When TV Becomes Trivial - Analysis of The 100 S5

"I'm going to write because I cannot help it," -Charlotte Bronte

As you all well know, my favorite hobby is analyzing stories. And, of course, I like to analyze the content I'm consuming. 

Is anyone surprised?

Anyway, Season 5 of my third favorite tv show - The 100 - has been airing for the past month, and I've been noticing a trend that's concerning. It has also plagued The CW's Riverdale. It could be that these two shows come from the same network, but alas. It's still a problem. 

Season Five picks back up at the very end where Season Four left off, with Clarke radioing Bellamy, and a mysterious ship appearing in the air. And from there, there's only about a one episode interlude of establishing both where Clarke is on earth and where Bellamy and the others are in space. One other episode is spent on Octavia in the bunker, but otherwise, the episodes plunge right back into the thick of the plot. 

And already, we have a problem. This season's conflict arises when a group of prisoners come down from their mother ship to fight for the last habitable spot on earth - well, North America at least. 

And my question is this: why focus on this when there are six years worth of quality material that is just skipped over? The stories within the six years are far more interesting that just watching our heroes defeat yet another villain. Imagine all of the things that happened to them over six years that changed them and shape them into who they are. Skipping all of this time and just breezing right past all of that good character material is just a disservice. 

This is, unfortunately, a pitfall that many tv shows fall into. Once Upon A Time and The Walking Dead, to name a few. And it all culminates to the fact that the writers start writing for the thrills and stop writing for the characters, which is a one-stop-shop to failure. The characters of The 100 feel disconnected from who they were, which is a tragedy. But it would be less of a tragedy if the writers spent more time developing who they had changed into. 

However, I think this is a systemic problem with television though. The writers can't see a permanent end in sight because they never know if the show is going to be renewed, and if they do, it's probably too little too late to fix all of their problems. When you can't see a permanent end in sight, meaning something that overarcs through the whole series, it all feels . . . trivial. Like nothing matters, and all of the characters seem to reset at the beginning of another season. 

The problem when tv shows drag on and on, like The 100 is gearing towards, is that it starts writing for the thrills and not writing for the characters. The writers think they need to keep the watchers hooked with big reveals and plot twists, but all they really need is solid characters with growing arcs. I'm afraid that this is what The 100 is becoming, because jumping right back into the action without giving these characters time to develop - or even breathe - makes all of the other time we spent with them in past seasons feel wasted. It all loses meaning when the writers forget to focus on the most important part of the story. 

The 100 is a good show. It has strong characters, heartbreaking arcs, and interesting and complex themes and morals. Don't let stats, viewership, or the uncertainty of renewal draw your focus away from what really keeps viewers: the characters. I'm looking at you, Jason Rothenberg. You can do better. You have done better. 

~The WordShaker

It's More Fun If They Die at The End | Analysis of The 100's Season 4

"The worst thing you write is better than the best thing you did not write," -Ellen Jackson

PSA: Sorry there was no blog post last week. Life caught up with me, and I ended up having NO time. Hopefully that won't happen again. On to this week's post!

~

It's more fun if they die at the end. 

While this isn't always the case, in many post-apocalyptic or science fiction stories, it should be the case, especially when the situation is hopeless. 

Where shows and books write themselves into a corner, is that they set up this hopeless situation, creating this plotline that drives the story. However, what all too often happens is that the infamous plot device deus ex machina quite literally pops up. 

A deus ex machina is where a seemingly unsolvable problem is suddenly abruptly resolved by the inspired and unexpected intervention of a new event. Thanks, Wikipedia. 

The way that Season 4 of the 100 is progressing is that the radiation is exponentially growing, and will wipe out 99% of life on earth, as claimed by the show. The main plot involves them trying to find ways to either stop the radiation or protect everyone from it as it ravages the earth. Our favorite flawed leaders, Clarke and Bellamy, are trying to save the day, along with a neurotic Raven. 

In this past week's episode, there is almost a hope of having another bunker, built by a religious zealot. My initial thoughts during the episode consisted of "oh no, this place is going to be habitable, and then the rest of the season is just going to be them fixing it up and making it usable."

What the episode beautifully pulls off is convincing the audience that this place would be intact and able to support the earth's populous. When this doesn't end up working out for our fatal heroes, I felt almost a relief. 

Why?  Don't I want everything to work out peachy and for everyone to survive?

No, not in this case. Because if another deus ex machina comes in and saves everyone, then there will be no point, the cycle of surviving and killing that The 100 has found itself in will only perpetuate. 

My projection is that this season will be The 100's last. I almost want it to be it's last season, because it will create a beautiful story arc with my predictions. 

1a. Clarke and Bellamy are unable to find another place except the Ark to hold 100 people, almost poetically. 

1b. 100 people, hopefully not our main characters, hole up in the Ark and survive the nuclear meltdowns. Our main characters die happily, having fulfilled their mission and resolved the conflict, and the human race lives on. 

2a. The Ark is somehow damaged beyond the repair of fixing in time. There is no place to hide. 

2b. 99% of the human population dies. However, our characters accept their death and live their last, sick days to the fullest. Or, they put themselves out of their misery via group suicide. 

I want my beloved characters to die because it will wrap up the story. Truly, I see almost no way out of this situation. The only other avenue I could see is if Season 5 would cover the straggling survivors on the Ark. 

However, the ending of the series would be much more impactful if it ended here, and in the two scenarios I provided above. 

It would be more impactful because if everyone or our beloved characters died, then it would give the message that you can't just live life by surviving, and sometimes dying can be more fulfilling than living. If everyone died, it would be poetic justice. The Arkadians sent down the 100 to die, they didn't die, but later, they ended up dying from radiation fallout, having learned all they could on the ground. It would be a fulfilling and timely death for all of our original 100. 

Compare this to the movie Passengers, starring Christ Pratt and Jennifer Lawrence. They are faced with a spaceship that is breaking down, and they have woken up about eighty years too early to arrive at their destination. After fixing the ship, and, of course, realizing they love each other, they accept their fate, which is that they won't be able to reenter cryogenic sleep. So, Pratt's and Lawrence's characters 'bloom where they're planted' so to speak, and live out the rest of their lives, alone on the ship. This is the impactful, deep, and emotional ending I have envisioned for this series. 

I suppose I wouldn't be mad if Season 5 continued on with some of our main characters inside of the ark riding out the radiation, but then, that would definitely have to be the end, with the remaining survivors barely scraping by to rebuild civilization. However, Jasper, everyone's favorite drug addict alongside Charlie Pace, has been the ringleader of what I want to happen. 

The characters learn to live, not just to survive, accept their inevitable death, and find peace within themselves. 

A hesitant watcher because Jason Rothenberg has hurt me too much already,

~The WordShaker

The Unappreciated Awesomeness of John Murphy | The 100

"Screw this, I'm going for it," -any successful writer ever

After a hard, stressful day at school, sometimes I just need to watch my new favorite TV show: The 100.

And this week's ramble is about the infamous John Murphy, A.K.A., the resident asshole, who I actually very much enjoy. 

When the show started, I hated him. I thought he was just awful and that's all there was too it. However, he was fun to watch because he was so cynically sarcastic and created conflict. 

But then, I grew to love to hate Murphy. I loved seeing the terrible shit he was going to do next because he was aggressively unpredictable, which, I hate to say, was super entertaining. It made for great tension.  

But then, around the beginning of Season 2, something crazy happened. I was so angry that he shot Raven, but then, in the dropship, he told her his life story, and, all of a sudden, it clicked. And then, soon, he grew into himself, I think. He opened up, and he let that go. 

Murphy's conscience began to show more as him and Jaha began traveling to the City of Light. As soon as he truly saw all of the awful things that Earth - as well as the people on it - had in store, they began to have the opposite effect on him. While other times, it hardened him, it became too much, and he cracked. Murphy changed. 

But what I love so much about this is that he kept his gruff and aggressive demeanor. And, damn it, sometimes he's so funny. His dry humor is perfectly placed, and he knows just what to say at the right time to say it with his beady eyes and pursed lips and scowl.

And so begins Season Three. 

The season starts off with Murphy on the edge of suicide, and his descent into this is powerful and gripping, just another show of Richard Harmon's amazing acting ability. 

He is strong and resilient and conscious in his opposition of Jaha and ALIE. While aspects of Murphy change, such as his outlook on life and his demeanor, the sad, manipulative, selfish, and raunchy core of Murphy never changes. Which is actually pretty great. 

Murphy and Emori together are fantastic. Not only is Emori equally badass and complex, their banter is entertaining, and their chemistry is on fire. 

On to his rape - and yes, Ontari raped him. Right after Titus beat and tortured him. Subtle in it's delivery, it poignantly shows the nuances and coercion of rape. It's just another layer in the deeply broken, sarcastic, and relatable John Murphy. 

The season ends with Murphy as the best part of it. He fights for Emori until the bitter end, and it's utterly fantastic. His greyness as a character is what makes him so dynamic, and, ultimately, so relatable and utterly loveable. 

Overall, I love to hate Murphy, but I also hate to love him. 

He's awesome, cunning, brave, cynical, funny, reckless, and badass. And also just an ass. 

But I absolutely love it. 

~

I've finally concluded that John Murphy is the 'Sawyer' of this series. 

If you have no idea what I just referenced, what the hell are you doing with your life?

~The WordShaker

The 100 | Why You Should Watch the TV Show and Not Read the Books

"Good writing is clear thinking made visible," -Bill Wheeler

So, if you're not up with the times, I am LOVING the CW's show, The 100. It takes the spot below my favorite show of all time, ABC's Lost. 

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The 100 is amazing in it's depth. In it's characters. Just about everything in it is perfect and I enjoy every second of it. 

So, of course, when I heard it was a book, I felt obligated to read it. It just wouldn't feel right without reading the source material. 

Truthfully, I hadn't heard many good things about the book, and I didn't expect it to be better than the TV show, because, well, the TV show was phenomenal. 

And, oh boy, have I never been more right. 

So, these are the reasons why you should watch the TV show and NOT read the books. 

1. The Characters

Finn. Raven. Jasper. Monty. Lexa. Murphy. Lincoln. Abby and Kane and even Jaha. 

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All of the amazingly complex characters we fell in love with in the show are nowhere to be found in the books. The amazing cast of characters made the show all the more diverse and interesting. 

But what other characters do we get in place of them? 

Whiny, weak, and stupid Glass and her one dimentional boyfriend Luke and their fabricated drama. 

Not only that, but the book strips the characters of their dimentions. Funny enough, the TV or movie adaption normally does this, but in this case, the TV show builds upon and expands these bare-bones characters into beautiful people. 

For example, two amazing examples are Clarke and Octavia. Heroic and no-nonsense Clarke that clashes and yet somehow mixes with hothead Bellamy is replaced with a quiet damsel-in-distress. She nearly becomes an object of Wells' and Bellamy's attention, and the relationship between her and Thalia is pathetic. However, she still remains the most developed female character, which is saying something. 

 Octavia (or should I say Oct-slay-via) has beautiful character development over the first two seasons, and I must admit that I kind of hated her at first. She was whiny and stupid and promiscuous, but comes into her own via Lincoln, the absence of Bellamy, and her influence from the Grounders. Her fight for Lincoln is admirable and shows that she can be, and is, so much more. And besides, she kicks ass. However, Octavia and her character is pretty much gone. Nowhere to be found. Her only purpose is to further Bellamy's plot-line.

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Surprisingly, TV Wells, who dies in the third episode of the first season, is more developed in that short period of time than through an entire book. In the show, he is unflinchingly moral and kind and loyal to a fault, and I was enraged when he died. But the Wells of the book has no other character, no other motivation than his selfish love of Clarke. 

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2. Depth 

Of which this book has none.

All of the amazing themes of the TV show, such as loyalty, good and evil being two sides of the same coin, moral ambiguity, and conflicting ideologies are nowhere to be found in the book.

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The author of this book seems to believe that luurrrrve is the only motivation teenagers can ever have. Other than Octavia stealing some medicine and some snide comments from Graham, Murphy's far inferior book counterpart, there's not much conflict outside of Glass's feeeeeeeeeeeelings, Wells trying to win back Clarke, and Clarke's flip-flopping feelings about Bellamy and Wells. 

There's just a great balance of coupley-love, platonic friendships, arguments, morality, action, and everything amazing about a show in The 100, while the book is jam packed full of shitty one lines about luurrrrve. 

Exhibit A: "To save the girl he loved, he'd have to endanger the entire human race."

Exhibit B: "There was no drug strong enough to repair a broken heart."

Exhibit C: "Without Luke, life would be as empty and cold as space itself."

Need I go on?

Good Lord, give me a break. There are character motivations other than the fleeting infatuation of teenage love. 

I can't even. 

3. Pacing 

This section will also talk about plot. 

So much more happens in Season 1 than even in the first book, and I feel that this is an issue of style. This book has four points-of-view, and this means the plot will move four times as slow because four different characters can be doing four different things in one day, which can take up a huge chunk of the book. This, in turn, causes lots of pages and words but little action. 

While I don't think this is detrimental, it's nowhere near as gripping as the TV show. There's just so much more going on in the show, versus the book. 

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Like I said, the show has a great mix of survival, action, and relationships, which I think is an important ratio to get right in shows like this. However, the book is like a terrible soap opera for teenagers. 

I would not recommend the books, even though I'm probably going to still read all of them. However, I highly encourage you to read them so we can bitch about them together. It's not the worst book I've ever read; it has some good aspects, but compared to the TV show, it's crap. 

~

I could probably talk forever about how the show is better than the book, but that might keep you from watching the amazing show. 


In other news, I SHIP BELLARKE SO FREAKING HARD I WILL GO DOWN WITH THIS SHIP SCREW CLEXA. 

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Now all I have to do is wait for Season 3 to come out on Netflix. 

*sigh*

~The WordShaker