While I agree that it's Joss-like to make huge leaps with no explanation, I've always considered that to be one of his weaknesses as a writer. He's fantastic with dialog and, when engaged, sometimes brilliant with emotional characterization. But solid plotting (both for story arcs or his characters' strategizing) often acts as his Achilles heel.
It does annoy me that he simply forgot what happened with Warren and Amy. It's sloppy. I don't like having to be told that even though it doesn't fit with what happened on the show, that's okay, because the author, who was in charge of what happened orgiginally, now tells me that he forgot. Oops.
That doesn't play well with me. It makes the writer's universe crack, and each subsequent inconsistency or huge blank space for fanwank makes that universe feel less and less 'real' and thus convincing within itself. It takes internal consistency to pull off a fictional universe, without internal consistency it grows increasingly difficult to suspend disbelief.
More than that, there's little effort in making the emotional journeys be an organic evolution from where the series left off (such as the Buffy/Faith thing) and little effort to explain where the primary characters heads and hearts are (see: Buffy and Giles situation here). In addition to the discontinuity of things like Warren, I just don't feel like Joss is playing fair with the audience or with the world he previously created by picking up at some nebulous point and then retconning stuff so that it feels like much of this is happening is a tangential offshoot rather than a continuation.
YMMV, of course, but I've yet to feel that Joss is telling Buffy's story. It feels a great deal like he's telling a story that necessarily involves Buffy because he needs her to have people buy the comics about the epic quasi-military potentials or whatever...with some Willow and Faith thrown in (don't get me wrong, I enjoy Faith so I'm not knocking her... or Willow.)
All in all, it 'feels' to me (admittedly a wholly subjective thing) that the AtS comics are coming from an appreciation of the AtS universe and that the BtVS comics feel like Joss restaging the BtVS universe while at the same time showing little actual interest or affection for the universe he previously created. It's that pick up and start somewhere entirely different with a different focus that seems very, very fanfic to me, as it's what fanfic writers do. Nothing is wrong with that, but such things naturally become filed in my head as something other than 'canon.'
I've been thrown off my stride by too often. He's done a bit too much changing of canon history and failing to connect to BtVS 7 (which, ironically was also my gripe with BtVS 7, it ignored the logical aftermath of BtVS 6... which is why I do consider this a Joss weakness in general). I need more internal continuity and I need a little more organic character evolution that doesn't require the audience to fanwank vast chunks of space, time, and pivotal characterization.
Paraphrasing rahirah from another post. I can fanwank virtually anything. In canon, I don't think I should constantly be required to.
I need more continuity if it's to feel canonical rather than fanficcy to me. Nothing is wrong with fanfic. I enjoy fanfic, but fanfic is allowed to have amorphous ties to the original text. Moreso than any direct outgrowth of canon should.
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Date: 2008-01-29 08:37 pm (UTC)It does annoy me that he simply forgot what happened with Warren and Amy. It's sloppy. I don't like having to be told that even though it doesn't fit with what happened on the show, that's okay, because the author, who was in charge of what happened orgiginally, now tells me that he forgot. Oops.
That doesn't play well with me. It makes the writer's universe crack, and each subsequent inconsistency or huge blank space for fanwank makes that universe feel less and less 'real' and thus convincing within itself. It takes internal consistency to pull off a fictional universe, without internal consistency it grows increasingly difficult to suspend disbelief.
More than that, there's little effort in making the emotional journeys be an organic evolution from where the series left off (such as the Buffy/Faith thing) and little effort to explain where the primary characters heads and hearts are (see: Buffy and Giles situation here). In addition to the discontinuity of things like Warren, I just don't feel like Joss is playing fair with the audience or with the world he previously created by picking up at some nebulous point and then retconning stuff so that it feels like much of this is happening is a tangential offshoot rather than a continuation.
YMMV, of course, but I've yet to feel that Joss is telling Buffy's story. It feels a great deal like he's telling a story that necessarily involves Buffy because he needs her to have people buy the comics about the epic quasi-military potentials or whatever...with some Willow and Faith thrown in (don't get me wrong, I enjoy Faith so I'm not knocking her... or Willow.)
All in all, it 'feels' to me (admittedly a wholly subjective thing) that the AtS comics are coming from an appreciation of the AtS universe and that the BtVS comics feel like Joss restaging the BtVS universe while at the same time showing little actual interest or affection for the universe he previously created. It's that pick up and start somewhere entirely different with a different focus that seems very, very fanfic to me, as it's what fanfic writers do. Nothing is wrong with that, but such things naturally become filed in my head as something other than 'canon.'
I've been thrown off my stride by too often. He's done a bit too much changing of canon history and failing to connect to BtVS 7 (which, ironically was also my gripe with BtVS 7, it ignored the logical aftermath of BtVS 6... which is why I do consider this a Joss weakness in general). I need more internal continuity and I need a little more organic character evolution that doesn't require the audience to fanwank vast chunks of space, time, and pivotal characterization.
Paraphrasing rahirah from another post. I can fanwank virtually anything. In canon, I don't think I should constantly be required to.
I need more continuity if it's to feel canonical rather than fanficcy to me. Nothing is wrong with fanfic. I enjoy fanfic, but fanfic is allowed to have amorphous ties to the original text. Moreso than any direct outgrowth of canon should.
YMMV, of course.