“This ends when I grant them my forgiveness, not the other way around.” - how a character’s backstory can improve a show

So. I’ve just finished Black Sails. I know, I know, the show’s been over for a while now, but only now did I watch the last season. When I started watching Black Sails back in 2015, I was mostly put off by the violence and the characters whose actions seemingly didn’t make any sense (I actually mentioned it in a post on my other blog once). But fans of the show generally agree that the first season is the weakest and you just have to get through it to get to a truly brilliant show. And what do you know? They are completely and utterly correct.

Spoilers, of course, for all of Black Sails!

The last two seasons in particular have such brilliant writing, acting, and cinematography. And I could probably go on and on about the fascinating parallels, themes, character constellations/developments and much more, but what I’m here to talk about today is how the backstory they gave Captain Flint (Toby Stephens) made his actions and words so much more meaningful and intense and emotional and the show as a whole so much better.

Captain Flint is known for being the pirate who buried the treasure chest of riches hidden on an island that sparks the whole of the novel Treasure Island. (Several other characters from the book appear as well, such as Long John Silver, Isaak Hands, and Billy Bones, as well as historical figures like Jack Rackham and Anne Bonny.) There isn’t much known about Captain Flint in the novel. He was a ruthless pirate, he accumulated a great deal of wealth, he did not trust anyone, one day he died.

Black Sails fills that gap with a rich backstory that makes Flint a complex and tragic character. Because before he was Captain Flint, ruthless pirate, he was James McGraw, an officer of the royal navy. He fell in love with Thomas Hamilton, the son of a prestigious English family, and was happy for a short while until his love was taken away from him. This experience led him to turn against England as a whole, a nation that not only robbed him of his love but also declared his love to be monstrous and vile.

“They took everything from us. And then they called me a monster. The moment I sign that pardon, the moment I ask for one, I proclaim to the world that they were right. This ends when I grant them my forgiveness, not the other way around.”

Instead of accepting this designation, Flint becomes a pirate intend on avenging what he believes to be his lover’s death and punishing England for calling him a monster for loving someone. His ruthlessness in his fight against the crown, consequently, is much more relatable and understandable. It is informed not by greed, but by pain.

When he talks about being painted as an evil villain, it is obvious that it does not only refer to his actions as a pirate but also to his sexual orientation. His words, therefore, hold more weight since his actions could certainly be seen as villainous, his loving a man, however, is definitely not. Not only does this make his character much more sympathetic - as he was driven into piracy by bigoted and hateful people - and complex - because we as an audience can understand where his violence comes from - but also gives the narrative as a whole a consistent theme.

“They paint the world full of shadows and then tell their children to stay close to the light. Their light. Their reasons, their judgements. Because in the darkness, there be dragons. But it isn’t true. We can prove that it isn’t true. In the dark, there is discovery, there is possibility, there is freedom in the dark once someone has illuminated it. And who has been so close to doing it as we are right now?... All this will be for nothing. We will have been for nothing. Defined by their histories, distorted to fit into their narrative until all that is left of us are the monsters in the stories they tell their children.”

In the last two seasons the pirates ally themselves with a slave revolt. The struggle for Nassau has moved from being solely about the pirates’ self-interest to an almost revolutionary effort against the English oppressors. The treasure chest is no longer simply wealth, it is intimately connected with freedom. Literal freedom for the former slaves, freedom to live on one’s own terms and not on terms defined by a government that despises you for others.

What Flint refers to in his speech quoted above is so much more meaningful and emotional because it comes from a gay character. Him condemning the English’s judgements of the world would ring hollow if it only referred to his piracy and related activities, but because it also refers to his experiences as a gay man, the possibility that lies in the darkness, is the possibility of a new way to live life free from persecution.

I haven’t even talked about Anne Bonny and Max and how their relationship made me cry more than once and how women actually get to do things and have agency and be people. It’s a good show, is what I’m saying, and their decision to include lgbt themes is a decisive factor in that.

Satori over and out

Corporate greed and fan apathy

aka why I couldn't care less about things I used to love

Despite the general title, this is going to be a rather personal examination of my feelings towards big franchises I used to love. It is, however, still a more general condemnation of the detrimental effects capitalism has on the industry.

Look, I'm not going to pretend I'm not a sucker for these big franchises. I watched Game of Thrones as soon as it came out, buying two months of a streaming service I didn’t need just so I’d be able to see it immediately, I go to the midnight screenings of new Star Wars movies and I have watched a lot of MCU movies twice (or more) in the theater. I spend money on merchandise, go to exhibits and conventions. I loved everything to do with them. Note the tense.

Now, I don’t have to tell you that people are disappointed with GoT’s season 8 (it went so far that over one and a half million people signed a petition to remake it and most comments underneath a teaser for new GoT content were ‘I don’t even want this anymore’). And the opinions on The Last Jedi diverged drastically, so it’s probably no surprise that I’m on the fence with that (and didn’t even watch Solo yet). I might, however, do have to tell you that I heavily disliked both Infinity War and Endgame (Endgame even more than the other) and that their implications actually taint the whole of the MCU’s future for me. Personally I was never what one could call a Harry Potter fan, so I can’t really speak to that, but what I gather from friends who very much are Harry Potter fans and from youtubers I regularly watch, they feel similar about the newest Fantastic Beasts movie.

I know I’m not alone with my opinion and talking to people who feel the same way, I tried to examine where exactly my frustration comes from and what fosters this almost-resentment with franchises that used to be so dear to me.

The very simple and obvious reason would be that they are just not very good anymore. And while that is definitely true for the last GoT seasons as enough people have already elaborated on much more comprehensively than I ever could (see e.g. Lindsay Ellis' wonderful part one and part two examination), and I personally believe this to be the case for both Infinity War and Endgame, many people did credibly praise The Last Jedi (people also did praise Endgame but you know, that’s just not understandable for me). More importantly, however, a lack of quality hasn’t stopped me from enjoying the movies before. Some of the more mediocre Marvel movies are some of my favorites and I really do like the Star Wars prequel trilogy very much. Some of the bad writing that would be GoT’s downfall already plagued season six and season six is one of my favorites.

Flaws that didn’t bother me before, now made movies unwatchable. I didn’t even enjoy Spiderman: Far From Home very much and I was looking forward to it. It’s not very bad, it really isn’t and I was still unhappy with it. And I came out of Thor: the Dark World loving it, mind you. What is different now?

Well, for one thing, Disney owns Star Wars as well as Marvel and Disney does everything in its power to make as much money as possible while exploiting everyone they can. Disneyland entry is 149 $ now. That’s horrendous. They force movie theaters to pay more money for the privilege to show their movies. They put Endgame back in the theater with one (1) new scene just so they could break the previous record (held by the way by another of their properties). When I heard that news, I was so angry that I wished there was some way to get the money back I already payed to watch Endgame in theater. Not to mention the stuff that lead to Spiderman almost leaving the MCU. And I’m singling out Disney here, because they are such a vast and powerful company with ever decreasing competition and an ever increasing monopoly, but almost all of these companies producing movies and shows put their priorities in making as much money as possible.

Yes, I do realize that companies wanting to make money is an understandable standard that is utterly naturalized. What bothers me, however, is how obvious it has become that creativity and the passion for movie-making are only afterthoughts if that. They didn’t put Endgame back in theaters because the deleted scene changes the whole movie, they literally said it was to make more money. The ‘live-action’ Lion King has no new and interesting elements that would justify a remake, hell, the cgi doesn’t even look all that good. It did make good money, though, so there’s your justification.

People will watch these movies/shows despite vocally complaining about it, the companies know that. I am not exempt from this, not at all. Like I said, I saw Endgame twice, even though I already disliked Infinity War and knew I wouldn’t like whatever they come up with. These companies know how to hook their audiences. With nostalgia, as is the case with Disney’s live-action remakes and Harry Potter, with the promise of a satisfying end, as was the case with GoT and is currently the case with Star Wars, or with fanservice banking on fan devotion, what comic book movies and SW anthology movies rely on.

They do just enough to keep audiences voluntarily paying for more but not an iota beyond that.

When I can almost feel the studio’s desire to make as much money as possible dominating everything surrounding the production while I watch their end-product, this is where they lose me.

Sure, this feeling is less than concrete but it does have tangible symptoms that can be found in popular complaints about big franchises. Movies tend to follow a “winning formula” which makes them appear very similar in structure, character dynamics and optics. Studios play it safe which is the reason that most movies nowadays are prequels, sequels, remakes or adaptations as those are already proven to be successful. Shock moments and plot twists work to keep audiences engaged, so producers put as many of them as they can fit into a story if it makes sense or not and spoilers are treated as vicious crimes and movie-ruining in each and every case (hate to break it to you, but if a spoiler utterly ruins a story, it’s not a very good story). Studios produce so much content of a franchise that is proven to bring in money that audiences can feel overwhelmed or lose interest. Producers put in as much fanservice as possible where it makes sense and where it doesn't.

These are strategies that help the studios make the maximum amount of money, sure, as was yet again proven with Endgame, but all these strategies are also to the detriment of creativity in the industry in general and to the detriment of the quality of the specific products in particular, which in turn leads to people who were loyal fans previously descending into a sort of apathy or resignation concerning new releases.

What I’m trying to say is, capitalism is ruining the movie industry like it ruins everything. Thanks for coming to my TEDtalk.

Satori over and out

 

P.S. Literally me: