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Captain James Flint in Every Episode: II.

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Black Sails Re-Watch, Episode 5:

There are so many things happening in this episode that I could talk about!  It’s tempting to try to fit them all in: Eleanor’s drive to have everything, even to the point of what’s beginning to feel, by this episode, like her inevitable undoing; the slow unfolding of the Billy-Flint-Miranda plot; the glimpses of the relationship between Vane, Anne, and Jack (the way that Anne and Vane are often more closely linked, in thought and opinion, than either of them are with Jack, as well as the familiarity between both Jack and Anne with Vane, or Charles, as Jack calls him in this episode).

Ultimately, though, I decided to give the relationship between Anne and Max a bit of attention.  This is the first time, I believe, that we see them in a scene alone together.  It’s interesting, the way it’s handled, and it’s powerful.

What I find especially interesting about it is that Max is clearly placed in this incredibly vulnerable situation -- I won’t go into it because it could be triggering, but the point is that she’s in a vulnerable position.  And then there’s Anne, this violent, sometimes even vicious, person.  We’re already surprised to see her be somewhat tender here.  She takes over Max’s care and does so specifically to be gentle toward her.  This is unlike anything we’ve seen from Anne up to this point.

So her tenderness, her gentleness, with Max is already a departure, but it’s pushed even further still when in the end it’s Max who does the attacking.  She confronts Anne about this sudden show of compassion, reminding her that it was Anne who “threw [Max] to [the crew] in the first place.”  And then the truly surprising thing happens: Anne flinches away from this fact.  We can see that it upsets her to think about, that she won’t deny responsibility but that it hurts her.  In other words, when we enter this scene, we see aggressive Anne and vulnerable Max, but by the time the scene ends, their roles have switched completely.

This surprises both the viewer and Max, and it serves as another example of how the show is constantly working to overthrow your expectations and complicate every situation.  But in the context of what is yet to come, it’s an important, powerful moment that shows that there’s something different here, something different happening between these two characters.  Max brings something out in Anne that is new.  Maybe it’s only in retrospect, but it seems that this scene is the beginning of something.

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Black Sails Re-Watch, Episode 4:

There are a lot of things that I could talk about for this episode.  The slow revelation of the relationship between Flint and Miranda was a strong contender, but I also thought about going a little more in-depth on Jack and Anne and their relationship to Vane, especially now that he no longer has a real crew or a ship.  In the end, though, it seemed sort of wrong to have come this far and still not dedicated much thought to John Silver.  Especially since, in one way, this story is more his than anyone’s.

Of everyone in the show, three characters are taken from Treasure Island: Flint, Billy, and Silver.  Knowing this, even though there are obviously many other things going on, I personally find it impossible not to at least kind of think of Black Sails as a Treasure Island prequel.  By the start of the novel, Flint is dead, Billy dies very early on, and Long John Silver is a major character throughout the whole thing.  So, for me, even before Silver grew to be one of the most interesting characters in Black Sails (to me at least) I knew to pay particular attention to him.  I wanted to catch the sprinklings of foreshadowing.  I wanted to see how the show would turn this guy into the pirate I’d read about.  It seemed like it would be a long journey.

But right away, what the viewer learns about Silver is that he is 100% out for himself, and in order to save himself, he’ll do anything.  In the first episode, we see him kill a man for a piece of paper -- a paper he doesn’t even know the importance of -- just because it might improve his chances.  And despite these dubious circumstances, he manages to talk himself out of the situation and into a position in Flint’s crew.

That’s the second thing we learn about him: that in the service of keeping himself alive and thriving, he’ll tell absolutely anyone absolutely anything.  And he’ll make it believable.  John Silver is a weaver of tales (interesting especially since, as I’ve mentioned before, I think Black Sails is acutely aware of itself as a story about stories).  He knows what affects people, can read whether he needs to appeal to emotion or logic, and he can make up lies on the spot -- whatever kind he needs to get himself out of whatever scrap he finds himself in.  It almost never fails him, which is one of the things that makes the character compelling, right?  Because as the viewer, you know what he’s up to, but just like Flint and Billy and everyone else, you’re taken in by him.

What struck me in this episode, though, is that Silver doesn’t just lie all the time, or lie compulsively.  He also knows when to tell the truth.  In this episode, he tells Flint that he saw Billy talking to man who ultimately ends up crushed by the ship, which is true.  Flint tells Silver that he doesn’t care, that he knows Silver is trying to drive a wedge between Flint and his men (because Silver is far from the only clever character).  And then later, when Flint decides that he wants to know after all, Silver tells the truth again, even though all he knows is that it sounded like they were talking about a woman, and that her name was Barlow.  Even though it’s not information, the truth of it affects Flint more than made-up details would.

Despite his inclination to lie and tell stories, Silver doesn’t do it blindly.  This exchange shows that he can tell when the truth has power, and he’s just as willing to use that when it serves him, which I think just makes his character a little more complex, and makes him feel a little more real.  In a way, it makes me trust him more as a character, even though I know I can’t trust him as a person in the show.

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Black Sails S1 E3 Reactions

Note: I’m just now reading the show description; I should probably read Treasure Island, huh?

☼lordy every time someone says “arca de lima” I die over how pretty Spanish is and how much I miss home

☼this intro reminds me of Ireland I’m just gonna be nostalgic this whole episode apparently (but actually it reminds me of the Viking fjords and towers of dubh linn/Dublin, appropriately and similarly named “black pool”)

☼oh right Flint went home at the end of last ep, that was nice I like that

☼I like Miranda a lot

☼ is Silver lying about knowing the last piece of the schedule??

☼I also like Billy a lot

☼….Billy is intentionally setting Silver up in the situation he warned about so he can be proven right?? damn next level petty

At this point my internet became entirely unreliable, so I stopped and read the Treasure Island Wikipedia page. Damn, Billy ends up first mate and Silver ends up quartermaster? Flint dies from drinking too much rum? Damn.

☼Silver is still a little shit, but he’s growing on me

☼ as much as I don’t want Vain around, it is the better choice :/

☼I just really freaking love the quartermaster (what is his name why do I not know yet!)

☼this music is so good

☼what the fuck of course Vain has Max fucking hell OH NO POOR GIRL WHAT THE FUCK

☼oh no oh no oh no oh no

☼ I can’t wait for Max to become a badass pirate herself this is rough

☼these sex scenes are always filmed in really interesting ways I’m gonna have to write meta about it eventually

☼oh shit is right oh shit oh shit oh shit

☼I’ve gotta admire how opportunistic these people are way to turn very strong emotion and a horrible situation into something useful for the quest

☼goodbye Vain no captaincy for u

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Black Sails Re-Watch, Episode 3:

This episode is such a good example of both how complex and how changing this show is.  I think that Black Sails does something really interesting a lot of the time, in that its form often imitates its ideas.  One example that I’m sure I’ll talk much more about as I move through the series is its focus on stories and storytelling.  Even in these first three episodes we’ve seen that -- in the power that Flint gives to the idea of the Urca by telling the story of it, in the way Silver is already able to manipulate people by telling them what they want to hear and making it believable.  In this episode itself, there’s a great quote from Hornigold: “No matter how many lies we tell ourselves, or stories we convince ourselves we’re a part of, we’re all just thieves awaiting a noose.”

Black Sails is, from the beginning, not only aware that it’s a story, but that it’s a story about stories, inspired by a story.  It’s fascinating, and I’m sure I’ll have fun talking more about it later, but while it does get brought up in this episode, I think the focus here is more on another way in which form borrows from content.

Nassau is, throughout the series, repeatedly characterized as being changing.  Already at this point in the show, we’ve heard Max say to Eleanor that “this place is just sand.  It cannot love you back.”  Everything about the world in which these people live is unstable.  Some of them thrive in that instability (Vane) while some of them want to find some way to make this world more lasting and reliable (Flint and Eleanor), but all of them recognize that Nassau and all that it represents are not only literally, physically changeable (by nature of the ocean and the fact that they live on a small island) but politically changeable as well.  This is an island once colonized and which now exists between worlds -- the touch of that colonization has not been purged, and yet the rule is missing.  That’s a state of being that all of the major players in the show know is volatile.

What’s interesting to me is that the show takes care to echo that background instability and volatility in the actual events of the show.  As we see in this episode, alliances form and crumble in the course of hours in the story -- mere minutes for the viewer.  Characters make choices that seem utterly wild, but that make sense for what you know of them.  The dynamics of lovers, of enemies, of entire crews can take 180-degree turns in one single scene.  In the climactic moment of episode three -- and I mean literally, just in that one scene that lasts only a few minutes -- we see Eleanor and Vane go from lovers to enemies, the new alliance between Flint and Vane crumbles as Vane’s entire crew abandons him for Flint, and Max chooses to go with the now crew-less Vane.

The world that these characters live in is built on sand, and as a result everything they know is just as shifting, just as capable of drastic change in a short amount of time.  And so for the viewer, the story follows the same pattern -- harsh, changing, and full of surprises.

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Black Sails S1 E1-2 Reactions

Note: these reactions are a post-date post. I had started the series prior to being asked to liveblog, but it feels strange to start on E3.

In no particular order, my thoughts:

☼possibly Eleanor has the best entrance of any tv show of all time. damn. I need to use that line.

☼followed by all that indecisive vulnerability? heck yes??

☼Flint is a pretentious academian frick

☼his first mate is So Good, So Pure

☼their accountant and I are one and the same. I love him

☼shit Max is also So Good, So Pure

☼is that Anne Bonney??? she is currently the opposite of tits out death, how will she get from here to there ??

☼LesBIaNs?? I love Max okay

☼Silver is clever I’ll give him that but also what a little shit

☼okay all of that punching and blood was 110% unnecessary yikes it splattered the camera

☼Eleanor why are you like this. Eleanor no. ELEANOR NO.

☼fucking christ you just condemned your lover, my girl Max, to more sex slavery, what the fuck is wrong with you

☼Max’s true friend is the blonde girl who tries to get Silver to pay for her time in some way and also who distracts the guards. love her.

☼side note a bit, I’m loving how they’re handling sex work in this? like it isn’t glorified by any means, but it very much is a day at the office, no shame, very practical, and any ~sexiness~ is clearly portrayed as part of the job skill set

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Does anyone have thoughts on the first few episodes that they’d like to share?  Any gushing emotions or contemplations?  Is anyone watching the series for the first time, or going through it again?

I’ve re-watched the first two episodes at this point, and I’m hoping to get through another one or two tonight, and I’d love to hear people’s thoughts!

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Black Sails Re-Watch, Episode 2:

My notes from re-watching episode 2 are a bit more scattered than they were for episode 1, where I felt like I had a clear focus.  During the second episode, I took notes on how I felt drawn to pay particular attention to certain relationships, the idea that I’ve grown to love some characters not just despite their flaws but sometimes even for them, and the fact that some characters’ goals have changed so drastically by the end of the show.

But one figure kept popping up: Captain Vane.  And I think that his prominence in this episode was intentional.  He was established in the first episode as a badass who relies on brute strength where Flint relies on intelligence and reason.  I think the writers wanted to, as quickly as possible, show us that not only is there more than that to Vane, but that his place as Flint’s foil is more complex than that as well.

In this episode we see many more sides to Vane.  We see that he is not just captain to Jack and Anne, but that he has a deeper and more personal connection to them.  Jack doesn’t cower when Vane confronts him, but stands his ground and even implies that the crew would agree with him over Vane.  And Anne neither blindly stands with Jack nor does she side with Vane out of respect or subservience, but clearly has her own thoughts on the matter even if she’s not especially moved to voice them.  The scene where the three of them discuss trading the pearls for the information on the Urca gold shows a complex, three-way dynamic of which Vane is an equal member, not a clear leader.

We also see uncertainty in Vane.  He’s not sure if Jack is right or not.  He clearly takes Jack’s point that the crew would want the information, and it seems that he himself agrees that it might be worth the risk.  But ultimately, he doesn’t know.  We see him questioning -- a couple of times -- what the right answer is going to be.  And we see him listen to those around him; he takes their counsel.

Compare that to Flint, who is so sure of himself, so sure that he can accomplish these impossible tasks, that he boldly scorns anyone who suggests otherwise.  Now, even though in the first episode Flint is presented as the civilized one, so to speak, and Vane as the brute-force-man, the writers have immediately turned those expectations on their head.  Vane listens and can be reasoned with; Flint is so sure of himself and his own ability that he won’t hear anyone who disagrees with him.  (And just to add a bit of irony, their choices work out for neither of them.)

The show clearly wants to establish Vane as the Other Big Pirate Captain in Nassau with this episode, but that’s more than what’s happening with his character.  Nothing in Black Sails is ever simple, and they want to make sure you know that the rule holds true for Vane too -- for himself, and his status as Flint’s opposite.

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Black Sails Re-Watch, Episode 1:

All I could think about while I watched this episode was how each character was introduced (and about how each had grown and changed by the end, four seasons later).  In retrospect, it was easy to notice the choices that the writers made, and what they made them for.

At first I thought it was a bit strange that the series opens with Silver rather than Flint (and interesting that the first time the viewer sees Silver, he’s running away from a fight, literally hiding while his fellow crew members are fighting to the death).  But then I realized that we were being introduced to Flint the same way that any other newcomer in this scene would have been introduced to him: through his name, and through the terror it invoked.

One of the things I’ve always loved about this show is that they don’t bother to explain anything to the viewer.  You come in either knowing that Flint is the fictional pirate captain for whom the infamous treasure of Treasure Island is named, or you don’t.  But they introduce him in such a way that you don’t need to know that.  The viewer can plainly see that whoever this man is, he’s good at what he does, the merchant crew knows who he is, and everyone knows to be afraid of him.

Then when Flint finally does come in, we see him as powerful, because he’s been successful, but also because he acts with reason.  He is not presented as bloodthirsty or overtaken by his passions (as later in the episode, we learn that he can be).  The writers have clearly chosen to have the viewer’s first impression of Flint be that he can act reasonably, responsibly, and be in control of his men.

I noticed that so many of the characters were clearly introduced putting their best foot forward.  Billy is calm, rational, friendly and clearly likable, but also loyal to a fault.  Eleanor is strong and witty, but brash and capable of overstepping.  Max is fiercely intelligent and good at working in the shadows.  Jack is cunning, Vane is powerful without needing to try, Anne is fearsome and mysterious.

But it’s not just the people who are introduced in particularly careful ways.  I specifically noticed that Nassau and the idea of piracy were given this attention as well.  Nassau is called “home” the first time we see it, and the writers make sure that the viewer knows right away that this is free land with no colonial rule -- and that the inhabitants like it that way.  It’s not presented as chaos, but freedom.  And piracy, after its initial introduction of terror is, like Flint, shown to be reasonable, even practical.  Again it comes down to freedom for the individuals, and the viewer is given to know right away that the process is a democratic one, even if each person acts in their own interest, sometimes through deceit.

The episode is clearly a first episode, taking care to set up all the major players and all of the major stages, making sure that the viewer has at least a basic idea of how life works in this pirate-run town.  But it’s interesting to me to consider the choices that the writers and actors made on how to introduce these people and places to the viewer for the first time.  It’s like they’re saying, “We know that when you got here, you thought things were going to be a certain way.  Well, they’re not going to be that way, and now that we’ve set you straight, we’ve got a story to tell.”

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Embarkation

I finished the fourth and final season of Black Sails nearly a week ago so, naturally, I can’t stop thinking about it, and longing for it, and wanting to live through it all over again.  I’ve also found myself wanting to write about it -- not just about the characters, not about their lives before or after the show takes place as I might do in fiction, but more about how the show works.  How the story works.

And since I’m never satisfied until I’ve got two jobs and a project to work on, I decided that this was a perfect opportunity.  I came up with the idea of re-watching the whole series and blogging about it as I go, writing one post per episode about whatever strikes my fancy.

My idea is that I won’t watch the show idly, despite having seen it before.  I want to pay very close and particular attention and write my responses (because they will be responses, really, rather than reviews) accordingly.

As far as spoilers go, I can’t promise to avoid them altogether because I expect that sometimes I’ll want to comment on how an episode plays into the larger story.  However, I will always write a “spoiler-free” section of each post (with spoilers only up until the episode to which the post is dedicated) and after that section is over, if I’m going to talk about later points in the series, I will clearly mark the change and put the rest of the post under a read more.  That way people who have already watched the show can continue reading, and any of those who are reading along as they watch for the first time can avoid spoilers for coming episodes.

I’m excited to relive this beautiful story and share my thoughts.  I have no idea if anyone else will be interested in reading, but I want to say that I’m absolutely interested in others’ thoughts and feelings and opinions!  I want to welcome anyone to reply to posts, send asks and messages, submit their own responses, etc.  Please feel completely free to interact with this blog in any way you want to (being respectful of spoilers for others, of course) so that we can have some discussion!  I would love nothing more than that.

So those are my ideas for what this blog will be.  If you decide to join me in some way for the ride, I’m thrilled to have you!