Viewing Single Post From: Thursday, October 4th Daily Discussion

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Viewing Single Post From: Thursday, October 4th Daily Discussion
esp13	Oct 4 2012, 10:42 AM
Posts: 3,707 Group: Elite Member Member #676 Joined: December 20, 2007	SocRMum1 Oct 4 2012, 10:06 AM esp13 Oct 4 2012, 09:36 AM bomber Oct 4 2012, 04:03 AM Tibi Oct 3 2012, 11:55 PM Quoting limited to 4 levels deepPosted Image This is the problem. If you take it at face value, Nicole's supposed to be the bad guy, setting up poor grief-stricken Jennifer. But no-one's buying it. Everyone hates Bitchifer and is rooting for Nicole. If TomSell's intention is to make Nicole an object of sympathy and have Jen universally derided then they have done a great job, but if that isn't their intention then they have fucked up the basics of storytelling - to make the heroine likeable. I'm not remotely convinced that Nicole is supposed to be unsympathetic in all of this. If that were the case, they wouldn't have her losing her baby. They'd have her setting up Jen in some other way to keep her away from Dan and then forcing Dan to marry her for the sake of the baby. That would be unsympathetic. Having Nicole go off the deep end after losing her baby means that she is supposed to be sympathetic even if we ultimately disagree with her actions. We are still supposed to understand and sympathize with her. And, judging by the comments, I think the vast majority of us do. I don't think that's by accident. I agree they are giving the audience reason to sympathize with Nicole's reasons for going to such extremes - but I also think they've made sure to set in place that Nicole is scheming against poor, grieving Jennifer prior to the loss of the baby and that poor, grieving Jennifer would never have these uncharacteristic outbursts of anger if Nicole wasn't intentionally manipulating her to do so. As a result, in the end it sounds to me like they want the audience to feel that what happens is really a result of Nicole's actions and essentially she has it coming - and that Jennifer is a completely blameless heroine who is being victimized by the crazy lady. Ultimately - I'd have preferred they not paint either character in such defining roles but allow the audience to empathize with both. It's times like this (among many) that I really hate they film so far ahead - because I'd love to have seen them set up the story so that neither woman is at fault or manipulating/hurting the other and then decide on the outcome based on the chemistry of the actors and the reaction/support from the audience. It's such a shame that there is absolutely no room anymore for the audience to dictate a story direction. I disagree that they are setting it up as Nicole being responsible for poor, grieving Jen's outbursts. They set up the outbursts before Nicole was even doing any real scheming against Jennifer. She got angry at Kayla early on and she also had the argument with Abigail that was arguably out of character. At that point in time, Nicole had done almost nothing to manipulate Jennifer other than implying a relationship with Daniel which, while perhaps not as meaningful as she made it out to be, was hardly manipulation or a lie. I think we are supposed to believe that Jennifer's irrational anger is out of grief (not that MR has been very good at playing it that way) and doesn't have much to do with Nicole's actions. Nicole didn't manipulate Jen into finding out about the DNA switch and going off the deep end about it. Nicole certainly didn't manipulate Jen into believing that Nicole is blackmailing or otherwise forcing Daniel into going along with the plan. It's been made very clear that Daniel is doing this on his own and, in fact, he made that very clear to Jennifer. So, Jennifer's obsession with Nicole isn't really about Nicole's manipulations and I don't think there is anything that's played out onscreen that is supposed to convince us that it is Nicole's fault. That said, I don't think Jennifer is being made out to be the guilty party either. I think they are trying to set it up as both being sympathetic. Nicole because of losing her baby, Jennifer because while she's been over the top, she doesn't actually cause the baby's death. The problem is that MR doesn't play the vulnerability necessary to actually make the audience feel sympathy for her, so some of the audience then assumes that the show is trying to make us feel sympathy for her when, honestly, I don't think it's intended to be one-sided at all. If it had been intended to be as one-sided as some think, I believe it would have been written much differently. JMO, of course.


Thursday, October 4th Daily Discussion · DAYS: News, Spoilers & Discussion