A House is Not a Home

[callmeonetrack.livejournal.com]

Comments

[callmeonetrack.livejournal.com]

This is an interesting shot really, because how the hell did he get all the way behind the staircase?

I like her outfit too. Although...no sleeves may have been kind of impractical for New Cap, eh?

[mserrada.livejournal.com]

Actually, the angle of the screenshot makes it hard to tell, but he had been standing on the landing with Kara and fallen to the side. The rug he's on is not under the stairs at all.
What got me, if you go back and rewatch the scene, you'll see him on his side like this shot. But when Sam comes for Kara, it shows Leoben flat on his back. (oops, blooper anyone ;^)

[callmeonetrack.livejournal.com]

That was one heck of a fall though. Like off and a few steps over and backwards a bit too. Lol.

I <3 continuity errors.

[mserrada.livejournal.com]

Hmmm, maybe Kara gave him a little psychic shove to help him along?

[callmeonetrack.livejournal.com]

A psychic shove? Heh. Is she an x-men now?

[mserrada.livejournal.com]

Come on, work with me here. Kara's 'special' right. By that point, I'm pretty sure she could have propelled Leoben across the room, out the window and half way across the compound if only her 'destiny' had kicked in right then.
Ok... That sounds like a good opening for a fic. Feel free and swipe it and run with it if you want. *waving graciously*

[scifishipper.livejournal.com]

The thing that has always bothered me most about this scene is that Kacey witnessed Kara stabbing Leoben in the gut. I know the girl went through a lot, but each time I watch this scene, which is not very often, I am obsessed with the horribleness of it for that little girl. Ugh. Hate Hate Hate!

:(

[rachelindeed.livejournal.com]

I just have to say that little girl who plays Kacey is utterly adorable. So, so cute. I'm not a big fan of the NC story arc for Kara -- I feel it was rushed and I didn't find Leoben's dollhouse nearly as traumatic as I was supposed to, I think. Listening to him talk about destiny and stabbing him when she got sick of it? She's been through so much worse, I just don't see her personality unravelling under the influence of his sinister insight or whatever they were going for, there. But I do think KS has a really lovely chemistry with the little girl, and it was nice to see that side of Kara. She is so multi-faceted, and I love seeing the deeply caring, deeply responsible side of her personality come out.

Also, this story arc did prompt one of my favorite random podcast comments, when someone pointed out that Kara's situation resembled an evil Groundhog Day, and RDM laughed and said, "That's right. Groundhog Day 2: This Time It's Not Funny."

:)

[rayruz.livejournal.com]

Well, we only got to see part of it. We don't really know what happened over the course of 4 months. *cough*Persephone*cough*. I think the trauma comes from the fact that she was utterly powerless in that situation. She couldn't escape and she couldn't even kill the guy who was keeping her prisoner. No victories. Which I imagine made her feel too much like how she did as a child, and that's sort of where the trauma really comes from... my opinion.

[mserrada.livejournal.com]

Plus, nothing for Kara to do day after day but think? Starbuck's always been about action--she's a restless soul.
Being cooped up in what amounted to solitary confinement with far too much time to go over all the messed up things in her life would really frak with her head. Especially with no end in sight, since after four months she had to have decided that no one was coming to rescue her.

[rachelindeed.livejournal.com]

I hear you. Certainly Kara hates being powerless, as anyone would. I can see how you can approach the material with Kara's childhood background in mind and think about a lot going on off-screen and make it make sense for her character.

But for me personally, it didn't work on a dramatic level because the whole household set-up didn't play as very effective or convincing brainwashing. I just didn't believe that Leoben's constant repetition of "love" and "destiny" would somehow prove irresistible to Kara's psyche. She's heard it before from him, and she'll hear it again, and I really thought in that situation she would hurt him as much as she could as often as she could and otherwise ignore him, and I didn't see that causing her to have a mental breakdown. The fact that Leoben never does anything to her but talk, and that he doesn't seem to be saying much of anything new, didn't help me to invest in the storyline, I'm afraid. As others have said, boredom and inactivity seem to be more difficult for her to deal with than Leoben. If they were going to psychologically torture her, I wish they had delved into some more new material or played upon her relationships with people she cared about.

I can see her starting to despair/go crazy if she thought she would never be free again, but that would have been true no matter where she was locked up. If this was meant to be a recreation of her childhood traumas, I think they could have done it far more effectively (and a big part of her childhood trauma was physical abuse, IMO, which is not in evidence here, and also her love/hate for her mother, which I'm not convinced Leoben has the emotional weight to replicate).

And I'm not sure why caring about Kacey would cause her to care about Leoben. The child is innocent, Leoben is not, and Kara is quite capable of distinguishing between them. Even if she does believe she and Leoben are the child's mutual parents, she has no reason to bond with the "father," given that he took advantage of the violation of her body in The Farm and continues to violate her freedom now. Their "bond" over Kacey just doesn't follow logically or emotionally, as far as I can see. I realize that her emotions are not supposed to be rational throughout this storyline, but I personally felt they were coming out of left field. *shrugs*

[nicole-anell.livejournal.com]

Groundhog Day 2: This Time It's Not Funny.
Bahahaha!

[callmeonetrack.livejournal.com]

I remember when I heard this plotline was coming up (I was spoiled way before I got there on the DVDs) I thought it was brilliantly awful because it was the worst conceivable torture for Kara. She could easily withstand anything physical, but mental/brainwashing in some sensitive areas? Eek. Trapped and being forced to play the docile housewife and killing him over and over but him coming back and trying to force his love down her throat. UGH. And then even worse, the baby. That one especially because it's the way he actually manages to break her/give her a bit of Stockholm or whatever.

Where I do think it could have been more sinister is...if they cast a baby the right age to believably have been from Kara's ovary they took on NC. I'm not sure why they didn't do that. Although God knows they missed so many other logical connections they could've made in other plots/episodes too.

[rachelindeed.livejournal.com]

Hey there! I was just saying to rayruz that I like the idea of psychologically torturing Kara, I just didn't find this way of going about it particularly dramatically/emotionally effective. But I'm glad it worked for so many others -- I know a lot of people love the NC story for Kara :) And I admit I am biased because Leoben almost never works for me, so that's probably affecting my enjoyment of the story here.

[callmeonetrack.livejournal.com]

Well I hated the NC arc actually, but I did think it was pretty clever. I just am not sure anything else would have been able to get to Kara in the way this did, esp. with the child. (Although one would think then that her greatest fear would be neither death nor being forgotten, but....motherhood.)

I think the reason I always dread Leoben's interaction with Kara is that it does overall feel very disingenuous to me and did ever since Flesh and Bone. It didn't make sense to me that Kara would let a cylon whose goal she knows to be mindfrakking actually affect her. I also don't think his dialogue in that episode is all that strong or sensical, which means Kara has to overreact to it a bit in order for them to make it emotional and get to that hand on the glass place which I detest. And it just feels manipulative.

And then of course, since they created this "big bond" in F&B, they kind of over-rely on that later. And you just know everytime Leoben shows up, it's BSG "breaking" Kara a bit more. Which sucks, because I love when we get to see her vulnerable side, but only when it's earned. When it's logically prompted by those she actually cares about (Bill, Lee, etc.) not some manipulative situation like this.

[nicole-anell.livejournal.com]

That screencap is brilliant.

[callmeonetrack.livejournal.com]

This one is actually not a cap but a still shot from carol segal's website. She has some really gorgeous ones.

[nicole-anell.livejournal.com]

Ooh, I love her stills. I don't think I ever saw this one - the way it's framed with the stairs and dead Leoben is awesome.

[zenzero42.livejournal.com]

I don't know, I would preferred to see Kara at the head of the resistance with Tigh much more.
Still, the story with Kacey was beautiful: to accept the connection with Kacey and to discover that it was only trick, this was the only thing able to break Kara. well, this notion was... intense.

[imelda72.livejournal.com]

I don't know, I would preferred to see Kara at the head of the resistance with Tigh much more.

Don't be silly! That's men's work!

...*is bitter* (tho I did love/was agonized by the Kacey storyline)

[callmeonetrack.livejournal.com]

Lol. I'm sorta amused that you just left five or six comments in the other post about the mommy problem arguing that the Kara/Kacey storyline wasn't a slight bit of gender fail and then this comment proves/is in agreement with the exact point of why I found it problematic. ;)

Needless to say, I too would have preferred to see Kara head the resistance much, much more.

[imelda72.livejournal.com]

I see a difference between a storyline being inherently misogynist, and saying that you'd rather see the character doing something else. (incidentally, I'm saying neither! I'm actually bitter that Lauroslin wasn't heading up the resistance, not Kara.)

My points on the other thread were only about bringing Kacey into Kara's life, and whether that marginalizes her into a maternal role. I don't think it does at all.

[callmeonetrack.livejournal.com]

But...you're sarcastically saying it's men's work so of course they didn't let her (or Laura) do this! I mean that pretty much implies that you think there was some gender imbalance, no?

And don't you think there's a bit of misogyny in the fact that they used a motherhood storyline to basically "break" Kara and have her accept Leoben's brainwashing to some extent (what with the handclutching in the hospital)?

I don't know, I guess I just resent that they did that for her character when I can't imagine them, for example, using Lee's fear of parenthood (as explored briefly in Black Market) against him in a similar scenario to this (say if he'd had to take care of Paya or something).

[imelda72.livejournal.com]

Gender imbalance, yes. There were no women leading the resistance, which is ridiculous. That's why I'm saying that I'm bitter Lauroslin wasn't more involved in it. My point was that you're saying that you think the Kacey storyline is sexist because you wanted Kara to be in the resistance. But those are 2 separate issues that shouldn't be causal.


And don't you think there's a bit of misogyny in the fact that they used a motherhood storyline to basically "break" Kara and have her accept Leoben's brainwashing to some extent (what with the handclutching in the hospital)? .... I can't imagine them, for example, using Lee's fear of parenthood (as explored briefly in Black Market) against him in a similar scenario to this

Hm, I do see your point. But it's a good storyline. Am I missing something if I suggest that perhaps Lee's character is the one that loses out in this gender bias, rather than Kara's?

[callmeonetrack.livejournal.com]

Oh I'm not saying the Kacey storyline is sexist simply because Kara wasn't in the resistance. I find it kind of distasteful/annoying that they used Kara's nurturing side against her in a way they wouldn't be able to do or dream of doing for a male character. Does that make sense?

Like, the writers thought, well, of course, she has to take care of the kid AND come around and let Leoben have some of his happy family fantasy fulfilled, because she's a woman and that's what they do... blurgh. I mean I just can't envision them coming up with this storyline for a man.

I think it depends on how successful you think the storyline is. I go back and forth and honestly tend to see it as just torture/pain for her WITH NO FOLLOW THROUGH (after the hug in Torn), so I'm not a huge fan of it. I mean Maelstrom happens pretty soon after this, but it's hard to say Kacey changed Kara at all, other than furthering her PTSD.

And yes, I'd agree that Lee misses out on a lot of good storylines, but I still dislike the fact that they brought the kid into it. It seems a bit cheap to me somehow. The execution of it all.

[imelda72.livejournal.com]

I totally see where you're coming from.

I guess for me, for something to bother me as sexist it has to be harmful, or unfair, somehow. And while you could argue that this storyline furthers the "women are only important as mothers" stereotype, I don't think anyone saw Kara that way, even after Kacey. It didn't define or limit her character in any way-- like you said, it was just an experience that contributed to her trauma.

It's a fine line to walk, and I hesitate at the implication that maternal-ish storylines should be taboo for strong women, just because it's not done with men.

Lee misses out on a lot of good storylines,

He sure does. For me the defining aspects of his character are his rocky relationship with his dad, which was largely resolved in the mini, and his lifelong chase of Kara. Not much else about him seemed to be consistent, or sticks in my mental image of him. (I think even with all the fail, and the fact that Lee lives and Kara dies [twice], the writers did a better job with her character. Or is that just my Kara-bias rearing its forceful head?) ;-)