The EVERYTHING thread Read-ME #3

[bbatb]

I know this discussion is really pointless, because we will never REALLY know what the writers wanted us to think and how they wanted us to interpret all these open questions:

But, it seems to me a very convoluted strategy to threaten to inject Vincent to make Catherine make Vincent do something Juliana wanted. The direct way would have been to threaten Catherine and then Vincent would have done ANYTHING to save her life. Bob and Carol were manipulated in that way and they were very motivated to please Juliana in order to get the antidote.

[Deleted]

Apr 19, 2016 6:59:11 GMT -5 bbatb said:

I know this discussion is really pointless, because we will never REALLY know what the writers wanted us to think and how they wanted us to interpret all these open questions:

But, it seems to me a very convoluted strategy to threaten to inject Vincent to make Catherine make Vincent do something Juliana wanted. The direct way would have been to threaten Catherine and then Vincent would have done ANYTHING to save her life. Bob and Carol were manipulated in that way and they were very motivated to please Juliana in order to get the antidote.

I was only trying to get a sense in all that mess :-) I would have liked to see Cat beasting out at some point, like she was injected by her mother to give her the power to revenge her death and save people, or become a superhuman and share problems with Vincent... I don't think writers went on that way

[bbatb]

I see your point luna76 and it is an interesting thought. Of course Vanessa wanted to protect her daughters and did NOT bring her work home. Unfortunately, we already had a female beast and I consider that plot line a failure, at least the way it was presented and by the actress that played her. Also, unfortunately, Catherine sort of DID beast out when she pounded Juliana relentlessly.

All mute points and we can only hope for a better S4.

[BeastieBoy]

It's very interesting that Gillian Horvath tweeted this. She took a lot of heat from unhappy beasties on twitter about S3, which IMHO was unjustly directed at her. But she was the only writer really interacting with beasties, until beasties vented to the point of almost seeming hostile. Then she finally stopped interacting.

The article offers insights into how fans always blame the writers, but there's usually other stuff going on behind the scenes, such as a lead's personal situation that can greatly affect things.

www.indiewire.com/article/castle-sleepy-hollow-actors-quit-writers-20160509?utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=IW_post 

[Deleted]

Is she/you implying that an analogous situation might have existed with BATB and that's part of the reason for the poor writing?

[beautyandtheleast]

May 10, 2016 18:27:09 GMT -5 BeastieBoy said:

It's very interesting that Gillian Horvath tweeted this. She took a lot of heat from unhappy beasties on twitter about S3, which IMHO was unjustly directed at her. But she was the only writer really interacting with beasties, until beasties vented to the point of almost seeming hostile. Then she finally stopped interacting.

The article offers insights into how fans always blame the writers, but there's usually other stuff going on behind the scenes, such as a lead's personal situation that can greatly affect things.

www.indiewire.com/article/castle-sleepy-hollow-actors-quit-writers-20160509?utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=IW_post 

So are you suggesting that GH is suggesting that any fan ire due to alleged claims of bad writing was misdirected at the writers, and should have been directed at others, perhaps even one of the leads? Because that is what seems to be suggested by GH and the way the tweets read to me.

[Deleted]

May 10, 2016 18:27:09 GMT -5 BeastieBoy said:

It's very interesting that Gillian Horvath tweeted this. She took a lot of heat from unhappy beasties on twitter about S3, which IMHO was unjustly directed at her. But she was the only writer really interacting with beasties, until beasties vented to the point of almost seeming hostile. Then she finally stopped interacting.

The article offers insights into how fans always blame the writers, but there's usually other stuff going on behind the scenes, such as a lead's personal situation that can greatly affect things.

www.indiewire.com/article/castle-sleepy-hollow-actors-quit-writers-20160509?utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=Social&utm_campaign=IW_post 

IF she was given away a blame to actors, I think she's only trying to protect her back from fans (read in this another expression)... I mean: we were the first who gave blame to KK and JR not being the same together, no more connection for whatever personal reasons... but S3 bloopers video says that it isn't true.  In her statement  I can read a post to Jay, maybe he wanted to spend more time with his baby (he said lot of times the he had problems in managing work and family), or maybe he asked for times to do other things (I remind that between S2 and S3 he was asked for a film, but he had to turn it down), or maybe he had medical problems due to freezing cold weather (has he said in more than one interview). Or maybe both asked for more money or less time and writers had to deal with this. But  both leads are on board most of the time, together or with other characters so it is not a personal or medical problem that have reduced hours (they clearly shoot even with flu). And with this onscreen time writers could have use it better than thay did IMO. The pic in the article is related to Castle where leads hate each other so much that both asked to have short time of working together... and we now know that it is not the case...

[BeastieBoy]

A big and common S3 complaint directed towards Gillian Horvath and others was the lack of Vincat passion, chemistry or emotional connection. Several beasties also sent Gillian images of the love scenes from S1's AMP and Insatiable as examples of what they felt was lacking in S3. This tweet, from last August, is an example of Gillian's feelings on the matter.

Almost a year later, this tweet in response to S4 tells me the subject is still on Gillian's mind.

I don't believe Gillian is implying that the leads or anything that happened behind the scenes is the reason for lousy writing. However, I thought maybe Gillian was hinting that something happened behind the scenes that perhaps forced the BATB writers to make certain adjustments to S3. Not having passionate love scenes perhaps being one of them.

OTOH, Gillian has since denied that it was related to any show that she worked on.  (Not sure if I'm buying it though...)

[Deleted]

May 11, 2016 2:12:10 GMT -5 BeastieBoy said:

A big and common S3 complaint directed towards Gillian Horvath and others was the lack of Vincat passion, chemistry or emotional connection. Several beasties also sent Gillian images of the love scenes from S1's AMP and Insatiable as examples of what they felt was lacking in S3. This tweet, from last August, is an example of Gillian's feelings on the matter.

Almost a year later, this tweet in response to S4 tells me the subject is still on Gillian's mind.

I don't believe Gillian is implying that the leads or anything that happened behind the scenes is the reason for lousy writing. However, I thought maybe Gillian was hinting that something happened behind the scenes that perhaps forced the BATB writers to make certain adjustments to S3. Not having passionate love scenes perhaps being one of them.

OTOH, Gillian has since denied that it was related to any show that she worked on.  (Not sure if I'm buying it though...)

There are two point in this. I understand Gillian about choosing complex storyline or kissing... we have 43 mins episodes and probably they thought that was a waste of time and they dropped off love scenes (not a good choice for beasties). And I am OK with a more complex storyline, in fact I think that S3 story is way better than S1 was. But if it was a problem of time, why waste it with some dialogue repetitions instead that with kissing time? I think that this was the thing that made beasties going mad

[Deleted]

May 11, 2016 2:12:10 GMT -5 BeastieBoy said:

OTOH, Gillian has since denied that it was related to any show that she worked on.  (Not sure if I'm buying it though...)

BeastieBoy Her twitts are too harsh for not being involved personally... IMO.  But she doesn't remind that in every work you have to deal with people, customer, problems... what makes the difference in this case between a good writer and a mediocre writer is the way you find to go through them

[Deleted]

She does appear to be interested in venting (a bit) on this topic.
However, it's all water-under-the-bridge at this point, regards BATB. Everything is done and dusted.

[bbatb]

May 11, 2016 2:12:10 GMT -5 BeastieBoy said:

Almost a year later, this tweet in response to S4 tells me the subject is still on Gillian's mind.

Not sure why a GOOD writer cannot find a balance of having a complex plot AND romance. Most fans understand that there cannot be kissing and bedroom scenes 'all the time', but some of the stupid psycho babble nonsense of the opening episodes of S3 could have been much shorter or better yet - ditched and replaced with some engagement bliss before the big bad appeared.

[BeastieBoy]

May 11, 2016 14:18:24 GMT -5 bbatb said:

May 11, 2016 2:12:10 GMT -5 BeastieBoy said:

Almost a year later, this tweet in response to S4 tells me the subject is still on Gillian's mind.

Not sure why a GOOD writer cannot find a balance of having a complex plot AND romance. Most fans understand that there cannot be kissing and bedroom scenes 'all the time', but some of the stupid psycho babble nonsense of the opening episodes of S3 could have been much shorter or better yet - ditched and replaced with some engagement bliss before the big bad appeared.

I absolutely agree.

However, the reason I thought some of the fan reaction was unjustly directed to GH was because she was just one of a team of writers. The episodes that she wrote, Chasing Ghosts and Sins of the Fathers, were arguably two of the better received eps of S3.

But because she was the only writer engaging with fans on twitter, all the pent up fan frustration landed squarely on her shoulders. So I can see why she got a bit defensive and annoyed. GH is engaging with fans again now as we ramp up for S4, but I feel the experience from S3 fan reaction is still weighing on her.

Although she denies anything related to a specific show that she worked on, I think the article must have resonated with some of her personal experiences. She's continued to tweet about how things going on BTS can affect the writing.

As @dave mentioned, it's all done and in the can at this point - nothing will change S3 or S4. I enjoyed S3 for what it was, imperfections and all. I intend to do the same for S4.

[bbatb]

Your are right BeastieBoy - it was not ONLY her fault and as you know by now, I lay the blame squarely on Brad Kern's shoulders. He is the show runner and the finished product is HIS responsibility. Of course, I know that HE has his marching orders from higher up, too, and as pippin has shown us in another post a while back, some networks do get involved down to the 'what the actors are wearing level'.

Still, Gillian missed a huge opportunity in 'Sins Of The Fathers' when Catherine broke down over Bob's body and nobody moved a finger to comfort her. I mean seriously: what do YOU do when the love of your life is in such distress?

[BeastieBoy]

May 11, 2016 23:37:23 GMT -5 bbatb said:

Your are right BeastieBoy - it was not ONLY her fault and as you know by now, I lay the blame squarely on Brad Kern's shoulders. He is the show runner and the finished product is HIS responsibility. Of course, I know that HE has his marching orders from higher up, too, and as pippin has shown us in another post a while back, some networks do get involved down to the 'what the actors are wearing level'.

Still, Gillian missed a huge opportunity in 'Sins Of The Fathers' when Catherine broke down over Bob's body and nobody moved a finger to comfort her. I mean seriously: what do YOU do when the love of your life is in such distress?

I'd stand there frozen and stunned, looking like a deer in headlights; given that the love of my life is in distress over the man who snagged me away in a net, wiped my mind erasing all memory of said love of my life and turned me into a heartless killing machine. LOL. 

Kidding aside, I think the even bigger lost opportunity for 312 was the ending bar scene. That could have and should have been a much more emotional conversation between VinCat. Some of it was the dialogue they were given by the writers, but some of it was the acting and/or direction. They should have been sitting much closer to each other and a simple thing like Vincent reaching for Cat's hand or putting his arm around her would have made a big difference. Those types of things can't be blamed on the show runner or the writers, they're not even there on set.

But all in all, I think that the current group of writers are okay for supernatural/sci-fi story lines, but lack the ability to create emotionally intimate dialogue for VinCat's relationship. Something that Jennifer & Sherri and the team of writers for S1 excelled at. I hope they will prove me wrong for S4, but I doubt they will.