Elementary 1x22

[killerweasel.livejournal.com]

Discussion post for Elementary 122 - 'Risk Management'

Spoilers in the comments.

What did you think?

Comments

[atheist-cheese.livejournal.com]

hey, you're free to feel as you must about any and all female character, but I'd like to point out -- the bonds of love are quite different from the bonds of friendship. They burn bright, but not necessarily as stable.

You are treading dangerously close to girl hate, the weird idea that for some reason There Can Only Be One ultimate female (character, in this case) thus leading to the toxic environment of perpetual competetiveness/pettiness between women.

But really, that's not the point. This is not real life so it doesn't really matter in any concrete way -- I'm just bringing up the concept to point out it's ludicrousness. Joan and Irene fulfill two completely different roles on the show. It is possible to have more than one female character. Joan's specialuniqueamazingness, as you coined it, has nothing to do/does not encroach with his relationship with Joan.

[midori-yee.livejournal.com]

Yes, I try to be as mindful as possible of internalized sexism within myself, which was why I was trying to figure out why I felt the way that I did about Irene encroaching on Joan's "awesomeness" in Elementary.

I knew the writers were smart enough not to make this a "girl fight" between Irene and Joan over Sherlock's esteem. Like you said, with Irene it was love; with Joan it's platonic.

This is where I think my potential "girl hate" was driven by my concerns about race. Sherlock obviously worshipped Irene for her brilliance, but I didn't want the show to necessarily show Irene as completely "eclipsing" Joan, thus pushing her into the background. The implications of a white female superseding a woman of color were more than I could possibly bear.

However, upon viewing the finale, I was quite pleased on both a gender and race basis on the characterization of both Irene and Joan. I had assumed that Irene was going to be revealed as Moriarty--she's so brilliant, she might as well be running the show. She's a genius, and she gets things done (although the "things" she gets done may be morally ambiguous), much like Alice in the BBC series, Luther. The fact that she was "beaten" in the end by her obsession with (and perchance love of) Sherlock, does not denigrate her due to gender--Sherlock, a male, was also "beaten" and obviously blinded by his love for her, too.

Joan, the "Herione" (I also had hoped that the episode was titled with her in mind), did save the day and managed to outsmart Moriarty--something that Sherlock, a male (blinded by love), could not do. I'm glad they chose this ending, instead of the BBC Sherlock's take wherein Sherlock, a male, outsmarts Irene for falling in love with him (a "weakness" of her gender).

Well played, Elementary writing staff. Well played.

[atheist-cheese.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I was pretty impressed with the finale. They took what I thought were two pieces of weak writing (fridging Irene and Moriarty's storyline -- which I had a hard time getting into) and smashed them together into something good.

I was really intruiged with how they handled the Irene/Joan interaction. That's when Joan figured her out, I assume. Joan's complete lack of fear, her jab at Irene's ability to read her. Despite being the one kidnapped and being held against her will, she felt way more in control of that scene.

Although with both Sherlock and Elementary the biggest annoyance in their Irene storylines was the fact that Sherlock wins, in the end. You're right, it was way more offensive with Sherlock (BBC), but the spirit of Irene's story is she is one of the few people (not women) that outsmarts him. That's why she made such an impact on him. I don't even care if they feel they must make her a love interest every single time (although in the original she had a husband and clearly gave no fucks about Sherlock) it just infuriates me that she never gets to win.

Yeah, I suppose you could justify Elementary's decision with the fact that they also brought in Moriarty -- it's just a disappointment. Sherlock-esque characters often begin to suffer from the can-never-be-wrong/defeated syndrome after a few seasons, making storylines hollow and predicable because you know they're always going to be right/figure it out. (See: House). Letting someone win is not only a good writing choice it would be sticking to the intent of the original story. It's kind of sad that something written during a period of patriarchy and in a very sexist society still dares to go farther than modern TV will.