Sunday, 22 November 2009

I warn you now...I wrote this when I was totally exhausted and therefore probably completely out of my mind....but I felt the need to share!

So I know it really should have occurred to me by now…and probably has before, but I have forgotten….but I realised that there are people out there who will see exactly the same thing I do, and think about it in a totally different way to me. What I like/have seen/appreciated/am aware of etc…affect how I will read something.
For example, my mum and I both watch Brothers and Sisters, and have from the beginning. So in terms of the characters and the general story of the show, we have the same history to pull from in our understanding of what is going on.

However, there is also all the material we bring from our pre-existing knowledge/history/adoration etc of the actors/writers etc… We knew going into the series that Calista had done Ally McBeal, and that Sally Field had done many things and loved them for them. I knew about Patricia Wettig and Ken Olin being actually married. I knew Ron Rifkin from Alias and so that made me see his character in a different way to my mum.

Now I didn’t really know anything about Rob Lowe when he started in Brothers and Sisters, and am not sure if I even thought that much of him after that…I knew I liked him, and knew that he was from The West Wing, and some 80’s movies…but not a whole lot else. Then I watched the West Wing…and while that changed the way I see almost everything, I now realise that my love of him from TWW makes me love his character more. I “aww” at him, and like his smile and him in a tux makes me happy. But my mum isn’t a fan, she doesn’t love him. And as a result does not get so excited to see him in the show, I mean she doesn’t hate him or anything, but she does adore him like I do. She doesn’t understand why I giggle when he says something overly political, or grin when he’s wearing a tux, but she can appreciate the character most of the time.
So if I take that logic to anything else…I A) start to feel bad(and kinda sad) for all the people watching movies with Allison Janney in them, that don’t or can’t appreciate her awesomeness! It’s really their loss, and I am sure most of them don’t know what they are missing. And B) worry about the people that watch the same shows I watch, and don’t get why so many people love certain characters they don’t, and also how so many people can actually HATE characters that I LOVE to death!
I wonder if there will ever be the day I will not be watching something and be able to connect it back to one of my fave TV shows. I also worry that someday I am going to either miss something, or not be able to hate the characters I should, because I am too attached. I mean its sorta happening already, but I imagine in the future, my brain might completely end up changing a movie or show I’m watching, and I will actually believe a very different outcome to what ACTUALLY happened.

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