fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2633 ]

[ SECRET POST #2633 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2633 ⌋

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I came late to Supernatural (and didn't stay past a few episodes into season six) so I missed a big chunk of the fandom experience. But I'm rewatching with Mark Watches, and his big ol' boner for Bela is getting everywhere, and...I kind of thought she was universally hated? Or was that just the bad misogynist fandom camp?

I know I don't like her. And I did question that at first (this time around), because, after all I do like Malcolm Reynolds over on Firefly, and he also walks a thin line and doesn't ask a lot of questions when jobs come his way. But the difference, for me, is that his jobs are to stay alive not to stay in the multimillion dollar high-life, and when he realizes his jobs will hurt good people, he backs off. Bela, not so much. Yeah, she doesn't like being indebted to Sam and Dean, but as long as she's not, she DGAF.

Guess I like my silver-tongued thieves to have hearts of gold -- a feature Bela lacks. But I'm curious on the general F!S consensus?

Bela is a male name. Do you mean Bella?

Bela Talbot. I think she took her name from Bela Lugosi.

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

mimi-sardinia.livejournal.com - 2014-03-20 06:39 (UTC) - Expand

Oh for fuck's sake. Clearly you know who is meant, so why be a douchebag about it?

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-19 23:41 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-19 23:41 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-20 02:49 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-19 23:41 (UTC) - Expand

I liked Bela, because it was kind of nice to have a human adversary that could outwit Sam and Dean (not that difficult, but still). She had no reason to be good, since she had already sold her soul to the demons and living the high life was the best she could get.

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-19 23:24 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-19 23:31 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-19 23:37 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-20 00:15 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-20 00:20 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-20 01:03 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-20 02:16 (UTC) - Expand

I'm not any more involved in the fandom than you are, but the impression I get is that she was strongly hated by the misogynist/wackadoodle/super-shippy part of the fandom and then as a reaction the other parts of the fandom got kind of defensively fond of her.

Personally I really, really disliked her (as well as s3 Ruby). Not out of any shipping reasons - don't have any ships in the show - but because of her narrative function, which is to be super-badass and all-knowing and mysterious and hint at things without resolving it, and therefore presenting a hindrance to the plot without any compelling justification. I don't think either character was very well-written at all - it just felt like neither character was complex as a character and both characters dominated every scene without any reason to do so except writer's fiat. The lack of a moral compass only compounds that issue for Bela.

Maybe I'm just a crazy misogynist but I liked Ruby a lot better when she came back the next season and I liked Jo and Ellen a lot. s3 Ruby and Bela were just irritating.

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-19 23:21 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-19 23:52 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-19 23:23 (UTC) - Expand

Eh, I liked her. She did her own thing, no doubt, but people do. I found her likable and driven.

Couldn't stand her and I cheered when she died.

Meh she was okay. But I never, ever, ever want her to come back. Because Maggie is one of the few people I still like on The Walking Dead (this has been the season of badass females).

I love Bella for her snark and her skills and her general awesomeness, but all I can say here is good for you! I appreciate that you don't like her, but at least took the time to contrast her with a male counterpart you DO like and examine why there was a difference instead of just hopping on the "she's awful, because she is!" train.

(anon because I'm not usually a crusader for feminism)

He's dead.
Undead undead undead.

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-19 23:47 (UTC) - Expand

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-20 00:27 (UTC) - Expand

I liked her well enough, except for...the writers had to make her totally bad-ass and be able to completely outsmart the Winchesters and Bobby, and to do that, they didn't just make her good at stuff or smart, they made the *other* characters stupid. I *detest* when that happens, in *any* show.

The character herself was interesting and a bit heartbreaking and provided a different side of the 'verse, which was fun. But the writers screwed up in making her *so* awesome by making the boys act *so* stupid, and that's just frustrating as hell. As far as her 'thief of stuff/selling to the highest bidder' stuff...i didn't care. In a world with vampires and magic and demons, she was only grey, not black, so it really didn't bother me. A lot of fandom, sadly, got all bunched up about her 'cause she was pretty and clever and hit on the boys, but in general, at least in my corner, the way her character was used and (used poorly) was the worst thing about her.

I don't like her, but then again I don't like Crowley either and their characters are kind of similar. I generally don't like the characters that are part of the archetype she's part of.

I didn't have too much of an opinion on her either way, but I admit I'm more than a little skeeved out by the fact that one of the reasons the writers killed her was because the fans hated her for "getting between the brothers" (even though she...really didn't?), so I'm a bit more on the sympathetic side to her. Same to Ruby, for that matter.

I...cordially hate her? She's clever and witty and strong, all of which are admirable enough qualities by themselves, and she did make me laugh. Even her extreme self-centeredness isn't a deal-breaker for me; I like Crowley, for example, and there's no denying he's a selfish bastard.

But Bela took it to an extreme that would have suited a demon very well, but IMO was downright off-putting in a human being. Absolutely everything she did seemed to have an ulterior motive, and despite what Lauren Cohan said to the contrary, I just never got the sense even for a moment that she had any genuine desire to connect with anyone or have a real friend or care for anybody but herself. Ever. The last-minute tragic backstory just wasn't enough to overcome that negative impression.

That said, the season got cut short by the writer's strike, and we might well have seen more depth to the character if she'd had a proper full season to develop. I can only go by what we actually got to see, though.

And honestly? Part of my dislike for the character, at this point, is probably due to the shrieks of "Misogyny!" I get whenever I mention it.

OP

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-20 00:35 (UTC) - Expand

I personally love her but I like the kind of unrepentant asshole character type she fits into. She wasn't a good person, didn't do good things, and tbh I just enjoyed watching her steal things from Sam and Dean while snarking at them.

Not everyone likes her and that's fine but I do think the flack she gets is way overboard(especially when the fandom creams itself over Crowley who is the same character type).

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-20 00:50 (UTC) - Expand

I think I'm one of the few who loved her. She reminds me a lot of Isabela from Dragon Age 2, who is one of my favourite characters in that series, so I think my opinion is slightly coloured by that. Also I liked having a competent adversary for the Winchesters who wasn't outright good or evil.

I liked her. I thought she was interesting addition to the group--it showed that humans aren't always inherently good, either. I admit I don't remember much about the episodes, though, so if I rewatched, my opinions might change.

I love Bela hard for a lot of reasons. I am so glad that we finally find out her back story. I sensed in "Red Sky at Morning" that there was a really interesting story there that would complicate her character and make it more sympathetic. I love that she made the deal with Lilith because her father was a bastard who deserved to die (and presumably her mother because she didn't stop the abuse) and I love that she dies without telling Sam and Dean the truth. That's the kind of narrative decision that gets me in the gut; they'll always believe that she was an evil, heartless woman and never see the scared little girl whose Daddy hurt her in the night. What do Sam and Dean in particular hate the most? People who hurt kids? I think Bela is important because they're wrong about her, and they'll never know that. Really powerful arc.

She was pretty universally hated in fandom, I think because she flirted with Sam and Dean, seemed like she might be a potential love interest at some point, and starred in a sexy dream of Sam's.

Re: Thoughts on Bela?

(Anonymous) - 2014-03-20 06:44 (UTC) - Expand

TO me Bella didn't fit in the Supernatural world. She struck me as an out of character character in a place where Hunters and humans in general were all driving around in either beat up junk piles or classic American muscle cars, wearing flannel, living out of motel after flea bitten motel or in shot gun shacks and had a working class, Mid-Western ethic to them. As a human, along side those humans, she was so out of place. (Funny enough, if she had popped up as a demon from the get go, I think she would have fitted in better. Because in many ways, she is like Crowley. Only Crowley has more wit and likes to point out how the Winchesters and their ilk are basically dumb hicks. Demons gets to be higher class on this show. They can be seen wearing designer clothing, sitting by the fire side while drinking wine that would cost an arm and a leg. It's understood that they are apart from the working class given human world.)

I'm not heavily into SPN or anything, but I rather liked her.

Bela is one of those characters I wanted to like, but couldn't. I think she suffered more than anyone else in that season from the writer's strike, because her arc was so incredibly compressed, and she didn't really serve the sort of narrative role neccessary for a recurring character very well because of it. She was just sort of there and obstructive in her initial appearances, and then suddenly important in her final appearance, and it felt like there really needed to be one more episode in there to really sell her connection to Lilith and the pretty horrifying tragedy of her backstory to the audience. As it was, it felt like she was two loosely connected characters rather than one cohesive character, and it made her harder to connect with than most of the other recurring supporting cast.

Ehh... What I saw of her (I never did finish watching season 3), I didn't mind her, but she is not a character I get hugely fangirly over either. She was amusing for being someone who could get one over the Winchesters, but I wouldn't want her on all the time.

I was predisposed to like Bela because she got such hate when her character was announced, before anyone even knew anything about her. And then she was so hated during the run (a lot by people saying that they hated that she was competent and that she made the boys look bad and how dare anyone be better than the boys at anything!) Which made me defensively like her more. I do like snarky, competent characters, though (especially ones who are damaged; see also my Cara from LotS love), so I probably would have loved her just as much without the vitriol against her.

I have speculated before about the reasons why more people say they like her now. I think part of it might be time away from the character. People might have been able to objectively look at her and seen that when it was out of the moment and knowing her backstory that they appreciated her more. I think that most of it, though, is that for better or ill, tumblr has made more people willing to say they like characters like Bela. I know that back when the show was airing, only a few people on my flist knew I loved her, and I wouldn't dare be non-anon when discussing/defending her. Now there are still some times when I won't be non-anon, depending on the context, but I've freely admitted I love her and will discuss her non~anon at times.

I didn't hate the idea of her, but she just wasn't actually interesting. She was a trope of a character that I've seen a million times, and she didn't break out of that. Her totally outwitting Sam and Dean at every turn came across as obnoxious, just because she was so perfect in how badass she was. Smart, slender, sexy, cat burglar type... yawn.

I could have liked her very easily, I just didn't think she had real substance. To be honest, the most interesting thing about her was the way she died, which I think was brutal and well done. Not in a sadistic way, it was just chilling and made her human - unfortunately, only in the few minutes before her death.

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