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We Were Supposed to Be a Team
So, internet, I tried to watch Scandal, and I just... nope. No to first season, no to skipping to the episodes with Jasika Nicole. Olivia and whatshisname - Grant? - the President's torrid, unending affair is pretty much every romantic Do Not Want. I don't believe that the President can scream he wanted to win fair and square and Olivia cheated him of that, and then tell Olivia he still loves her. I don't believe Olivia will ever stop trying to "fix" and control the people around her, including - especially - the people she loves. I don't believe either of them will change. "Gift of the Magi" style stories are dear to my heart: people can be gutted and battered and wiser, because they have learned from their mistakes. But the core story of Scandal - Olivia giving Grant the election, and Grant lurching around maundering about love until that presidency is in danger, both of them rendering these gifts meaningless - all that pain, with no learning to show for it? That's really not my thing.
Olivia is the genie, or maybe Mr. Morden: she gives what you wish for, and if you didn't wish carefully? Well then, you get side effects. That's okay! A series about Olivia Pope, Chaotic Neutral, would be peachy. Or a show about Olivia Pope, Fixing Things Because She Knows Better and Is Boss Of You All has potential, too. But Scandal is not that show, it's a soap opera. Olivia tells Grant "no, don't touch me" and he does anyway and she doesn't slap him across the Oval Office with a harassment suit. Bummer, that. I don't believe this is the leader of the free world and I don't believe these two are going to move beyond their history of damaging each other. It's just two people making the same mistakes, trying the same wretched takebacks, and being shocked they get the same painful high-volume fights and dubcon kissing. DTMFA, Olivia! Your Presidential squeeze can't give you what you want, and you keep giving him things he doesn't want! Shack up with Huck or something! Or try the single life! Make lots of friends! Friends who do not work for you!
Tangentially, the DC Metro has this amazing, dim, moody lighting which is not reflected in Scandal's set design. I am very sad the show did not find a way to take advantage of real life to enhance the epic sadness of Huck's very sad, kind of creepy 2x19 Kim-and-son train-watching act.
Olivia is the genie, or maybe Mr. Morden: she gives what you wish for, and if you didn't wish carefully? Well then, you get side effects. That's okay! A series about Olivia Pope, Chaotic Neutral, would be peachy. Or a show about Olivia Pope, Fixing Things Because She Knows Better and Is Boss Of You All has potential, too. But Scandal is not that show, it's a soap opera. Olivia tells Grant "no, don't touch me" and he does anyway and she doesn't slap him across the Oval Office with a harassment suit. Bummer, that. I don't believe this is the leader of the free world and I don't believe these two are going to move beyond their history of damaging each other. It's just two people making the same mistakes, trying the same wretched takebacks, and being shocked they get the same painful high-volume fights and dubcon kissing. DTMFA, Olivia! Your Presidential squeeze can't give you what you want, and you keep giving him things he doesn't want! Shack up with Huck or something! Or try the single life! Make lots of friends! Friends who do not work for you!
Tangentially, the DC Metro has this amazing, dim, moody lighting which is not reflected in Scandal's set design. I am very sad the show did not find a way to take advantage of real life to enhance the epic sadness of Huck's very sad, kind of creepy 2x19 Kim-and-son train-watching act.
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Yes, yes it is. This is so not my thing, three paragraphs barely scratched the surface. But! There is other TV. I've only watched The Wire all the way through once, and never saw most of The West Wing. And at some point I will watch the second season of Orphan Black, and Sleepy Hollow.