in the vast majority of the show, and arguably even after Gideon’s rushed last-act redemption.
**another interesting thing to consider here is how the adult Ford is also associated with the color red, both in his most frequent outfit and the covers of his distinctive journals. His first non-flashback appearance also has him dressed entirely in black, but he never mixes the two colors the way his brother does. If I had better sources, I might add a bit to the Essay and use this to support my assertion in chapter 2 that Ford’s friendship with Fiddleford in college may have involved Ford deliberately, to some extent, replacing himself with Fiddleford rather than replacing Stan with Fiddleford; since I don’t have better sources, though, and academic rigor is out to lunch on this one anyway, I’ll leave it here as merely a curiosity.
[6] Admittedly, a ‘normal kid’ who is still apparently in complete command of at least a couple of violent criminals who evidently have nothing better to do with their regained freedom than guard Gideon from bullies, but…it’s a start, anyway.
[7] Given the weirdness of Weirdmageddon and our only extremely vague understanding of how Gideon came to make a second deal with Bill, it’s impossible to say exactly how long Gideon actually acted as Bill’s vassal and even more impossible to ascertain how long that period of time might have seemed from Gideon’s point of view after the death of time and meaning, but unfortunately, the show didn’t have enough room at the end to really explore this subplot fully.
🦇🩸20 years of three cheers 🩸🦇 (OH MY GOD CLICK FOR QUALITY COMPRESSION OBLITERATED MY ART)
happy birthday to the best album ever! revenge is such a time and a place and i love it more every time i listen to it. cant even say how many hours ive spend just pondering the meaning and plot ironing out the details in my head, and i've still gotten basically nowhere! thats the hallmark of a GOOD fucking piece of media!
there isnt a single second of that forty or so minutes that doesnt go as hard as possible and doesnt go as ICONIC as possible. out of all albums, to me its very name and songs hold some sort of magic you can invoke just by reciting the titles and lyrics. Helena. I'm Not Okay. The Ghost of You. Thank You For The Venom. Cemetery Drive. I NEVER Told You What I Do For A Living. Perhaps it's because each word holds in it 20 years of connections and meanings and history. Every moment of it is so intense and real and deep and memorable. this album hits every emotion in the human spectrum and masterfully builds up tension and resolution and kicks you to the curb at the end, forcing you to just think about what you've heard.
this album has been there for me when no one else could and i understand fully that for the last 20 years it's been doing that for every goddamn person that listened to it.
ive only been into american rock band my chemical romance, and by extension three cheers for sweet revenge, for a year. a twentieth of its lifespan. i cant imagine how much more i will love it after two years, five, ten, how hyped i will be for 25 years of three cheers, for fifty, even seventy five. im legitimately so happy and excited to find out
so, yeah. three cheers to three cheers~
also as a bonus mcr5 could happen at any moment...TEHEE
Hii! I’m curious about your opinion re: one of the most controversial questions in this fandom, the Reverse Portal AU. What would have Ford, as we know him in canon, done if Stan went through the portal instead? Saved him or prioritized what he then considered a “greater good”? From the fanfics I’ve encountered, people definitely disagree on this, but they can be pretty biased. I’m personally of the opinion he would have saved Stan despite all his chiding about responsibility -- considering his decision to succumb to Bill’s blackmail and give him the universe in Weirdmaggedon, he’s a tiiiny bit hypocritical/contradictory in this regard (as well as in many others), hahah. I’d say it was pretty clear that he valued family above everything then, at least, but researcher!Ford... I am not 100% sure. To me there’s a difference between what Ford considers Danger with a Capital D™ (Bill Cipher) and what he didn’t even stop to consider was dangerous (Stan’s life in the streets). Stan going through the Portal That Made Fiddleford Crazy would fall into the former. Still, I don’t want to be seeing all of this through rose colored brotherhood glasses and it’s hard to get fully rid of my own bias. What do you, who wrote a huge wonderful canon analysis about him, think?
Hm, you know, I had never really thought about this! It is a tricky question, considering that the post-Portal version of Ford we know best can be considered a very different person from the pre-Portal Ford...except for all the ways in which they're exactly the same, of course. Thinking on it, though, there are some bits and bops I can use to speculate...Short answer, I think you're right that "there's a difference between what Ford considers Danger with a Capital D and what he didn't even stop to consider was dangerous" (a much more succinct summary than I could have made, lol) and that, despite their estrangement, Ford would have...at least wanted to rescue Stan. I also think that he would have at least been delayed by the need to get Fiddleford back on board, though. Considering Ford's tendency to assume the worst, it also seems quite plausible that Ford could quickly come to believe that rescuing Stan would be impossible, either due to Fiddleford's lack of cooperation with anything that involved opening the Portal back up to the Nightmare Realm or due to assuming/being convinced that Stan was dead. From either of those solutions, I reckon there's a number of ways things could go.
I’ll begin by addressing the counterargument. It's fair to point out that even when he wasn't in a distinctly grandiose frame of mind ("save the world or lose my life in the attempt"), Ford does have a tendency to lash out at Stan in a way that could be interpreted as suggesting that he values [whatever he's mad about] as more valuable than his brother. On the night of the science fair, Ford came into the living room looking like he was spoiling for a fight before Filbrick interrupted; on-screen, Ford and Stan come to blows three times, and on two of those occasions, Ford is the one who swings first. However, I think it's equally important to note that on both of those occasions, Ford's also the one who first realizes oh my God what am I doing? and tries to deescalate it again. In the 1981 flashbacks, he immediately backs off once he realizes Stan had gotten injured on the machinery, and when it looks like Stan might still want to fight, he keeps backing off for the rest of the scene despite the great big gaping, gravity-altering doorway to another reality being both turned on and right behind him. In 2012, he punches Stan on autopilot after going straight from a grenade-tossing and death ray-wielding and up-against-impossible-odds space battle to the ruins of the basement, but when Stan tries to escalate the conflict into an outright brawl like the one they had before, Ford is cross but relatively calm, and merely restrains him instead of indulging in further violence (I suppose his entry into the multiverse was a mistake he actually learned from and didn't care to risk any chance that he might repeat). So, to conclude the argument on this point - I don’t feel it’s really reasonable to assume that “Ford wanted to beat the tar out of Stan” in any way implies “Ford would have callously written off Portal Stan as a necessary sacrifice and then gone on his merry way.” One of Ford’s major flaws is a failure to accurately assess and deal with his own emotions and how they affect his relationships, and he’s pretty consistently shown to be far more sentimental about his attachments than he thinks he is. And even if he weren’t, well, good grief – even if he had genuinely hated Stan or considered him a totally worthless person, there would still be a long, long way between “I would like to beat this guy up” and “I am sufficiently jaded that I won’t feel a bit bad about it if my actions accidentally lead to Something Truly Horrible happening to this guy.” When we look at Stan and Ford specifically, we also have to factor in both that Ford had apparently (if the scattered references in the Journal are anything to go by) been thinking of Stan semi-fondly/at least ambivalently again for a while before he contacted him in the winter of ‘81, and what Ford’s mental state was at the time. He had very little life experience involving other people/outside of a laboratory and he seemed to be on the brink of an anxiety-and-sleep-deprivation-fueled psychotic break. He may have very well enjoyed lashing out at Stan in the moment, directing his bottomless pit of unpleasant emotions outward toward this Other who conveniently looked just like him instead of inward at himself, but I really do think he would have freaked out and felt incredibly guilty and upset had Stan actually gone through the Portal.***
Now, as for how he might have reacted instead of going on his merry way…in the possibly unlikely event anyone is still reading, then that’s where things get really interesting.
To begin on a gloomy note, I don’t think Ford could have launched an immediate rescue attempt for Portal Stan, no matter how much he wanted to. It’s made clear that he doesn’t understand everything about the Portal, and hinted that he actually understands even less than he thinks he does. When Ford writes in the Journal about the early stages of building the Portal, he makes it clear that, for whatever reason, he could not finish without Fiddleford, who understands the plans so well that he is able to suggest improvements and see the danger in them; when Ford writes in the Journal about the “Better World” dimension, he makes it clear that Parallel Ford was unable to achieve anything until he persuaded Parallel Fiddleford to come back. If AU Ford tried to retrieve Portal Stan, then he’d first have to persuade AU Fiddleford to help him, and it is extremely unlikely that AU Fiddleford would have allowed even a brief connection to the Nightmare Realm before he stabilized the Portal for good, even if Ford begged him on his knees to do so – not least because Fiddleford, having seen what was on the other side for himself, probably would assume that nobody who went through without a rope could possibly survive long. I suppose it’s possible that AU Fiddleford could at least outwardly convince AU Ford that he has to give up any hope of retrieving his brother in the service of the Greater Good – perhaps even that this is the universe’s punishment for being presumptuous and toying with Things Man Was Not Meant To Know – but I find it hard to imagine that Ford wouldn’t be severely haunted by this even in the best-case scenario. Worst-case scenario, that would have been the straw that broke the somewhat mentally unstable camel's back, with who knows what results.
However, there’s a number of other solutions besides "gave up, regardless of the reason or how he felt about it." One might be Ford going out into the multiverse at a later date, after Fiddleford somehow figured out how to make the Portal work without going through Bill’s domain, in search of his brother, in the slight hopes that Stan might have survived long enough to dimension-hop. Another might involve him staying in his home dimension, but secretly experimenting behind Fiddleford’s back in an attempt to figure out if Stan’s still alive – I say ‘experimenting’ because the original Portal was a doorway, essentially, but it seems to have exceeded that mandate when it found Ford for Stan over the course of Season 2A. It's possible that some of the “components held together with duct tape” that Ford mentions might represent Stan-made modifications of the design intended to make it do what Stan wanted it to do. If it was modified, that could also explain why its final activation was so much more violent and unstable than the other two times it was turned on. Gravity behaved anomalously when both Fiddleford and Ford went through the Portal, sure, but it seems to have only done so in extremely close proximity to the device. When Ford came back the other way, half the buildings in town seem to have been lifted clean off their foundations. Something about that third time was...different. Though, of course, it's always also possible that Stan just hoped Ford would have stayed in place for thirty years and thus did simply open the Portal back up - as for why it took so long, it's implied at one point that Stan had trouble getting his hands on enough toxic waste to adequately fuel the thing - and that Ford happening to be in the Nightmare Realm right then was either because of Fate or sheer dumb Pines luck.
I could go on further (about how Ford might half-convince himself he doesn't care at all, with this having zero impact on how he actually does, or how the 'tinkering behind Fiddleford's back' thing could lead into a script flip of "Not What He Seems," or...etc.) but it gets increasingly speculative/like I'm drawing up plans for a specific plot. Hopefully something in all this managed to answer the question to your satisfaction, Anon, and hopefully it was at least mildly entertaining even if it failed in its primary mission? Glad you enjoyed the canon analysis!
***Another important factor to consider in all this may well be that Ford and Stan both trained as boxers for a long time - possibly for as long seven or eight years, probably for five at a minimum. They both knew all about punching, both how to dish it and how to take it with minimal damage, and the photo in Stan’s car indicates they at least practiced together. I suspect (despite having never punched anyone, either in or out of a boxing ring) that punching someone in boxing gloves when everyone involved has consented to getting punched at some point is a lot different than punching someone in anger and with your bare hands, but "try to punch Stan in the head" is still something Ford probably did many times when they were younger, all without a hint of ill will existing on either side. Ford might therefore not necessarily think of ‘hit Stan’ as an action that would or even could seriously harm him, even if done in anger instead of as part of a recreational sport. Plus, while he was almost certainly using violence as an ineffective form of communication before the end of the 1981 fight, he started it when he was alarmed, not enraged, and he was shocked/horrified out of being angry the instant a factor other than just the two of them trying to pummel the stupid out of each other directly got involved. It's certainly worth noting that Stan, at least, didn't seem to take "Ford punched me in the face before I could say hello properly" or "I then tried to hit back because I was annoyed about that punching/lack of gratitude business" as indicators that the situation was beyond salvaging; he only seems to have given up on any hope of reconciliation at the very end of ATOTS, after Ford first talked civilly with him, then made a joke with him, and then calmly announced that he was basically going to take his toys and go play alone in the basement until Stan went away. Years earlier, after the science fair, Stan also seemed to initially shrug off how Ford had blown up at him and to have assumed that he could smooth things over at first; it's Ford's silent, seemingly more miserable and conflicted than fisticuffs-inducingly angry, refusal to intercede with Filbrick on his behalf, after the initial outburst of temper has ended, that finally gets to him and prompts him to loudly and unconvincingly declare that he doesn't care anyway before he storms off. They...both really need to work on improving those verbal communication skills.
Cut for long ass personal story about gender and sexuality and whatnot.
Today I once again recalled the trans* guy who was in my high school dance class. At that time I was not aware of my own gender's complexity. But for some reason, even though we barely talked and he was older than me (we had joint grade classes sometimes) he at one point gave me the honour of telling me about his gender. I've told this story before, in part, but I enjoy retelling it so I'm going to.
For some reason (well, it was probably obvious) he noticed that I had a crush on another student. I told him that it was hopeless because said crush was gay, and I was still a young women.
He told me "So? You can still like the guy." Which is a concept that I think many need to enforce for themselves. Feeling attracted to someone is never bad as long as you don't violate their consent or disrupt them in any way that they don't want you to do. Often I was made fun of for the multitude of gay men I found attractive or even men whose sexuality was presumed straight that were feminine or sensitive. This did not make me question my gender, but my sexuality. I thought that somehow this must mean I was a lesbian. This logic is completely. well, illogical, but for some reason it seems to be implied more often than you'd think.
I recall an episode from one of my favourite shows of all time, Joan of Arcadia. In it, Joan's brother Luke tells his male friend that he's attracted to a friend of Joan's, Grace, who is female, androgynous. and an anarchist, assertive about her image being "anti". His friend thinks this means that Grace is a lesbian, and because of that, Luke finding her attractive makes him gay.
Luke later confides in his older brother Kevin about this, and he quells the concept and supports Luke with some simple logic; Grace is female, Luke is sexually attracted to female people, so therefore he is heterosexual.
That's just one example of this odd way of thinking when it comes to those who think it's their business to judge someone else's sexuality purely on the person who they are attracted to's own sexuality. But getting back to my own scenario, I remember writing into a teen website called gurl.com where there was an advice column about teen (mostly girl's) problems. I never got my question answered (it was extremely popular and most likely I didn't make the queue) but I find it distressing that I thought that my 'problem' of being attracted to non-stereotypically macho straight men and gay men was serious enough to warrant that sort of advice about.
In the end, I'm glad the submission never was answered. I was able to come to my own conclusion in due time.
And that conclusion, surprisingly enough, was not that my attraction preferences made me male, but that those preferences were nothing more or less than just that; preferences. There's no hidden, Freudian meaning to it all. You like who you like, and don't like who you don't, and the questioning of such a thing is not only grossly invasive and inherently mysoginistic, but also a disturbing demonstration that you feel it is your right to question the self-concept of another individual. Which you do not.
My preferences were once more questioned when I (mistakenly) entered a debate on trans* issues, specifically on if/when one should disclose their trans* history to a romantic partner. I'm in the party of it being that trans* person's decision, and theirs alone, but from a personal perspective, since I share that type of experience, I would be unhappy if my partner hid their trans status to me, especially because I would disclose to them fairly early on in our relationship; that I will guarantee.
I made the mistake of disclosing that I would not be attracted to another trans person in a sexual way. This is due to triggers concerning dysphoria that I have. ANother trans person in the discussion thought it was okay to grill me on this preference in an accusatory manner (veiled with the fact that it was a debate, and apparently you can do that in debates?), to the point where I became so uncomfortable and triggered that i had to leave the discussion. It was extremely humiliating and disturbing to me.
This person also decided that he would dictate my sexuality to me; that I was demisexual.
For those not in the know, demisexuality is on the asexual scale; it pertains to those who feel that they cannot feel sexual attraction to another person unless and until they form a concrete, emotional bond with them.
I dislike this term. It's problematic as all hell. It indicates strongly that the idea of being attracted to someone based on personality and emotion is something most people don't experience and that most people just screw whatever the hell they see and have no preference scale of their own. ie, slut shaming. Massively.
Regardless, I would feel insulted no matter what sexuality someone decided they would assign to me themselves. I've worked hard to overcome the stupid, completely nonsensical idea that attraction to gay men (or just effeminate/non-macho men) makes straight women gay or vice versa with straight men. And though it ultimately came to stand alongside my gender epiphany, I still maintain that it was not the reason that I am the gender that I am today.
Going back to trans* friend in dance; I find the idea that he entrusted me with such a personal issue coincides more with the fate of my gender than the thing we were discussing in that very conversation. I believe in the idea that the unconscious energy from one person can be felt, as unconsciously, by another, and motivate us to pursue people, places and things because of this energy. Therefore, my reminiscing now is ultimately fond, if detoured by the adjacent memory of my struggle with the invalidation of my sexuality.
I was writing a response to this blog entry (by a fellow Scottie who doesn't know I read her blog...hi...) and it got a little long, so I just moved it over here.
Massive tl;dr- THG marketing team, you could have done it so right.
Ever since the Hunger Games movie advertising campaign started, I've been trying to figure out what exactly they were trying to do with it. There's a lot of it- besides the prop replicas like the pins, which existed before the movie, and this Katniss Barbie, which, you know, they do make 'collector dolls' of lots of movie characters, and it's probably that kind, not the kind you give to a 5-year-old girl- which is engineered around a social media-type "Capitol" experience- framing actual movie news as in-universe hype for the 74th Hunger Games. Add in the 'Capitol Colors' nail polish and the Capitol Couture tumblr...I think they could have done more with the District IDs and making the idea of fans as District citizens more interactive, but that's leading to the point here...The marketing is framing the fans/media as the Capitol. I keep thinking that this is either a genius move, once the film comes out, or a huge missed opportunity.
A big underlying message of the books is that we, as citizens of the world's developed countries, are like the Capitol and we need to pay more attention to the people that the system that produces all the things we take for granted is taking advantage of and hurting. We are the people who our governments are giving 'bread and circuses' (Panem et Circenses, in the Latin) so we can keep up our lifestyles that are harming other human beings and harming our world. On the other hand, in the wake of the Occupy movement and similar, we are also the Districts. We are the people who the 1% will not hesitate to keep depriving of our rights, our freedoms, and our livelihoods in the name of patriotism and stability. They will keep framing the people who protest as the villains. The opulent Capitol lifestyle exists now, in real life. The 1% have it, our politicians and corporate CEOs and billionaires. And they want us to keep working for them.
If the marketing team for the movie wanted to incorporate a political message into the advertising material for the movie, I think they were on the right track. Get all of the fans registered as citizens of the Districts. (Even better, they could have mapped the Districts onto a map of the US and assign based on geographical location. Create some realspace regional solidarity. Assign international fans randomly?) Give them social media tasks for points, get the fanbase to do early promotion for you. (What would have been really cool...would have been to do a Reaping a few months prior to release...with more points increasing your likelihood of being chosen, like tesserae. Two fans from each District. Then the community 'sponsors'/votes on everybody...yeah, it's a popularity contest, but that's how the Games work too. Then the 'Victor' with the most votes gets tickets to the premiere or something awesome like that. I'm rambling now. Anyway. Get the fans to have some real, personal stake in the idea of being citizens of the districts of Panem.
Then we have the marketing based around the Capitol. As cool as a lot of the marketing and merch has been so far (I'm gonna admit, I preordered the nailpolish. I love nailpolish.) I think this is only really appropriate under one condition, and I don't really think they've done enough groundwork, haven't made it immersive enough, to make it work. The film comes out, and it makes it painfully obvious that all of this Capitol marketing was that way on purpose- and the rest of the real-life media industry does it completely unironically. By the end of that movie, everyone walking out of that movie should be disgusted with every bit of "Capitol" marketing. We should see that this is what happens in real life- kids don't literally end up dead, but it sucks people in and eats them alive. It objectifies them. We consume them as objects. We should feel so much for Katniss and Peeta and the rest of the tributes, who the Capitol sends to die as political symbols, as objects, not as people. We should feel bad for doing the same to our celebrities in real life. And we should hate the people who encourage us to objectify real people to maintain our 'modern' lives.
Unfortunately, I don't think that the Hunger Games marketing team put that much thought into it- and besides, that result kind of discourages the buying of merchandise, and they very, very much want people to buy merchandise. I suspect that they kind of intitiated the idea of District citizens with the capitol.pn site and IDs, and then saw an in-universe analog for our own glitzy promotional habits and latched on, and tried to make it immersive social media and kind of fell flat. The fans, and people who go into the movie and get the subtext, are recognizing that this is kind of fucked up. Fortunately for the movie, and the fans of the franchise, Lionsgate is doing a good job to get hype going, it looks like it's going to be a hit, and maybe it'll do well enough that we get the next two movies. (Because I want some Finnick Odair in a movie.)
But if they'd done it right, maybe we could have gotten something real out of it. We could have turned an entire subsection of young people, many of whom are already frustrated and feel powerless, into activists. Because we're not going to beat the Capitol- the one in Washington, D.C.- without a rebellion from our Districts. Maybe Katniss could have been the Mockingjay off the page as well. Maybe, if the movie gets the books' message to a wider audience, she still can be.
(And I just spent, like, a hour writing this and not my paper, but you know what? I feel like I just used my brain more than I have in this entire school year. I sure hope college gets around to something I care about. Also, this is why I want to do media studies.)
