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5thinvictus · 8 years ago

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The Strain 4x05: A Write Up

Disclaimer: The point of this is not to belittle or undermine anyone else’s interpretation or headcanon of the episode. The point of this is simply to get it off my chest. This is in no way an attack or a troll. It’s simply what I do after episodes, I just normally attach it with GIFs.

As MANY people in this fandom already know ... I’ve never been a Tasa shipper, but I accepted the relationship as a part of Quinlan’s life which allowed him to grow and feel.

I admit, full-heartedly, that The Strain is no longer a good TV show, but until now it was a HELL of a guilty pleasure. I watched it despite some part of myself understanding that it was bad, because I dug some of the characters and actors. I spent a LOT OF TIME pushing the show and creating content for it. I even spent nearly all of my time at SDCC doing so, knowing it wasn’t critically acclaimed or anything. However, this past episode wasn’t a guilty pleasure. This past episode, the creators actually insulted my intelligence a bit.

From the truck action (there were a few cool bits, but i.e. Quinlan falling to the truck for SEVERAL seconds, as the strigoi looks CONFUSED at him before getting cut in half. The wire was REALLY high up. It would have been so much cooler if Q had ducked under it at the perfect time) to the flashbacks to the unnecessary meandering dialogue/romance with Eph and his new lady friend (did we need that scene at all? There are only 5 episodes left and … what was the point of it all?), to Eph just letting that woman go to become the Master and know his location ... the writing and direction in this episode was scattered all over the place. ಠ_ಠ

I could likely go on for pages about the rest of the episode, but I’m not going to rant about anything in this post except the flashbacks and their personal impact on me.

Quinlan: out of Character? Perhaps ... Perhaps not.

The Strain is a bit notorious for not being able to keep any of their own characters straight. I think this might be because of the wide range of writers and I know this happens on TV shows because of that fact, but they flip-flop back in forth for everyone, with the only exceptions being Abraham and possibly Mr. Quinlan. Until now.

The flashbacks.

Very simply put, I would have accepted this all better if he was younger. That’s the crux of my problem with it. Not Louisa. Not that Louisa isn’t Tasa. Not that they’ve, once again, changed canon. I’ve read some arguments for this behavior that conjecture he was just "curious" and he had talked about being “curious” in Rome two thousand years prior. But that was when he was very young. If you follow the canon timeline, he was in his late teens or early 20s in that scene.

That was when he was STILL trying to figure out humans. In this scene, he is 1848 years old (1888 A.D. - 40 A.D.). Take a moment to fathom that number. 1848 years old. If human’s average lifespan is around 70 … that is a little more than 26 lifetimes. At this point in the story, he has lived 26 lifetimes. He has traveled the world, leading the life of a demigod undead hunter, integrating with societies all over. He was a gladiator, which meant he was likely used for sexual purposes. He would not be as curious as a schoolboy, or confused by a woman painting his face. Makeup is not a new invention. Over 1848 years, it’s ludicrous to think that he hasn’t TRIED to paint the strigoi out of himself before.

What I find the most hard to swallow about this scene is not that they replaced Tasa with Louisa or that they gave him a woman at all. I don’t care either way. It is that he acted like a child for most of the flashback. When the little girl ran in and met him, he acted like he’d never met a child before … Wait what?

So, if they had done this "love story" in Rome or sometime around that part of his past, I would have actually bought into it, because he was still on his first lifetime and he was still trusting, and curious, and childish, and … naive.

This leads me back to my headcanon about it. Louisa and her daughter remind him of Tasa and Sura, so he bought into the "romance," or the “idea” of it. He’s been alone for a long time and he’s grown tired and this woman pops out of nowhere and offers him a chance to revisit what he had lost so long ago, then maybe he would be more open to … moving in with her after a couple of days / weeks? (I agree with @theforgottensheikah on this. I fully understand they are rushed, but some kind of montage would have made it seem like more time had passed? The quickness was terribly OoC).

Expectation vs. Execution: The scene itself

Intimacy + Bonding vs. Strange Stinger Kink + Porno Moans

IMHO, this was weird. He’s feeding on her. There’s no kiss, there’s no intimacy, there’s no bonding.

They could have made that scene very sexy and made the audience feel the emotion that was supposedly there (even with the unbelievable Quinlan makeup) by having something like:

Forehead or nose touches (I fucking love these, sorry).

Quinlan refusing at first, telling her he didn’t want to hurt her, expressing concern for her.

Kissing … good lord, some kind of kissing.

Twitching and rattling with excitement over just the possibility of touching her.

I’m not daft or a fool. I get what they were trying to convey, but it fell flat. I’m not a crazy fangirl because I was more than open to see this. I DIDN’T MISS THE POINT AT ALL. But I wanted to see some intimacy. I wanted to see how Rupert would convey that intimacy. I was excited to possibly see Quinlan kissing someone.

IT … FELL … FLAT and then they made it weird.

He drinks her. Hmmm. To him, humans are food. To him, humans have always been food. 1848 years of food food food. I get that she’s got the kink and he conforms to it, but that’s not his kink He does what she asks but I’ve never been a huge vampire/blood play fan because … You like a good steak, but that doesn’t mean you want to fuck the cow, and if you are fucking the cow, doesn’t mean you are eating them at the same time. This disappointed me because it’s an incredibly clichéd vampire trope and I would hope that someone like Quinlan would be beyond it, especially at his age.

Also, I want to point out something particularly poignant here. Given how he reacted to the Master reminding him of Ancharia in 2x07, her death is still very much an open wound. So, I would think that being encouraged to drink from Louisa would be uncomfortable for him, to say the least. Since the Master forced him to drink the last known human that he cared for to survive, this scenario should actually be quite traumatic to him.

And, why would he want to drink someone he loves, especially after she just told him he was more beautiful as a human than a strigoi? Isn’t that confusing? She just painted him up like a human and then told him to drink her like a strigoi. I digress ...

When I watched this part of the episode, I wasn’t crying, I wasn’t angry, I wasn’t even cringing. When I watched this part of the episode, I started laughing. This is no exaggeration. Even my husband asked me what I was ‘cackling’ about because these flashbacks played as if I was watching them re-enact a bad fanfiction. After it was over, I was more embarrassed and a bit creeped out about being a fan than angry or even disappointed.

What ran through my head was:

Oh good god. Is this what the show runners think of us?

Someone who accepts him in all of his unique beauty vs. Someone who tells him he needs to be human to be beautiful

I don’t need to touch on this subject as many already have. Instead, I’ll let Guillermo del Toro speak for all of us:

Well, I have said this in the past, so I hope i don’t bore you by repeating it, but I think that we live or die under the tyranny of perfection. Socially, we are pushed towards being perfect. Physically, beautiful to conform to standards that are cruel and uncommon, to behave and lead our lives in a certain way, to demonstrate to the world that we are happy and healthy and all full of sunshine. We are told to always smile and never sweat, by multiple commercials of shampoo or beer.

And I feel that the most achievable goal of our lives is to have the freedom that imperfection gives us.

And there is no better patron saint of imperfection than a monster.

We will try really hard to be angels, but I think that a balanced, sane life is to accept the monstrosity in ourselves and others as part of what being human is. Imperfection, the acceptance of imperfection, leads to tolerance and liberates us from social models that I find horrible and oppressive.

— Guillermo del Toro, on why he has always been intrigued by monsters

Passive vs. Submissive vs. Dominant

Quinlan was uncharacteristically passive in this episode. HE WAS THE SEXY LAMP THIS TIME. From Ancharia to Rome to modern day, he’s never been this passive. Even when he was working with Abe, he was still contributing and arguing.

This breaks the continuity of his characterization.

Aside

For those comparing him to Dracula AND/OR Lestat and using that as a basis for belittling others into loving what they saw: I didn’t pick Mr. Quinlan because he reminded me of other critically acclaimed vampires. I picked Mr. Quinlan as my favorite fictional character because he was uniquely interesting and beautiful.

I chose him because of how intriguing and new he looked, how he acted and how Mr. Penry-Jones portrayed him. I picked him because he was different than any other vampire/dhampir/nephilim I had ever seen. Comparing what they did to him with other vampires, regardless of how I feel about those other character, actually cheapens his uniqueness for me.

Also, Gary Oldman was a shapeshifter in that movie and thus, it was well within my suspension of disbelief that he could change the contours of his face to look entirely human.

Now ... Understanding Your Fanbase

Part of the reason I, and many more fans, like the character of Quinlan is because he doesn’t conform to modern beauty standards. I loved that he wasn’t your average handsome, makeup-laden (cough - Twilight) vampire hunk. I loved that he was unique and complex. They took one of the most important aspects of his character and they wanted us to buy into a rushed and botched romance with a woman who wanted to fundamentally change him. Tasa fan or not, it’s very clear why this bothered people.

Would you and SHOULD YOU be with someone who convinced you that you needed to get plastic surgery? I guess, since this is made by ‘Hollywood’, then this is an acceptable thing in that space?

In Conclusion: 4x05

No, we did not miss the point. No, we aren’t being stupid fangirls who don’t want to share Quinlan. The fact is, we just aren’t that gullible. Many of the people in this fandom have written their own fics, whether it be explicit or not, whether it be with an original character or Tasa or another canon character.

An impressive amount of us have actually sat down and put pen to paper in an attempt to characterize Quinlan. This is a difficult thing to do, because we like to think that he’s incredibly complex and mysterious. But, everyone is free to have their own interpretation of him.

Mini rant: Why does The Strain always make their female characters so sexually aggressive? ��From Nora ripping Eph’s clothes off in the middle of an episode, to Anya being the one to invite Gus into her warm bosom, to Dutch VERY AGGRESSIVELY seducing both Fet and Eph, to Louisa begging for it? Is this really the only type of woman that exist in this world?

In Further Conclusion: Quinlan and The Strain Fandom

I’ve never been a superfan of anything in my life and, while it has been a phenomenally creative outlet, the toxicity and ugliness of the current fandom makes me realize that I’ve got to get back to being an adult now. At the end of the day, it’s just any old terrible TV show and they’ve decided to remove the one thing that was inspiring me to continue watching and the bragging that it’s only going to get worse only tires me more.

It’s absolutely no secret that if the Strain didn’t have Quinlan in it, I would have stopped watching it halfway through season 3. It was all over the place, from the plot holes, strange character direction, and … of course … the treatment of women.

On that note, allow me a tiny tangent. Something has seemed significantly off about the Strain since it came back together to film Season 4. Speculation on the cause of this tepidness shown from the creators, crew, and actors has driven mad speculation throughout the remaining members of the dwindling fandom.

What was going on that no one wanted to say anything? Was it that good that they didn’t want to spoil anything or … was it that bad that people are actually embarrassed about their contractual involvement? Why wasn’t the cast promoting it very much anymore? Why wasn’t the social media team themselves promoting it very much? Why weren’t there any teasers or anything to drive anticipation. And … most importantly … where the fuck did Guillermo del Toro go?!?

While we’re desperate to know why everything seemingly fizzled out, as just ‘simple fans’ who’s opinions don’t matter, we will never be privy to such information. If anyone has any insight into this and they’d like to share with me as a parting gift, please do so. It would be a private conversation.

I’ve been putting far too much passion into promoting and generating content for this show and after the atrocity that was the last episode (and the manner in which people reacted to criticism of the episode), I’ll be taking an indefinite hiatus from further involvement in this fandom. (Indefinite: lasting for an unknown or unstated length of time.) After all, I’m just a ‘simple fan’, and the only way that I can really show my disdain for the misdirection is by boycotting further direct involvement in the fandom.

WAIT! WAIT! WHAT ABOUT THE GODDAMN FIC!?!

。゜゜(´Ｏ｀)°゜。

I do not regret the time I’ve put into this as it gave me the confidence to reach beyond what I thought I was capable of and it drove me to start writing finally. I don’t even regret that the Strain was terrible in Season 3, because the best fanfic actually comes out of terrible shows (for obvious reasons). And regardless of what happens next in the show (which I am politely declining to watch further), no one can EVER take away the headcanon that I’ve created for myself and my version of Quinlan. Overall, I am incredibly proud of the characters that I built and the fandom that I have for my own interpretation.

With that being said, the latest episode was amazingly uninspiring and it kinda murdered my muse a bit. I will see what I can do about that. I promise. And if there is enough interest in me continuing it, I will.

Now, my fierce and lovely fandom … prepare yourselves for one final and epic commission for Straining for Originality. I’d wanted to wait until the chapter, but fuck it all …

Gif by @quintustheinvictus

#the strain #quinlan #Mr. Quinlan #quintus sertorius #the born #rant #the strain rant #the strain review #review

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