#peter ellison | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

goneseriesanalysis · 8 months

Text

Peter Ellison

So, finally, here is my Little Pete analysis. This one was particularly hard to write because his characterisation (or should I say lack of) really really upsets me. This is now a Peter Ellison fan account because he just deserves all the love I can give him forever. That being said, I want to give a few disclaimers before I actually get into this analysis.

Firstly, I wanted to keep this analysis solely focused on Little Pete, with as little focus on other characters as possible. I’m going to be talking about the poor care that Little Pete received in this book (alongside the r-slur scene) and how this will have affected him. But, I am in no way blaming Astrid for this. Astrid was a child who loved Little Pete and who was doing her absolute best to take care of him. However, her effort does not negate the fact that Little Pete’s care was less than ideal and that this would have affected him severely. Because of this, it may seem like I’m blaming Astrid or making her out to be a bad person, but I promise I’m not. I just don’t want to be defending her every other line when I should be focusing on Little Pete. I will however be going into more detail on her side of things in a later post about their relationship.

Secondly, this analysis will not be as in-depth as my previous ones. There are two reasons for this. One being that I simply do not have the time and two being that I am not entirely sure that it is my place to do such an analysis on this character. I know that a lot of people have issues with MG’s portrayal of Little Pete and I do not want to take away from people’s concerns. That being said, I do not think that it was his intention to be ableist or to hurt anyone when he was writing this character. But intent doesn’t cancel out what he actually wrote.

Now, onto the analysis.

Old Opinion: Honestly, I didn’t really have an opinion on Little Pete. He seemed more like a plot point to me than a character and so that’s really just how I viewed him.

New Opinion: After re-reading the first book, I unfortunately still cannot seem to care for Little Pete. I wish MG had gone into more depth and written him as an actual character. There is just so much wasted potential.

How Little Pete is Viewed by Other Characters in The Text and in The Text Itself

This is a title that I haven’t done before in any of my analyses, but I thought it was important to do this for Little Pete as a lot of the issues that people have with his character stem from how he is treated by others, and how their actions seemed to be excused by the text. This will be a much shorter analysis than any other that I have done. One because there is not as much to analyse, and two because I feel like it is not my place to do a deep dive on a character who’s experiences I do not understand.

Something that I did notice quite a lot during my re-read of Gone (and my re-read of my re-read) is that MG seems to have done a pretty good job at researching the technical aspects of autism (trigger phrases, types of therapy, possible modifications needed), but he seems to neglect the actual thoughts, feelings, and emotions of autistic people. It almost seems as if Little Pete is a walking NHS page, instead of, you know, a person. But let’s first talk about the technical aspects.

The first introduction that we get to Little Pete, is through his environment rather than through any mention or meeting of the character himself. This occurs on page 17: “But everything was put away. There was nothing out that could be broken. The tables had little plastic cushions on the corners. The electrical sockets had childproof covers. In the kitchen the knives were in a glass-front cupboard with a childproof lock on the handle. There were child proof knobs on the stove.” Now while we don’t get confirmation until a few sentences later, we can already assume that these precautions have not been made for Astrid. However, my first assumption would not be that they are for a quiet, often unresponsive child – which is who Little Pete seems to be. Rather, I would assume the opposite – that this was for an unruly and destructive child, one who likes to grab and touch and move things. Little Pete is shown to do none of those things, in fact the only time that he is seen to be destructive when using his powers, and even then, he is only destructive in very stressful situations. So, to me, it seems odd that these measures are taken for Little Pete. They don’t seem to fit with his personality at all, making it seem like this choice was made based off of stereotypes, rather than made with the character of Little Pete in mind.

This does not necessarily mean, however, that the fault is with the writing. In fact, I quite like the idea that the reason the Ellison’s are making precautions that do not seem to align with Little Pete’s needs is because they themselves are ignorant to his needs. While the plot does not allow us to see Pete’s parents interact with Little Pete, we are given the impressions that they treat him as a nuisance more than anything else and this, paired with the time within which the book is set, makes it easy for me to believe that they have little interest in their son. This impression is also given when Astrid first makes reference to Little Pete’s powers, “He seems able to do a lot of things. Mostly we’re good, the two of us. Mostly he doesn’t really notice me. But once, I was doing his therapy, working with this picture book we work on sometimes. I show him a picture and try to get him to say the word and, I don’t know, I guess I was in a bad mood that day. I guess I was too rough taking his hand and putting his finger on the picture like you’re supposed to do. He got mad. And then, I wasn’t there anymore. Once second, I was in his room, and then all of a sudden, I was in my room.” (Page 133)

Why is Astrid doing these activities and not his parents? It seems like the parentification of Astrid began long before the FAYZ, and Little Pete’s neglect seems to be a huge part of his character. This, coupled with the fact that he himself is unable to communicate with the characters in any way that they understand, means that we unfortunately do not get as much of an in- depth characterisation as we do with others. This, of course, is something that Michael Grant had been criticised for many times. However, while it is not my place to tell people that they cannot be upset by this representation (because of course you can) I feel like I am able to bring about another perspective: that the reason Little Pete is written in this way is because this is how other characters see him. Seen as we can only see this world through their eyes, it makes sense that the impression we get of Little Pete is not one that is ideal.

Little Pete and His Importance to the Plot:

Now, to say that Little Pete is a character who is neglected so much, he is one of the main plot points within the novel. In fact, I would argue that especially in the first book, he is more plot point than actual character and here is why:

One – Little Pete is the driving force behind Sam and Astrid’s relationship, Edilio’s joining of the group and Sam and Quinn’s falling out.

Two – Little Pete is the reason that Sam won.

Three – Little Pete is the reason for the FAYZ in the first place.

If you ask me, those are three pretty major plot points that all come to be because of one character, especially a character who does not get a pov (only talking about the first book here). I’m not going into how all of these things happened due to Little Pete because that would be less and analysis of the text and more me explaining the book to you, which I am sure nobody wants. But my main point by including this section is that Little Pete is an intrinsic part of the text and so is the way he is written. If Little Pete is able to freely communicate with a people in a way that they understand then the book would have ended very differently, or maybe it would not have even started at all.

Essentially what MG has done here has used Little Pete as a structural device, giving his character the means to completely change the outcome of the story without giving him almost any say in what he does. While I understand how this can be upsetting to some people, I also think that this use of character is fascinating and adds an element of mystery to the story the likes of which I haven’t really seen before. Little Pete both controls the story and is barely present in it, and while I definitely whish that we could have learnt more about him as a person, I understand that with the way this story is written, that would have resulted in changes within the book that would have changed the story completely.

As always thank you for reading the ramblings that I have offered up to you. I am sorry that this analysis is so short, but I felt like I just needed to say what I wanted to say and not embellish. As I said before, I feel like it is not quite my place to give my full thoughts on this character, but I hope that what I have given has been enjoyable in it’s own way.

#the gone series #peter ellison #little pete #gone

5 notes · View notes

forensicated · 4 months

Text

02x12 - The Chief Super's Party

This episode was originally the series ender for series 1 but a strike meant that only 11 episodes were finished by the time it came to air. It was tweaked with some reshoots and edits to explain cast changes.

Uniform head over to yard with Mike and Dashers. They have to break in to an office where they find a man beaten and tied up on the floor. He's rather sarcastic about how long they took - even when Pete and Abe claim it was just a couple of minutes. The man claims that the burglars stole a van and some of his sheepskin coats.

Reg has been sent to coventry by the others after he applied for the Chief Superintendents Clerk's job. It's not a popular position as the person who holds it essentially ends up making life hard for the officers with overtime refusals/expense claims/unforgiving memos and so forth. He's in two minds whether or not to attend the party that the Chief Super is holding that night at the pub for the retiring clerk that most people have muttered about in the last few episodes and consider a persnickety pain in the arse. Alec tells him he won't be the only one ignored - Dave Litten has said that he will be returning to attend after 'poncing off' to join another Division. Alec tells him that they're clearly jealous and that's why they're ignoring him and that he should find his niche and stick to it.

Ted drives the man around to see if they can spot the van as it hasn't been spotted by any other officers. Pete drives around the other end of Sun Hill, claiming it's a waste of time as they'd be long gone. Roy is aware of the man who was tied up and his business partner as they've pulled similar dodgy schemes before. Ted also thinks it's iffy but they have to look into it despite both men thinking it's an inside job that they've now shown some 'violence' in as part of to make it look different from the others. Ted suggests he does an obbo overnight to watch the man to stop him from having to go to the party. Roy won't hear of it - if he has to suffer through the party, so does Ted. Brownlow is expecting everyone to be there.

Pete speaks to a cafe owner who has heard whispers in the cafe that the theft of the van/coats is an inside job. He can't give them names or locations however.

Yorkie drives June and Jim to the party. The boys aren't looking forward to it, however, June is - as much as she pretends she isn't aware that Dave will be there and she definitely hasn't had her hair and makeup done for him!

Also attending is DS Tommy [not yet Frank] Burnside. "Some nice boozers out in Epping," Bob says dryly. "Haven't heard of any?" Burnside claims he's attending to say goodbye to Henry but Bob claims it's because he's heard about the free booze. Roy asks him where his bottle is and that he has to bring one or he doesn't get in. Sadie won't sell him one over the bar so he has to go to an off licence.

Roy reminds Ted to go steady on the booze because he has a promotion board hearing coming up. Upstairs at the free bar, June is having a struggle trying to pull pints without a ridiculous amount of head on them. Dave sits at the side of the bar looking bored.

Local businessmen, including Bernie - Roy's car lot owner friend - have been invited to make up numbers and can be heard laughing over the general hubbub. Charles keeps being distracted by them and looks for Roy to keep an eye on them, threatening Roy that his feet won't touch the ground if Charles is embarrassed in front of his golf club friends by them or Ted who is obviously drunk.

Tom stands with Bob but makes no secret that he's eyeing Viv up. Burnside returns, pilfering a bottle from the side of the bar and pretending he brought it with him. He hands it to Roy who is wise to him, getting dragged out to the stairwell while Brownlow makes a speech and presentation to Henry, his clerk. Roy asks Burnside what he's doing on the manor because he knows he's up to something. Burnside tells him he's over as a social call cos he fancies June and wants to try his luck. "Do what?" Roy scoffs. "How can any bird in her right mind be interested in a bloke as obnoxious as you?!" Burnside claims he's rung her a few times and she's knocked him back only to say that, if he was truly serious, to turn up that night.

Roy walks away laughing, 'promising' not to tell anyone.

Ted makes drunken snarky comments throughout Charles' speech which, judging by Brownlow's side looks, can be heard.

Dave is glad that he's on night duty and will have to leave soon as it's a dull party and he's spent it leaning against the bar. Burnside tries to chat June up in front of him and Dave tells him to leave it because 'she's taken!' Reg isn't having any luck either, asking Viv if she wants to have a dirty weekend with him. "Look, Sonny, if I wanted a dirty weekend, I'd choose a man." Bob slips out, unable to stick drinking in the same room as Burnside much longer. He's on night shift too so he walks out with Taffy and Jim wondering if they could get away with doing the same.

With Bob gone, Tom chats up Viv and Mike starts to make a move to leave for a date. Roy has noticed that the Scotch is rather strong so asks Mike to water it down before he goes. Seeing her chance, Viv sidesteps Tom to make a move on Mike, asking him what he's doing that night. In response, Mike puts her down very harshly which seems quite out of character considering how he is often the peacemaker for Ted. "Got a sick dog at home, got to go look after it. Think it's on heat or something." Thanks a lot, Pal!" she snaps back with June wincing for her.

Mike puts in too much water so asks June to top up Roy's drink a little bit. She pours it out from a bottle that Mike recognises and asks her to stash it away and not serve anyone else from it - or the other bottle that was brought in but won't tell her why. "Did anyone tell you, Mike Dashwood, you've got a right way with women(!)"

Roy corners Ted and warns him that he's already too drunk and needs to go home - but not under his own steam! Ted slurs about Reg likely being the next clerk and that he's warned him if he ever grasses on him he'd punch him. Mike interrupts and leads Roy to one side and tells him that two bottles of Scotch that were stolen from the warehouse have turned up at the party. He tells Mike to send June over to him at the buffet and, if Burnside asks why, to feed him a story to keep him away. When they return, Ted has already gone and Mike fears that he'll be driving home drunk.

Most disturbingly of all, Roy eats celery with far too much enthusiasm.

There's no excuse for it, Roy!

At a table with Dave, Mike slips in a 'casual' reference to June being Roy Galloway's girl. Dave almost chokes on his drink in the process.

Roy has June 'casually' look around the room whilst holding a plate of food as cover to see if she can spot the man who gave her the bottles of Scotch. She can't be sure but she thinks it's one of Brownlow's guests. He tells her to let only Brownlow's guests drink that Scotch - as they're asking for it by name - and to not open the 2nd bottle but put it to one side with the other once it's empty. When the party is over he'll collect them. June asks him to tell her what is going on and he claims - if it comes off - "It's a rare coup." Roy tells Mike to start tracing where the scotch came from in the morning, knowing that it's likely one over on the Super...

Getting nowhere with June, Dave leaves to go over to his nick for night duty, claiming 'This lot ain't worth waiting about for, you know what I mean?' to Roy.

Alec is surprised to see Bob arrive back early for his shift. "It's quiet as a graveyard, Bob. Nothing happened at all. Not. A. Dicky. Bird. Nothing in that book since 5." Alec committed the ultimate sin of a policeman - mentioning the Q word and a woman comes in, shouting the odds.

Henry - the clerk - and his wife start saying goodbye to the people at their party. A large group ignore them and continue their own conversations. It seems that no one really wanted to attend.

Roy spots Brownlow looking at him talking to his friends and, with a knowing smirk because the Chief Super has just had a glass of stolen whiskey poured for him, he raises his glass to him. June winks across the room at Roy and Burnside spots it, looking between them and reading more into it after what Mike told him with Dave.

Ted drives home with music booming from his car. The rocking of the car is making Ted fall asleep, waking in time just to avoid a skip. He swerves to avoid it and crashes into someone's fence. His car is stuck in the mud and he staggers out muttering "What have I done?" as the homeowner comes out to shout at him. He runs off, pretending he's running after the man who did it when a crowd gathers.

Jim arrives slightly late for the briefing, having to sneak in behind Bob. Pete tells him a van load of sheepskin coats are missing and that he's to let him know if they turn up. Bob reports that a man has called in, complaining that he has a car in his front garden. "Why don't they have little plastic gnomes like everyone else?" Taffy laughs. Given that Taffy and Jim were seen drinking at the party - Bob thinks nothing of sticking them in a car together to drive out to see what has happened with the crashed car...!

Ted rings his girlfriend to tell her that he's crashed the car while drunk. He's alright but he's going to disappear for a little while whilst the heat dies down as he can't afford to be breathalysed at the minute so he tells her to say she doesn't know where he is and he hasn't been in touch if contacted.

As Roy approaches June to gather the bottles, Burnside is seen leading Viv out. "When one door closes..." he smirks at Roy. June tells Roy that Burnside is under the impression that she's having it off with someone else and that whoever it is has scared him off good and proper. "Why'd you want me?" Roy asks with June taking a double take in response before realising what he meant. She tells him that she has the bottles ready for him. She's worked out what the problem Roy might have with it is too. "It's nicked, isn't it....?" Roy grins and tells her they'll have to see.

Jim and Taffy attend the crashed car and Taffy recognises who it belongs to. The man shouts at them when they ask for his name and tells them that he used to be a copper. Bugger. There's no easy way of pulling the wool over his eyes as he knows the procedure and he's very - very - angry! Taffy whispers to Jim that the car belongs to Ted and that he should go over to the phonebox round the corner and ring Bob to ask him what to do.

Reg has a discreet word with Roy to tell him Bob is outside. Bob tells him that Ted has crashed in someone's front garden and he's done a runner. They don't think he's hurt given how he ran away and they are aware he'll be hiding so he doesn't have to be breathalysed. Roy doesn't want Charles to hear about it, knowing it'd be the end of his career. The car has only superficial damage so he's had it towed into the station car park and parked it in such a way that hides the damage. Roy asks Bob if he can square it with the house owner that they'll get him a new fence if he doesn't take it any further. Roy reminds him that 'good boys can't be bad boys'. [I wouldn't say that...there's a very Sun Hill officers that were very bad boys, Roy...!] Bob says he'll help cover unless it gets iffy.

Ted hides in the kitchen of an Italian restaurant, asking the manager for somewhere to hide whilst the dust settles.

As the party settles down and the stragglers leave, Charles makes plans to head home but asks Roy to pop in in the morning as there's something he'd like to discuss. Roy agrees and lingers at the bar so Brownlow asks him if he's hanging on. Roy covers, saying he'd offered to make sure June gets home safely. June is amused when Roy says to give him a few minutes to go before giving her the bottles. "You not taking me home then, sir?" "Taking you home? You don't want me to take you home do you?" he repeats, looking shyly at the bar. "Some might venture that I'm the mystery man you're having it off with and that would never do, would it." "Yeah, perhaps you're right..." June muses, "That'd never do. I do have my reputation to think of... sir..." [I can't help but ship them! Especially how Roy can't look at her when he repeats 'You don't want me to take you home, do you?' and keeps his eyes down on the bar!]

Ted spends the night on a restaurant boat, surrounded by bottles of alcohol which - thankfully - he doesn't seem to have continued to drink. Ted staggers to his feet holding his head and leaves the boat. The sudden brightness as he opens the door blinds him at first but he makes his way out and walks along the docks. Ted hasn't made contact with anyone yet but in his walking around he spots the man who was found tied up at the start of the episode and his business partner selling the 'stolen' sheepskin coats on the docks. He legs it to the nearest phonebox and calls Roy at home to tell him, brushing aside what also happened the night before. Roy calls Bob and reports it, arranging to meet him at the docks with Jim and Mike. Ted tells them he's not asking for absolution when they arrive but he has found the evidence they need. Unfortunately, they're spotted by one of the men so have to make chase.

The boss of one of the fish companies on the docks comes running at them to tell them that 2 men have gone into his cold storage when the forklift came out. There's no other way out so, amused, Roy tells the boss to send his men for breakfast and leave them to 'sweat' as it were for half hour. Roy wants to turn Ted's problem into a success story but Ted doesn't think it's enough to save him. Bob tells him he's straightened things out with the homeowner but he does have to buy him a new fence. Bob is worried that the chief super will kick off about the unauthorised overtime of him and Jim, but Roy just smiles. "With any luck the overtime will be the least of the chief supers worries." "... Have you got something up your sleeve?" Bob blinks. "I think you could say that."

Bob takes Ted over to the homeowner to settle things - promising to pay for the new fence AND get the man into the special constabulary. Roy sends Mike to the golf club to trace the moody scotch and he and Jim sit and wait outside the cold storage.

Reg arrives early and goes into the parade room. He calls Brownlow at home and reports Ted for drunk driving. He says he doesn't like to inform on a fellow officer but he's smiling the entire time - then asks about the new clerk's job. Instead of answering, Brownlow hangs up.

Roy and the others prepare to make their arrests. They enter the cold storage in style on a forklift truck wearing the sheepskin coats. Huddled together they find the two men in question.

At the golf club, Mike talks to the manager about fake spirits. He claims everything is legit and nothing is bought over/or under the counter. One of the golf club members is the manager of the distillery of the scotch in question, however. Mike looks through the golf course members and rings the station after telling the boss to go and get him all the spirit receipts for the last quarter.

As Roy et al return, Brownlow orders them to his office. In the parade room, June is fussing a stray dog. Roy asks her if she's seen Ted and she tells him that he's upstairs in the canteen. Without another word, Roy goes upstairs. June sighs, looking at the dog. "Thank you for taking me home last night sir..." "That's alright June, all in the course of duty..." she mimics.

Brownlow tells Ted his behaviour was a disgrace and completely unbecoming of an officer which showed both him and Brownlow up and that he was in no fit state to drive home.

Mike asks June to put him through to the Super's office - and quickly - before Brownlow can continue his rant at Ted and Roy. Mike tells him that the scotch came from one of the guests last night and that he stole the bottles from his employer. In front of Brownlow, Roy makes a big show of telling Dashers not to take the matter any further so as not to cause more embarrassment to the Chief Super - obv! Roy asks Ted to leave the office because there's a matter of great delicacy that has arisen. He tells Charles that a guest of his knowingly brought stolen Scotch to the party. Scotch that he and his friends were asking for by name all night.

Ted sits at his desk, contemplating his career - knowing that any chance of promotion has now gone even if he does keep his job.

Roy returns to CID, gathering Mike for an early lunch on a restaurant boat with Bob at the behest of the Superintendent. Ted asks why not him and Roy says they didn't think it'd be Ted's sort of thing. Ted smiles. "If the Chief Super says you've gotta go someplace - well... you've gotta go"

4 notes · View notes