DPP: Starbuck and Apollo, Lee and Kara

[da-angel729.livejournal.com]

Hello again! I'm da_angel729 and I'm doing the DPP this week!

Today's post is something that's been swirling around in my brain for a while.

I've heard people say (and maybe even said it myself) that 'Starbuck' and 'Apollo' are almost persona that Lee and Kara adopt to help them through whatever crap they don't feel like doing. Especially in Kara's case. And that how they act when in that mode is somehow different than their normal personalities.

I don't necessarily think that is the case, and I'm not saying that they're have multiple personalities or anything. I guess what I'm trying to say is that they sometimes have moments that don't quite match up with what we've seen or come to expect from our characters. Kara especially comes across as widely different: there's been moments that I might classify as Kara rather than 'Starbuck'-moments where she's more vulnerable, perhaps, than one would expect a hotshot Viper pilot to be, though I hope it doesn't sound like I don't expect characters to be three-dimensional.

But it's interesting that for all of those moments, I don't think it ever really feels like a disconnect between who they are and what their 'persona' is, just another aspect of the character we see on screen.

So, some questions:

-What scenes or moments would you classify as wildly different for a character than what we've come to expect on-screen. In other words, what did Kara or Lee do or say that surprised you about them the first time on seeing it?
-Do you feel the callsigns allow our pilots to adopt different aspects of their personalities in a way that then seems distinct from their normal ones?
-And, how much of their 'persona' is just an extension of their personality, and how much of it is acting or faking it?
-To tie it back into pilots, do they seem more compatible when they're being (or showing typical behaviour of) Starbuck and Apollo or Lee and Kara? Lee and Starbuck? Kara and Apollo?

Comments

[nazkey.livejournal.com]

What a great topic!

What scenes or moments would you classify as wildly different for a character than what we've come to expect on-screen. In other words, what did Kara or Lee do or say that surprised you about them the first time on seeing it?

I don't know that there was anything they did that was surprising to me because I feel that the writers did a great job in the mini establishing the whole Starbuck/Kara and Apollo/Lee differences right off the bat. I mean, the first time in the brig, you could see Kara and Lee rather than Starbuck & Apollo, so there wasn't really any point where I thought, wow, didn't see that coming.

Do you feel the callsigns allow our pilots to adopt different aspects of their personalities in a way that then seems distinct from their normal ones?

Oh absolutely! I think they both definitely use it as a mask. They have a very serious job to do and in order to do it, their "humanity" has to be hidden and their precision has to be razor sharp. When they shift into their callsign mode, they turn everything else off, except of course, when they are near each other and the intensity of their K/L-ness keeps simmering up to the surface.

And, how much of their 'persona' is just an extension of their personality, and how much of it is acting or faking it?

I don't think there's any acting involved. Military people are trained to behave a certain way on the job and their callsigns reflect their work persona. When Kara is Starbuck, all her insecurities are clamped down and she is an out-of-the-box thinker and the best pilot in the fleet. When Lee is Apollo, his self-control and natural leadership skills allow him to be the CAG and live up to the expectation of being Adama's son. It's just a part of who they are, no acting or faking. BUT, I think what's really hard for both of them is that they are so comfortable in those skins that it's hard for them to just be Kara and Lee. THAT's when the "fun" starts. ;-)

To tie it back into pilots, do they seem more compatible when they're being (or showing typical behaviour of) Starbuck and Apollo or Lee and Kara? Lee and Starbuck? Kara and Apollo?

Starbuck & Apollo are clearly the perfect complement for each other. They work well together because they approach a situation from different angles so the overall result is that ALL the angles have been explored. Kara & Lee? Yeah, they WOULD work together if they let go. Their timing is always off and they just don't know how to get out of their own way, so while it's painfully obvious to everyone that K/L can work just as beautifully and seamlessly as S/A, it's not going to happen because neither one of them is in the right place at the right time (well, except maybe a little bit on NC).

[ecstaticdance.livejournal.com]

What scenes or moments would you classify as wildly different for a character than what we've come to expect on-screen. In other words, what did Kara or Lee do or say that surprised you about them the first time on seeing it?

I think the first real "ah-ha" moment I had with regards to Kara was seeing her pull out those idols and pray. It was shocking, but it was illuminating. It proved that the depth we saw in the brig was also broad. It showed her more tender side, the part of her that needed to slow down and be serious every once in a while.

As for Lee... "Lady's in charge." Again, it was the first glimpse we had of the breadth that went with the depth we saw in the mini. Not shocking, but enlightening. It showed his sense of humor and his genuine lack of ego, despite initial appearances to the contrary.

-Do you feel the callsigns allow our pilots to adopt different aspects of their personalities in a way that then seems distinct from their normal ones?
-And, how much of their 'persona' is just an extension of their personality, and how much of it is acting or faking it?

I think the callsigns give them a socially approved place to wear the masks that make them feel least vulnerable. We all wear masks. It's part of the difficulty of meeting new people and establishing meaningful relationships. We hide our vulnerabilities and flaunt what we see as our strengths, and then letting people in, letting people see the tender, humorous, un-egotistic side of ourselves... it's scary. These two just take it to an overwhelming extreme.

To tie it back into pilots, do they seem more compatible when they're being (or showing typical behaviour of) Starbuck and Apollo or Lee and Kara? Lee and Starbuck? Kara and Apollo?

I'm gonna cheat on this one and say "What Naz said." Because she pretty much perfectly captured my thoughts on the matter.

[(Anonymous)]

This are really good questions so I don't know where the rest of the thinky thoughts brigade is...

Scenes that were wildly different...
Lee in Black Market when he shoots Phelan. I didn't know he had it in him to be so cold blooded/ruthless like that.
Lee in the hallway when he lost his wedding ring. Maybe that was just drunkenness but he had NO dignity and was searching for it in the hallway and that just wasn't like him at all.
FatLee. I could see how the extreme pain of what happened with Kara could cause a LOT of eating, but it just didn't seem like Lee to eat more when depressed. Certainly some people do, and some people eat a lot less, but there just wasn't any evidence that Lee would react that way by eating more.

Callsigns
I don't think it's adopting different personality aspects as much as it is that certain aspects of their personalities dominate in those roles and other parts are hidden. I think that's kinda a normal thing in a work environment and it makes sense that it was more pronounced in the kind of life or death environment they were in- they had to do what it took to get it done. Also I think that callsigns are generally chosen to reflect a person's personality, at least the part of their personality that was already coming through in that environment. Nobody really knows the meaning of the callsign Starbuck though. I still think Apollo was less a reflection of Lee's personality than a reflection of his dad being high ranking in the fleet.

I think when they are being Starbuck and Apollo they are a DAMN GOOD TEAM but that is mostly a "works very well together" coworker thing and the works well together thing doesn't necessarily carry over into personal life though in their case it does.
I think they are compatible as people as Lee and Kara and that is why they are such good friends and have the EPIC pilot love.

Also I think that their jobs (pilots) is a large part of their identity, of who they are. I don't know if that is because it's their job or it's their calling. I know in the US what someone's job is seems to be a large part of their identity, for example if you meet someone socially, one of the first things you say other than exchanging names is, "so what do you do?" (ie do for a living- your job) To a lesser extent maybe being in the military was part of their identity but I think being pilots was more of it. Also I think that flying was a calling for them though maybe Lee didn't realize it? I had some trouble with the Lee as lawyer thing because he was meant to be a pilot in my opinion and it just seemed weird and a little wrong for him to be anything else. Also I didn't like the civilian haircut he had- didn't look good.

[acsgrlie.livejournal.com]

The only moment I thought was real OOC the first time around was in EoJ after they had the hot makeout session and Kara refused to divorce. And in a few episodes later when Lee was the one who refused to leave Dee. I just felt like the writers were jerking us around and trying to keep the love rectangle alive.

[ninjamonkey73.livejournal.com]

Great topic! I think Nazkey and Anonymous really hit just about everything I was going to say. Lee shooting Phelan and fat!Lee are the two big OOC moments for me. Kara I was more inclined to believe anything she did was in character, since I felt like she was so emotionally damaged and reckless that anything could happen.

Starbuck and Apollo, as personas, weren't necessarily faked. In fact, I'll quote jeneviverose for this one:

We hide our vulnerabilities and flaunt what we see as our strengths, and then letting people in, letting people see the tender, humorous, un-egotistic side of ourselves... it's scary. These two just take it to an overwhelming extreme.

As far as compatibility, work-wise they were more compatible as Starbuck and Apollo, but personally/emotionally they were more compatible as Kara and Lee. I'm thinking specifically of their "Are we okay?" conversation in The Captain's Hand where they were definitely Lee and Kara. They may not have been together then, but they were at least on the same page more than most other times.

[(Anonymous)]

When I wrote that I had forgotten about the whole Maelstrom dream sequence with Leoben- that seemed out of character for Kara but it was a dream and we can't control dreams so I have to give her a pass on that one. But I can't give her a pass on her whole association with Leoben after Maelstrom, because after what he did to her on New Caprica I don't see how she could even tolerate being the same room with him!! Maybe she is a LOT better than I thought she was at separating out the actions of one Leoben model from another???

[(Anonymous)]

Agreed that was totally out of character for both of them and your sentence hits the nail on the head: "I just felt like the writers were jerking us around and trying to keep the love rectangle alive".
I think I had blocked that part out from my memories :) so I didn't mention it earlier

[damao2010.livejournal.com]

Yes, I agree 100%. Especially what you wrote about Lee :"Not shocking, but enlightening. It showed his sense of humor and his genuine lack of ego, despite initial appearances to the contrary."

[damao2010.livejournal.com]

I totally agree with you about Lee's OOC moments. I don't think FatLee was believable at all. And I hated the ring scene. You put it very well - he had no dignity and , to me, he may have been a jerk at times and he may have been really down, but he always kept his dignity. But the absolutely worst was the scene where kills Phelan. Lots of people were shocked or totally disliked the hooker plot, but what made me cringe in that episode was the cold blooded murder.

As for Kara, there are certain things I didn't like but nothing I can't think of right now felt completely OOC.

[rachelindeed.livejournal.com]

These are really great questions, and I've so enjoyed the thoughtful earlier responses ~ sorry to be coming late to this party!

I agree with those above who have said that Kara and Lee use their personas to shut down their emotions and vulnerabilities in order to do their jobs confidently, and I think Kara likes to live inside Starbuck more than Lee depends on Apollo.

With Lee, you can see him visibly shifting into Apollo mode when he has to, and it's sometimes a bumpy transition - the classic example is his two seconds of being scared before settling into command of the Pegasus in "Captain's Hand." But Lee doesn't always successfully make that shift into Apollo-mode, even in times of battle and crisis. When I watch him talking to himself in "Hand of God," or inspiring his recruits while struggling with his own confusion and fear in "Valley of Darkness," I see a lot of Lee coming through, not just Apollo.

This strikes me as very much in character - I think Lee has always regarded 'Apollo' as a bit of a burden, a mask he wears for the sake of others perhaps more than for his own satisfaction. I think it's interesting how dismissive he is when people try to apply that persona to his personality rather than just his job. When Zarek tries to analyze Lee's personality in terms of healing vs. war-making, Lee insists that he's not actually Apollo-like, it's "just a stupid nickname." He looks wry and a bit defeated when Roslin insists on regarding him as "Captain Apollo" as she shares the secret of her cancer with him. I love the expression on his face in the last shot of Bastille Day, it's so unexpectedly uncomfortable. Even as late as "Sometimes A Great Notion," when Dee calls him 'Apollo' and says that he is the only one who can give people a reason to go on after the disaster of Earth, he looks at her with such surprised vulnerability, as if he's thinking "you of all people should know that I'm not that perfect, I'm not the one with the answers." And it's clear that she knows that, of course - she no longer believes in 'Apollo,' she doesn't believe that Lee or anyone can make things right or give her a reason to go on, as she makes abundantly clear soon after. But Lee nonetheless succeeds in being the inspiring leader in public, in speeches, before troops and the people who never look close enough to see his own doubts and frailties.

I think the moments when Lee comes across as OOC and a bit scary are those few moments when he completely immerses himself in his military persona and has clearly shut down the part of himself that questions, doubts, and feels. I think "Razor" is the epitome of this phenomenon, but I also see it at times after his space-walk in Resurrection Ship, and in his ruthless advocacy for genocide in "A Measure of Salvation." Apollo without Lee is frankly scary, and I'm glad most of the time the two are pretty thoroughly mixed.

With Kara, you can see her remaining 'Starbuck' in a lot of her personal interactions with others - she's Starbuck at the card table, not just in the cockpit. I think she's initially Starbuck in most of her romantic relationships, though she can rarely stay that confident and in control for long. I think she loves Starbuck in a way she can't love herself; her underlying self-esteem issues are a big part of the reason she relies on her persona so much more than Lee does. And I agree that Starbuck and Apollo get along great, and that Lee and Kara are perfect for each other though they're both too scared to fully trust their relationship.

But I actually think that Apollo/Kara and Lee/Starbuck combinations are total disasters. When one of them is being vulnerable and the other is not, it's always rotten. I see Apollo/Kara in KLG Part I, from the "would you miss me?" through the rejected apology. It's horrible. And I see Starbuck/Lee in their near-encounter during Scar, which was equally hurtful and disasterous. The only comfort is that Lee knew the difference between Kara and Starbuck, which is why he stopped making out with Starbuck and tried to figure out where the heck Kara was in all this.

Anyhow, that's my take on them, and thanks for the interesting topic!

[rachelindeed.livejournal.com]

I really enjoyed your analysis here, especially your comments on the pilot's breadth as well as depth. Very nicely put.

[damao2010.livejournal.com]

I'm not in a very analytical mode today, so I guess I'll limit myself to either agreeing or disagreeing with people. It is usually very difficult to disagree with you as you always make such solid arguments. I really wish I had your brain and your way with words.

Anyway, I really agree with today. In a post above, I agreed with Anonymous regarding OOC Lee but when it comes to Apollo, I absolutely loved this "when he completely immerses himself in his military persona and has clearly shut down the part of himself that questions, doubts, and feels." It made me think of a WIP fic that has been recently updated on ffnet (Everything that was, will be again by Igore). The Lee there is downright scary.

[rachelindeed.livejournal.com]

I love that fic! And yes, Lee is very scary and yet still recognizable there, which is part of the reason it impresses me. :)

[damao2010.livejournal.com]

Oh, I love it, too. It has very dark overtones and you are right Lee is still recognizable. I just wish the author would update more often. The last chapter ended with such a terrible cliffhanger.