Dirk Hero

[sistermagpie]

Just read a great post by mrs_laugh_track on a subject that I think doesn't get covered enough. In a nutshell:

"There is a LOT of people who are GOOD at things on television right now. People who are naturals. Who are the best something to ever something. And in order to emphasize that we don't really get presented with them working really hard to get there. And to me personally that can lead to a lot of genericness. Because by removing the hard work you are removing the part of them as a person that is heavily influenced by whatever it is that they do. So you end up with these very interchangeable characters having very interchangeable banter. And the banter is interchangeable because it's barely about their jobs because the character isn't ABOUT the job."

I have to say, I've felt that same frustration. I love characters that are what they do, whose personality has developed around their profession. I feel like this also connects to the competency porn idea. In case you've never heard that, that was a term I think made up by the Leverage writers who said that they originally worried that the audience would be bored by too much exposition in an ep, but then discovered that the audience loved scenes where people who were damn good at they do discussed their plans. I think what turns something from generic talented people banter to competency porn is making us believe that the characters love what they do, find it fascinating to actually do it in ways they can only do because of years of study and discipline.

Read the actual post here

What I love, too, is that she zeroes in on this being about characters caring about something and not just characters being too talented.

Comments

[six_of_one]

I kind-of know what you mean, and I am sometimes astounded when I see someone actually work in a show or film. I loved the first Iron Man movie because it seemed to be all about engineering. The film was a great advertisement for how cool engineering can be, but, of course, Tony Stark was rich and genius-talented before he channeled his energy into his projects. His work wasn't all good stuff, either, but he faced up to that. At least he didn't sit around and cut coupons.

The second movie seems to be all about his personality, though, at least judging from the trailers. I've never read the comic.

On TV, I'll watch Burn Notice. The conceit of the show is that the main character is presenting step-by-step lessons on how to be a spy. Still ... not a lot of depth there, and who can say how accurate the information is. I don't want to find out, frankly. MacGyver was about as close to that as I wanted to get, or the Bourne series. Talk about competent at your job!

Leverage sounds like the old Mission Impossible. I've never watched Leverage, for some reason. Con men are just not my thing, I guess.

I'm sort of the person who looks beyond the job to see who a person really is. So many people I know are consumed by their jobs. It really disturbs me. Some jobs are interesting, though. Reality TV covers some of that. I'm always amazed at how chefs and designers manage to do the things they do under incredible pressures.

[sistermagpie]

That's a good point about Iron Man. Thinking about it more, I almost relate it a lot to description. There's description in fiction that's just description, but when it's done well it's telling you something about the characters or the story; it's got emotion. When this kind of thing is done really well the character is demonstrating their character in the way they do their thing.