[ SECRET POST #158 ]

[shahni.livejournal.com]

⌈ Secret Post #158 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

This is a magic post and I'm not really here. :D

Secrets Left to Post: 03 pages, 58 secrets from Secret Submission Post #023.
Secrets Not Posted: 0 broken links, 0 not!secrets, 0 not!fandom.
Next Secret Post: Tomorrow, Wednesday, June 13th, 2007.
Current Secret Submission Post: Here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[panksters.livejournal.com]

15: How is she not a Sue? Just wondering.

[cephiedvariable.livejournal.com]

She's not perfect or faultless. She makes mistakes that are meant to be viewed as mistakes and has character traits that are intended to be viewed as personality flaws just like every other character in the cast.

She has no "tragikal past" and the story doesn't go out of it's way to throw pity parties for her (NO, DAVY JONES GETS THOSE ALL TO HIMSELF and Bootstrap, I guess. Norrington too. Maybe Beckett a little). The writers don't go out of their way to glorify her anymore than the other "hero" characters (and certainly not as much as Jack Sparrow).

Her only "Sue-ish" traits are:

1) She mastered the sword very quickly between PotC 1+2. Which is a little inexplicable, yes, but if the writers wanted her to be able to participate in sword fights in the second and third movies, shouldn't we girls be happy that our gender is represented in the epic battles? ALSO, she was pretty decent at fighting using random objects in CotBP as it was and she probably had Will (who, the writers have stated, is the best swordsman in the cast) teaching her. It's not so hard to believe that she caught on quickly.

2) "All the men are in love with her". Which, yes, maybe a little. But a lot of it is for plot purposes/comedic effect. Seaman are horny, ha ha ha, ect. Sao Feng only wanted her because he thought she was Calypso; Barbossa was more interested in the apple; Jack's a whore, c'mon (and got over his momentary infatuation pretty quickly). Which leaves Will- her actual love interest, and Norrington who loved her in the first movie BEFORE anyone accused her of being a Sue.

3) She's female and capable. Quickest and easiest way to earn a fangirl's ire.

Answer your question? ^__^;;

[panksters.livejournal.com]

She also learned how to sail very quickly, is extremely pretty, becomes a pirate capitain, becomes the pirate king, people take orders from her, some dude thought she was Calypso, which placed her in a situation where she'd have to use her StReNgTh while still being a chick, etc.

(spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[cephiedvariable.livejournal.com]

And Will outsmarted everyone and their mother, held his breath underwater for, like, fifteen minutes and then became the freaking captain of the Flying Dutchman. Also, he's got the prettiest eyes that ever roamed the seven seas since Davy Jones went squid-faced.

She's a main character. Main characters, by virtue of being main characters, are GOING to be attractive and have interesting things happen to them. My point here is that Will and Elizabeth have pretty much the same sort of character arc: they wanted little to do with pirates, got tangled up with Jack Sparrow and ended up pretty much fufilling legendary roles in the pirate universe. While people will complain about Will because he's Orlando Bloom his character doesn't appeal to them, no one cries OMG STU!!! because of his "Touch o' destiny".

I'm not saying that people shouldn't DISLIKE Elizabeth, I'm just saying that she's not a Sue.

Re: (spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[panksters.livejournal.com]

Saying Will is the same way doesn't disprove Elizabeth being a Sue.

On that note, Will also betrayed everyone like five thousand times, which knocks him down on the cliche scale.

Re: (spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[samuraiter.livejournal.com]

(Ms. Swann speechified. That's all it took for her to fall off the respect scale for me. Speechifying can make any character look bad who isn't in 300 or something.)

Re: (spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[panksters.livejournal.com]

That speech reminded me of King Arthur so bad.

Re: (spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[manda-babylon.livejournal.com]

This phenomenon, commonly referred to as The Saint Crispin's speech, originated with Shakespeare and is seen as a necessary element to a "Dramatic" story. However, it is also exactly the sort of thing that does happen and is appreciated in real life. This isn't meant to sound snarky, because I really don't understand: why is it okay in 300 but not in another movie about a group of people facing the entire annihilation of their way of life and the entire world they knew?

[panksters.livejournal.com]

I don't think she's a sue over the course of the entire series, just in the third movie. I liked her in the first two, but I got sick of her real fast in the third. She was really important in the third movie, even though she didn't need to be.

Re: (spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[moebot.livejournal.com]

She became a pirate captain because of Sao Feng, became the Pirate King because of Jack, and Sao Feng only thought she was Calypso because Barbossa was leading him to believe that.

She didn't get those things because she was awesome at everything or because everyone was in love with her, she got them because people were using her to play their little games and because the plot needed those things to happen in order for the movie to go on.

Besides, everyone in the main cast is extraordinary and good-looking and make magical things happen that don't always logically work. I'd actually argue that it's Jack, as much as I love him, that's the biggest Sue/Stu in the entire series.

Re: (spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[panksters.livejournal.com]

Nooo, she was put in those situations because the writers wanted shit to happen to her. They wanted her to become a captain, a pirate king, mistaken for a goddess, etc.

Re: (spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[moebot.livejournal.com]

Yes, the writers tend to want interesting shit to happen to their leading cast to have the plot move forwards. Because that's what writers do. And it's also what they did to Jack and Will.

If those things didn't happen to Elizabeth, they would have had to happen to another character.

Re: (spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[panksters.livejournal.com]

And the only reason they happened to her is because she was a sue in that movie :)

For example: Chinese guy didn't have to die, she didn't have to be mistaken for Calypso. <-- Those two had nothing to do with the plot.

Anyoen else, like, idk, Jack, could have been pirate king. Barbosa. The monkey. But it happened to Elizabeth because she's a sue :)

Re: (spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[moebot.livejournal.com]

Had she not been mistaken for Calypso, Sao Feng wouldn't have taken her. When he died and made her captain (because he thought she was Calypso), she got to go to the Brethren Court, where Jack voted to make her King, and because of her role as King, they all went to fight at the Climactic Battle at the end of the movie were they emerged triumphant.

If Sao Feng had lived and Elizabeth had not been made captain or King, the Pirate Lords would probably be arguing for days/weeks/whatever amongst themselves since I doubt that any of them would have voted for anyone but themselves, and in the end, they probably wouldn't have chosen to go and fight, since so many were vehemently against it.

So I will disagree when you say that it had nothing to do with the plot. It had a lot to do with the plot.

If Jack or Barbossa (or the monkey) had been made King on top of everything they already were, would you be calling them Sues?

Re: (spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[panksters.livejournal.com]

But... she didn't have to be pirate king. I mean, Jack's apparently willing to vote for other people, or she could have voted for someone else. Elizabeth didn't have to be the pirate king for the story to make sense.

Barbosa isn't a sue for obvious reason, and Jack isn't a sue because he's weird and crazy/doesn't fit a personality mold.

Re: (spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[cephiedvariable.livejournal.com]

Oh, they actually SAID Elizabeth was the protagonist? XD That makes me bizarrely happy since I always assumed they meant it to, ultimately, be Will's story.

Though honestly, it was a journey she and Will took together. They even took turns being the damsel in distress!

Although someone's just going to argue that her "being the most important character" only further proves she's a Sue. :P

Re: (spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[cephiedvariable.livejournal.com]

Now, if Elizabeth HAD been Calypso.

Then I'd call Sue.

Even though the moment they brought it up, I figured it was Tia Dalma, I was still terrified there for a second.

Then Barbossa did all his complicated: "WTF, oh, ooohhh, lol Sao Feng I'm gonna con yoooouuu" eyework and I was relieved.

Re: (spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[i-am-the-apeman.livejournal.com]

It's not because she's a girl. It's because I don't think her character originally came across as a powerful main character. Her character in the first movie is cliche damsel for the most part.

Turning the example gender wise, if half way through Buffy, Joss Whedon came out and said the protagonist of the show was Xander and suddenly started designing plot lines around him, I'd scream Stu.

Now, the comparison is not exact since Buffy is *clearly* the protagonist of Buffy, and you could argue with me that Will isn't the protagonist of Pirates and that Elizabeth should have been all along. But then I'd just have to say, I don't see it. Her character really was used mostly as a plot device and had very little arc. I'll give you that Elizabeth might have been intended to be the storyteller, the one whose eyes we see things through, but that doesn't make her the protagonist.

Re: (spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[doubtful-salmon.livejournal.com]

Oh my god! We can't have them voting! The next thing you know they'll be wanting to work and get degrees. We can't have that...the world would go to pot.

[i-am-the-apeman.livejournal.com]

See, I think that's exactly why I find her annoying. Even though all of you have made extremely logical and sensible arguments about why she's not a Sue, I still keep feeling like she is. And I think it's because of that very thing.

I guess I always felt like it was more naturally Will's story. In the first movie, he's the one with the Pirate father. He's the one with an adventure that takes his character on an arc. At the start he hates Pirates, and by the end he learns to appreciate his heritage. At the start he's too wimpy to try to get Elizabeth, and by the end he learns the initiative to win her. What was Elizabeth's arc? At the start, she though pirates were cool, and by the end she still thought pirates were still cool. At the start she wanted Will to pay attention to her, and by the end Will started to pay attention to her, but what did she *do* or *learn* that made that happen? Elizabeth was the plucky damsel in distress with plenty of initiative, but she was still more of a plot device to get Will on the his adventure or a goal for Will's happy ending than a protagonist.

I guess it just seemed artificial to me that suddenly Elizabeth was the one rallying the pirates to war. She'd been artificially (IMO) thrust into being *the* main character. And, to me, that's the Sue-ist thing of all--when a character steals all the attention from the character who's story it truly is.

Re: (spoiler warning, before anyone clicks on this collapsed thread by accident)

[panksters.livejournal.com]

Uh, if a guy had learned how to sword fight, sail, become a ship's captain, have everyone fall in love with him ever, be mistaken for a god, and give a giant bravery speech while being extremely attractive, I would have labeled him a Stu. LOL.

But on that note, it's less believable for Elizabeth to be put in charge and be respected and a tough fighter, because she's an aristocratic lady. ;)