[ SECRET POST #158 ]

[shahni.livejournal.com]

⌈ Secret Post #158 ⌋

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

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

11.

12.

13.

14.

15.

16.

17.

18.

19.



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

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)

[moebot.livejournal.com]

But what was the guarantee that someone else would have chosen to stay in fight? If I recall, only one of the other Pirate Lords wanted to fight, and Jack... well, it's implied that he's screwed most of the Brethren over at various points, so I can't see him entrusting his fate to anyone else in that room.

Sure, he might have voted for something else. But thematically, it makes sense for it to be Elizabeth, because otherwise, she probably would have been phased out of the story completely, since that was her big thing all through AWE, and why would the writers discard their protagonist?

Jack's not a Sue? He:
a)makes it with hot women all the world over
b)manages to outsmart practically everyone
c)pulls off stunts that would never, ever work
d)has a good heart underneath the scruffy pirate exterior
e)inspires loyalty in many people that he's screwed over multiple times
f)is super attractive (to both the audience and the cast)
g)knows practically everyone in the cast and has some hand in their backstory, no matter where they are from or what their background is
h)has mad skillz at basically everything he tries his hand at
i)is one of the focal points of the entire series

Personality isn't what determines a Sue. It's what they do and their role within the main storyline. Just because Jack is "quirky" doesn't mean that he cannot possibly be considered one.

(i sound so srs, but i'm actually enjoying this debate. lawl).

[cephiedvariable.livejournal.com]

Since it was her idea to fight, and Jack was the only one who agreed with her, it was either Elizabeth or Jack who had to be the King. Sure, it could have been Jack but honestly- he had other stuff to do. If Jack had been Pirate King, they couldn't have traded him to the other side and thus Jack never would have gotten on the ship, gotten at the heart, ect. ect. In that sense, it had to be Elizabeth.

If she were not made a Pirate lord by circumstance in the first place (a role which other characters often treated as ridiculous on her; it's a nice thought, but I honestly doubt after the "war" was over any of those pirates would continue listening to her if not held at gunpoint by Cap'n Teague), what would she have done in the movie? The writers set her and Will up to be a loose "positive" parallel to Davy and Tia. So Will becomes Captain of the Dutchman, and Elizabeth... is still a noble girl tagging along for the ride? They *BOTH* had to be elevated to epic roles in order to, y'know, make the story epic.

If Sao Feng had lived, either the brethren would have done NOTHING at all, or Barbossa would have been voted Pirate King since Sao Feng agreed with him and junk. And that would have been totally less cool because Barbossa is totally suited to be a Pirate King and these movies are all about coincidental, ironic destiny and tentacle rape.

Barbosa isn't a sue for obvious reason

I HOPE YOU'RE IMPLYING SOMETHING ELSE AND NOT TRYING TO SAY THAT HE IS NOT ATTRACTIVE. BECUZ GEOFFREY RUSH IS A+++++ SEXY. D:

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

[kinneas.livejournal.com]

What would you have her do, sit on the sidelines and be useless while the men go off and do their jolly male-dominating thing? A strong, important character does NOT a Sue make.

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.

[doubtful-salmon.livejournal.com]

I totally disagree. I mean, I even saw the movie in the first place because I'm a huge Lord of the Rings fan, and I never thought that it was Will's story. The first person you see onscreen is Elizabeth. She is the object of the first film...she is the reason that everything happens. It is she who finds Will, it is she who dreams about him, she who falls in the water, she who asks to meet up with Barbossa and call off the hunt, she who lies, and she who is chased after when she is finally stuck not necessarily because of her gender but because she made a mistake. Will is only an important character, at least in my eyes, because Elizabeth makes him one. All his actions, in the whole movie, seem to be fueled by Elizabeth...and almost all of hers are her own.

So yes, Elizabeth is a plot device, but actually, so are all protagonists. They're not mutually exclusive.

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

The first person you see onscreen is Elizabeth...Will is only an important character...because Elizabeth makes him one.

In my eyes, these two things make Elizabeth the narrator of the story, but that doesn't necessarily make her the protagonist. For example, in "The Shawshank Redemption", Red is the narrator, but Andy is the protagonist.

It is she who finds Will, it is she who dreams about him...

You have a very valid point with all of these examples. You're right in that a lot of action not only revolves around Elizabeth, but she takes a lot of action. But again, I come back to the question of arc. And it doesn't really feel like Elizabeth has one, definitely not when compared to Will. To me that is what differentiates between a character who's integral to the story and a protagonist.

[cephiedvariable.livejournal.com]

This is how I interpreted Elizabeth's journey: in CotBP, you get the feeling that she's ill suited for the life she's living. Keira Knightly likes to say that Liz is a 20th century girl living in the 18th century. She's restless and bored, but she doesn't actually seem to realize it. Over the course of the movies she is thrust into adventure for one reason: kidnapped, trying to rescue her boy toy, ect. ect. and learns what's she's actually capable of- both good and bad. Her journey is one of inner discover, while Will discovers *external* things about himself (and I hope I'm not giving the movies TOO much credit when I assume it was written this way on purpose).

I suppose this kind of character arc could be Sueish if she actually HAD stolen all the attention from who the viewers felt was SUPPOSED to be the main character, but Will's character arc was still strong. She just got to do more cool stuff in AWE. But EVERYONE did cool stuff in DMC. Jack fought on the mast of a ship, Barbossa sailed through a maelstrom (while fighting and reciting wedding vows SIMULTANEOUSLY), Will got to talk smack to the villains and Ragetti freed a Goddess. It was a movie full of people doing cool stuff. :P


... that was a markedly less coherent argument than I anticipated it would be. -___-;;

[cephiedvariable.livejournal.com]

*in AWE, not DMC

No one did cool stuff in DMC. Everyone SUCKED in DMC, which was kind of the point. :PPP

[panksters.livejournal.com]

iawtc. I'm glad there are people about with real talkin skillz that weeuns don't have round heer who I can agree with.

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. ;)

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

[panksters.livejournal.com]

No, because you're forgetting that the writers write that shit. Elizabeth didn't have to be mistaken for Calypso. They could have just gone SHE HAWT I WANT 2 BONE HER LOLOL or something. They could have done anythign they wanted to, so saying she had to do this and this and this is retarded. The writers wrote her that way instead of doing something else. They made her extremely central, lovey, strong, and the pirate king like any suethor would.