DPP, Day Three -- Out of Character?

[workerbee73.livejournal.com]

Ack!  Oh Wednesday, why must you be so busy?  Sorry I'm running late, y'all.

Today is all about challenging our assumptions.  When it comes to pilots that is.  So many times I'll be reading or thinking or dicussing something K/L-related and think "Oh that's defintiely Kara or definitely Lee or "no that doesn't feel right" or something will ping for me and I can't quite explain why.  One thing that comes up over and over again when you ask people why they love certain fic or meta or whatever is that the characters feel right.  But what does that really mean?

Today I want to look at the assumptions we make about pilots and deconstruct them a bit.  Canon shapes some things and then there's a point where fanon (or fanon interpretation) kind of goes from there.

Today's Topic 'O the Day (tm) is simple-- Name a character assumption (or three or 27) and challenge it. 

Not in a it's right or it's wrong and I'll meet you with pistols at dawn if you disagree kind of way, more in a let's see if we can get to the bottom of why we think this kind of way.  I'm hoping it will jumpstart some good discussions.  And of course, bring some fun to the table.

I'll kick things off with a few of my own:

1.  Why is Lee always the neat and clean one? 
The is something we see over and over again in fic and fanon (and Lord knows I do it too), but the only canon foundation I have for this is the conversation in Colonial Day when Lee teases Kara about her hygeine (or lack thereof).  Which in fact is actually more about Kara.  So why do we draw the implication that Lee is the opposite way? 

2.  Lee as Miss Rules and Regs.
I'm so bad about this one it isn't even funny, but the more I started thinking about it, I realized that he can be much more deviant than Kara when it comes to following (or not following) orders.  Cutting deals with the likes of Tom Zarek and promising elections without authorization?  Mutiny anyone?  The whole sneak out and take pics of the resurrection ship without permission was his idea.  And yes, Kara did run off to Caprica to get the arrow, but she was still following orders-- the President's orders.  So how much is Lee actually the rebel and Kara much more the good soldier? 

3.  Kara as emotional (or not emotional).
This is a tough one for me, because I always feel like Kara keeps a very big wall around her emotions and hardly ever lets anyone know what she's really thinking or feeling.  And so sometimes, in fic or discussions I get a little blindsided when she opens up, cries, expresses more emotion than I was prepared for.  And I'm trying to figure out why this trips me up. 

4.  Kara as a hit-first-ask-questions-later kind of girl.
This is one I think can go either way, as our canon examples are pretty 50/50.  Yes, she takes a swing at Tigh in the mini (after being provoked), and she also takes a swing at Lee in KLG1 (also after being provoked).  She also goads Lee into a fight as a means of working out their issues (and also to assuage her guilt) in UB.  But is this enough evidence to say she's just a hothead?  Aside from direct provocations, I think she's very strategic in the way she uses violence.  But again, I'm trying to articulate why I feel this way.

Okay.  There's some stuff to get us started.  Come on and bring some more to the table!

**holds out punch and pie enticingly**

Comments

[wicked-sassy.livejournal.com]

Ooh, fun!

1) Lee as neat and clean: I think we get this impression because he's always got the tidy military hair and no visible tattoos, unlike Kara. He also doesn't get chided by the knuckledraggers about cleanup of his viper as much.

2) Lee as Mme. Rules & Regs: I think Lee is very much a lawyer about his rules and regs. He chooses to interpret and/or apply them under a very fine microscope of his choosing, like when he reminds Bill and Laura that there will be an election or they aren't actually holding the positions that they claim. He's got a very strong sense of justice and sometimes that clashes with his militarism and/or what's legal.

3) Kara & feelings: I think Kara's triad face gets her through a lot of tough situations, as do the walls she necessarily created after years of Socrata's abuse. She's not very good at keeping those walls intact, though; a lot of people get under her skin and she lashes out when she feels affronted, or angry, or vulnerable. It's also hard for her when she's challenged; in my version of things, she loved Zak and Anders because they don't challenge her the same way that Lee or, say, Helo do.

4) Kara & violence: Oh, I'd say she's very strategic. Sometimes she punches and sometimes she slaps--the punching is definitely explosive whereas the slapping seems like a reaction to betrayal (say, when Baltar tells her secret or when Lee pushes her emotional buttons in "Scar"). So I think it can go either way with her.

Hmmm, here's an assumption I'd love to see explored:

Kara doesn't have friendships with women. Doesn't ring true for me. I'd argue that we don't know a lot of the backstory in canon but that she was friends with Boomer before the worlds ended, and struggles to maintain that once Helo and Sharon are partnered; I also think she might've been buddies with Cally or some of Sam's Buccaneer survivalists like Sue Shawn and Jean.

[workerbee73.livejournal.com]

in my version of things, she loved Zak and Anders because they don't challenge her the same way that Lee or, say, Helo do

My version too, bb. Any they were WAY easier to love once dead/left for dead/tub of goo. That spawed a whole line of discussion known as Kara's Dead FOlk Issues (or DFI for short).

I FORGOT ABOUT THE SLAPS! (Now all I can think of is Slapsgiving...) And a slap is a very prototypical "female" kind fo violence too. Interesting that she'd choose a slap in those two particular situations (with Lee in Scar and with Baltar in Islanded).

[workerbee73.livejournal.com]

Also yes to your point about friendships with women. I'm not sure where or how that idea got started. We don't see a lot of examples in canon, but the contrary was never implied as far as I can remember.

[damao2010.livejournal.com]

1. Why is Lee always the neat and clean one?

I think Lee is regarded as the neat and clean just because we tend to think of him in opposition to Kara. He did tease her once because of her hygiene. Fandom tends to take little tidbits like this and just run with them. In reality, the military is known for being strict in regards to this sort of thing.

2. Lee as Mme. Rules & Regs

I think deep down Lee is much more of a rule-breaker than she is. But they have very different styles. She is the one who will slump through the pilots briefing, smoke a cigar and sunglasses and generally make fun of things or plainly backtalk to other officers (even superior officers). But she usually obeys the orders. As you said, even when she appeared to disobey going to Caprica, she was still obeying the president. While Lee, on the surface, appears to be more obedient, sitting straight and saying all the yes,sirs. But when you get down to it, he disobeyed orders or just acted without checking with his superiors much more often. In short, she seems to get on everybody's face for the little things, but tends to follow military procedure in the big issues, he does the opposite.

Squeaky clean Lee

[workerbee73.livejournal.com]

As to #1, I think that's the only explanation for it. That and it's probably not stretch to think that b/c his personality is so much more anal and exacting than hers that it would also spill over into other areas (ie, neat and clean).

Miss Rules and Regs.

[workerbee73.livejournal.com]

SO MUCH YES TO ALL OF THIS. I think these are really fantastic observations. And really it plays so much into their dynamic with each other. Kara always seems to kind of take-charge in their interactions, but there's always a point at which she pulls back and waits to see what he's going to do. And more often than not (especially if it's something she agrees with), she will end up following his lead.

[kdbleu.livejournal.com]

3. Kara as emotional (or not emotional).
This is a tough one for me, because I always feel like Kara keeps a very big wall around her emotions and hardly ever lets anyone know what she's really thinking or feeling. And so sometimes, in fic or discussions I get a little blindsided when she opens up, cries, expresses more emotion than I was prepared for. And I'm trying to figure out why this trips me up.

I this is a hard one because the moment I really started liking (and ultimately identifying with) Kara is in AoC when she breaks down in front of Adama about being responsible for Zak's death. It's such a defining event, but I can't think of another place where she lets down like that again. It's almost as though she becomes more guarded after that. Like she can't let herself be vulnerable that way again, but it's in there which I think is, in part why writers come back to that kind of out pouring of emotion.

[scifishipper.livejournal.com]

She definitely breaks down in private, but I agree that she doesn't really show that level of emotional vulnerability again, except in front of Sam or Lee and definitely not to the same extent.

As for fic, not that you asked (;P),I don't get overly worked up about Kara being emotional, as long as the build up is sufficient. My issue with Kara being too emotional in fic is generally a problem when she just starts falling apart with little provocation. She is a pretty emotional person and when earned, emotional and vulnerable emotions seem just right.

Kara is the violent one, Lee the gentle(ish) one

[scifishipper.livejournal.com]

I'm going to throw this out here because the more and more I watch BSG, the more I see that in the scope of the universe, Lee can be a pretty violent guy. I know it's the movies and all and action yada yada yada, but he fights, he hits, he roughs it up with quite a few people in the show.

I think that one thing Lee tends not to be (unless with Kara) is impulsively violent (where I believe that Kara is impulsively violent). To wit, he is so frakking brutal in UB. Much more brutal, in fact, than Kara. His facial expressions, his rage, even the way he manhandles Dee in one awful moment, not to mention the way he just punches Kara when she mouths off to him about sloppy seconds speaks to the potential of his violence. Like whoa. His hair trigger, when he gets to that point, seems very deadly and serious to me. Kara's violence is more de rigeur, if that makes any sense. People expect her to react violently.

For Lee, he tends to build and build and build, holding it in as long as he can. I think, in general, Lee does a better job of managing his anger than Kara - working out, displacing, distracting, etc. Kara drinks and fights and fraks - all physical things. Lee tends to use more intellectual ways of ameliorating his anger, but underneath, I think he has just as much fodder for violence as she does. And when is shows, it's very intense.

Whoops, rambly there a bit. :)

Re: Kara is the violent one, Lee the gentle(ish) one

[wicked-sassy.livejournal.com]

This!

I definitely think Lee's brutality runs far deeper than Kara's, and you make a good point about people expecting her to react violently. She's a firecracker--flares up, makes a pop or a boom, then fizzles. He simmers and then explodes and, whoa, watch out. He's wound really tightly and it has to come out somewhere.

I feel like... Kara's violence is a loss of control, whereas Lee's is an extension of his need for it. He punches with fury; Kara punches with despair.

Re: Kara is the violent one, Lee the gentle(ish) one

[rachelindeed.livejournal.com]

I feel like... Kara's violence is a loss of control, whereas Lee's is an extension of his need for it. He punches with fury; Kara punches with despair.

Whoa. Brilliance.

<3 <3 <3

Re: Kara is the violent one, Lee the gentle(ish) one

[workerbee73.livejournal.com]

Agreed. Really excellent observation.

Re: Kara is the violent one, Lee the gentle(ish) one

[wicked-sassy.livejournal.com]

Thank you, you're too kind! *happy dances*

Re: Kara is the violent one, Lee the gentle(ish) one

[damao2010.livejournal.com]

I think his violent episodes are intense precisely because he keeps so much bottled up (and I guess a healthy dose of testosterone doesn't exactly help). It's like a pressure pan. At some point all that pressure has to be released, whereas Kara lets go more often and louder and therefore has less steam built up, maybe. However, though he has no problem lashing out when angry (especially at Kara and his father), honestly it takes a lot to get him to react in a truly phisical violent way. When he hit her after the Baltar incident, he was clearly jealous as hell, but she struck him first. He did try to kill Sharon but she had shot his father. In UB, Kara went out of her way to provoke him.

Re: Kara is the violent one, Lee the gentle(ish) one

[kag523.livejournal.com]

I've no time to comment today, but then I read your comment and HAD to say that you've explained the Lee / Kara violence EXACTLY how I see it. Bravo!

Re: Kara is the violent one, Lee the gentle(ish) one

[workerbee73.livejournal.com]

I think you're spot on about Lee. And for Kara, yes, I think violence is a very comfortable language for her. She was raised on it, and to a certain extent it makes sense to her, so it's natural she would chose that avenue when trying to make a point. But for Lee it so much more buried, hidden beneath layers and layers of control. But it doesn't mean it's any less potent. In many ways it's moreso, and for the very reasons you've articulated. (And also, I always suspect that whenever someone takes great pains to conceal something, be it passion or emotion or even violence, it usually means those waters run deeper and those flames burn brighter than you can possibly imagine. And I definitely think that's the case here.)

Re: Kara is the violent one, Lee the gentle(ish) one

[useyourlove.livejournal.com]

I LOVE THIS WHOLE COMMENT. I think you have it spot on. Lee tends to hold things in, but he also lashes out with words much more often than fists, and I think he often comes off as a huge jerk because of that (especially when I'm trying to get new people into this show). He does lash out with his fists and when he does watch out. But he also tends to know just exactly what cutting thing to say to people--Kara especially--that's going to take them down without even having to throw a punch. Which, of course, usually gets him hit when he's talking to Kara. But he knows her and he knows that her reactions are all physical, so he's pretty much asking for it every time which kind of makes me love him even more for some stupid reason.

[rachelindeed.livejournal.com]

I'll just throw this in the ring, real quick: Responsibility.

I think it's interesting that quite often Kara grapples with the pain she encounters by in some way blaming herself or qualities in herself for creating it. Lee, I think, is less prone to blame himself or to accept it when others try to blame him and more ready to blame other people who've hurt him.

This is not to say that Lee can't take responsibility for his own mistakes; he can and does (though not always). But I think often it takes him a longer time to face these things, and he doesn't tend to overdo it. Kara, I think, does.

Between the two, I think she is more inclined to take responsibility for what happens to other people, and to exaggerate that responsibility. It's one of the ways she reminds me of Bill, actually.

[workerbee73.livejournal.com]

Between the two, I think she is more inclined to take responsibility for what happens to other people, and to exaggerate that responsibility. It's one of the ways she reminds me of Bill, actually.

Absolutely. And also like Bill she's also the one who's much more likely to make it personal, and to take on the guilt of any given situation, whether it's hers to take or not.

[damao2010.livejournal.com]

I think that could be said about Bill to an extent - he certainly feels responsible for the people in the fleet and for his crew in particular. I don't think he is particularly prone to take responsibility for the hurt/pain/his mistakes caused to his own family, though. Also, in Bill's case he is supposed to take responsibility because he is the one in charge and he makes the decision upon which everyone's lives are depending. Kara, however, seems to try to put too much on her shoulders out of a twisted notion that she is a frak-up or a cancer or whatever. So, as you said, much of that is clearly exagerated.

[word-vomity.livejournal.com]

Yes. I think your spot on. While Kara expects that she is the problem and harbors an overwhelming amount of guilt about it, Lee expects himself to be perfect (more for his father and the world than for himself) and so has a much harder time accepting his failures. Kara just expects to be a screw-up pretty regularly and therefore is quick to blame herself (although, she often tries to hide that blame and only admit it to herself).

[pennyante.livejournal.com]

Kara/Lee as emotional: Hard to work through this one, right? It seems like the assumption's that Kara's the unemotional and inarticulate one, which is why it's odd to run into an off-canon too-articulate Kara, one too in touch with her feelings, and too capable of showing emotion. Fics frequently--maybe even usually--challenge that assumption because nothing about the emotional status quo between Lee and Kara could change without Kara gaining some ground, emotionally.

Both Kara and Lee them speak in code to avoid saying what they feel, but Lee mostly only does that with Kara. Kara has to cheat to keep the pieces together in pretty much *every* part of her life--to get up in the morning at all, and her denial of her own pain is so deep that she doesn't even know what she's denying, exactly. I think it's telling that her main way of expressing emotional connection even with Adm. Adama, for example, is in military code--"Nothin' but the rain," she says, but means "I love you, Dad, and I'm keeping your faith."

[workerbee73.livejournal.com]

Really excellent points ot both of these. I quite agree. : )

Regarding them speaking in code, I don't think it's conscious so much (except maybe with Lee when speaking to Kara) as it is just both of them being incredibly guarded about what they share (which usually isn't much).

[velvety2010.livejournal.com]

What a great discussion. I need to get on LJ more often. Miss you guys!

[workerbee73.livejournal.com]

We miss you too! **huggles you**

Pilots as pilots

[winegums.livejournal.com]

*cries* of all the weeks to be moving and have no internet access....well, here's a quick one:

- pilots flying together. It happens only a handful of times in canon, and no one ever talks about how it is when they fly together (despite the Blackbird test flight adorableness, Maelstrom with Lee flying Kara's wing, Crossroads/He That Believeth In Me)....but I love the fact that we just assume that flying is like sex for them and take it from there.

Of course, it's helped along liberally by the miniseries, in which their Vipers are actually frakking and is one of my favourite assumptions that is kinda-supported by canon, but still ;)

[workerbee73.livejournal.com]

I know! I love this bit of fanon. The evidence may be thing, bit I'm-a clining! :D