Same Planet, Different Worlds

[rivkat]

LaT pointed to this page, which made my jaw drop two separate times. [ETA: LaT correctly points out that the first reviewer, Neal, says a bunch of things with which I agree, and that she doesn't agree with his wacky views about the feminist agenda of the producers.]

But Neal hated the episode because it was so "feminist," in combination with "Spell," because in his reading the show argued that women's sexuality is good and fun and women are never responsible for their choices and men are evil dogs if they like sex.

Yes, "evil slut" is apparently a good thing in the show's universe -- Neal thinks that the producers want us to admire sexy Countess Lanabelle's sexual agency, despite Lana's condemnation. And he thinks we're supposed to sympathize with Shannon. (I guess he kind of has a point here, since we're told that she's right about Lex almost as often in the episode as we're told that Lana is Beautiful.) But, feminist? Of all the reasons to hate an episode of Smallville, feminism has to rank up there with "the actors aren't pretty enough." He also seems to think that women sleep with Lex just because he's rich. Yeah, keep thinking that, Neal.

But wait! There's more! Search down for Rebecca's review. (On behalf of Rebeccas everywhere ... I'm really sorry.) She loved the episode! A perfect ten! And Clark was so nice to Lex at the end, giving him another chance!

This is why we're never going to see Clark recognize his share of the responsibility for how Lex turns out. As long as a significant viewer population accepts at face value the show's statements about who's good and who's bad, the people responsible for the show will never take the position that Clark is any more responsible for what happened these past years in SV than he was for the meteor strike in the first place; Clark will feel equally guilty about both, and the audience will be supposed to understand that neither is his fault.

Comments

[latxcvi.livejournal.com]

I feel the need to clarify that I didn't point to Neal Bailey's review because I agree with his apparent reading that the show is too feminist. I pointed to it because I agree with his points on (a) how the sex-negativity of the show is ass backwards when they're not above using the lure of nudity and sexual naughtiness to increase ratings; (b) that the sex-negativity of the show is quite silly and ass backwards all on its own; (c) how completely whack-ass it is that Clark takes Lionel's protestations of Being Good Now at face value and worse, despite everything Lionel's done in the *last few months*, blithely trusts him while simultaneously being apparently unwilling/unable to view Lex with anything other than suspicion, distrust and barely concealed disdain/contempt; (d) the utter ridiculousness of the notion that we're supposed to think a woman who *cheated on her fiance with a complete stranger* has any kind of actual moral authority to comment on said stranger or, really, anyone else; and, finally (e) that the whole notion that because Lex regularly has casual, anonymous (as anonymous as he can be, being Lex Luthor and all) sex it means he's really just evil and rotten to the core is retarded. Those are all also points Bailey made in the review, and they're all points I (and apparently several other people, too) do happen to agree with.

[rivkat.livejournal.com]

Absolutely -- I'm sorry if I imputed his beliefs to you & I'll edit the post accordingly. I agree with those points too. We're clearly watching the same show (same planet), but it's the idea that the producers pulled this shit because they're blinded by feminism that amazes me (different worlds).

[latxcvi.livejournal.com]

I definitely think that there are personal issues Bailey's bringing to the table when he goes off on his rants about the show's sexual politics *and* that those issues get further compounded/confused/clouded by his absolute hatred of how Lana, as a character, gets treated from a meta-textual perspective (everyone must love her, there are rarely ever any negative consequences for it when she behaves badly, we're constantly told how good and sweet and nice she is even when she behaves in ways that are anything but, etc.). What I think Bailey is missing, probably, is that how the show deals, meta-textually, with Lana is very specific *to* Lana; it's a function of both the character and her portrayer being clear and special favorites of Al Gough. But Bailey makes, I think, the erroneous assumption that such thinking applies across the board to how the show deals with women, and while I certainly think there's much SV's creative team has to answer for in terms of its treatment of gender roles/gender politics, I agree that 'having a feminist slant' is most emphatically *not* one of those things.

[rivkat.livejournal.com]

Your analysis of what's going on with him makes a lot of sense. As Sarah T said, he's angry at being told about the madonna and not noticing that he's also being told about a lot of whores.