In my little bio bit on this site, I mention that I am a fan of genre TV shows.  I think.  I say that somewhere on the internet.  With this tendency we all have to shout into the void of the web, it gets hard to remember exactly where things are, or if anyone is listening.

Anyway, I haven’t blogged about TV shows yet, and today marked the return of my favourite one.  Supernatural.  The internet keeps showing my pictures of the first episode and interpretations of key relationships vary wildly.  To me, with my love of meta and analysis, this is all part of the joy of the show.  To some people, however, it is clearly akin to a life or death situation.  When the show seems to be going to way they want it to go, they are all joy and delight.  One slight hint or spoiler to the contrary, and woe is them.

Essentially, these fictional characters have become a vital part of people’s lives.  Now, I get very involved in some shows and a lot of books.  I can become obsessed with them, though often only for one season or even a few episodes.  I have definitely cried at the deaths of fictional characters, or at them having their hopes crushed, and I often teleport to the kitchen, quite without meaning to, when something embarrassing happens to my favourite characters on screen.  I really do not remember either a conscious decision to move or the actions of said movement.  This may be less embarrassing for me than my reaction to a scene in The Almighty Johnsons (another wonderful show – Norse gods in the guise of mortal men and women, in New Zealand.  One recent episode included the patriarch of the family declaring his wrath will be known, and then turning up dressed as a giant, purple octopus.  What’s not to love?).  One scene made me wince, and then next thing I realised, I was climbing up the arm of the chair and over the other side, in some sort of interpretive dance version of a human slinky.  Even the dogs were giving me weird looks. 

So, yes, I do get into these shows. 

I can see why people get so involved.  These characters can come to represent things about your own life or self.  They can reflect some part of you or your situation back at yourself, so of course it is painful when the version of them which lives in your head turns out not to be the one seen by the writers/produces/show runners/studio execs… however many people have a finger in this show-pie. 

Personally, I like to take the precaution of having another show on stand-by, or another book, so I can shift into that world and let whatever upsetting thing has happened in my primary show fade away.  For instance, Burn Notice, with its ever-so-competent spy lead character and tongue-in-cheek humour, is making me feel much better about everything, from other TV shows and real life (and doesn’t real life suck with its plotting and character development sometimes?  I am long overdue for my fashion montage, for a start, and I want to know when I am getting my superpowers.  I have another birthday soon.  Perhaps this time I will find out I have a mystical destiny.)

To write fiction, you need to be alive to the tropes and story-arcs and so forth in what you read and watch, which is why I sometimes find myself considering what they are trying to make me think and how characters are presented to illustrate themes, rather than just getting swept away with things.  We also need to be swept away, at least some of the time.  After all, if our characters are not real to us, how will they be real to the readers? 

It’s just that maybe some of us become so swept away that we lose our footing and find the show or book is more important that the things going on in real life are.  And I am all right with this, in its proper measure.  I feel alive when I am deep inside a created world, buying into the rules and values, charting the journeys of the people fighting and growing in the text.  Sadly, (or perhaps I mean ‘healthily’) I do have to crawl back into the real world in order to find food.  And tea.  Tea is so very important in these things, as it is in all things.  Which reminds me, those hobbits love tea…and second breakfast…  Oh, screw it.  Who needs real food?  I’ll go join Bilbo for an unexpected party.