Lost my reply and hadda start again.
I don't wanna get into shipland stuff too deeply cos it's always a place with very strong feelings, no doubt.
I will only insofar as I have an opinion on how I think it would affect the show. And I gotta say I agree, no matter who is in question, too much of that sorta stuff can become a detriment to the show.
While I believe office romances are indeed quite prevalent, that doesn't mean there hasta be that kind of parallel depicted on tv. With less than an hour's screentime, it's not what I wanna see a lot of it devoted to.
For me it always cynically feels like a ratings grab to go that route,
especially within the core of canon characters. I mean, tell me it wasn't on Miami (didn't calleigh and delko get together or something?). With CSI, as I remember it anyways, I thought the early snippets of odd interplay between Sara and Grissom were quirky, puzzling, fairly subtle and spaced out, and I didn't really know if the writers were just having fun or if anything was really gonna come of it. It as a longtime teaser with them. When they finally crossed it, it was like it made demands on the writers and the show that it hadn't previously imposed. Some liked it and some didn't. But whether you did or not, go ahead and tell me ratings weren't a factor in the decision to stretch the boundaries of a show that'd been on the air for a loooong time at the point where they did... And tell me that TPTB in NY aren't doing exactly the same thing by positioning 5.17 with regards to sweeps? :vulcan:
Look, CSINY is
not a night time soap, it's a crime drama. CSINY is not RL, it's a convenient selection of things compiled and edited to depict the investigation of a case. What I tune in to watch every week is
not who is hooking up or batting eyelashes at whom, but what they're gonna be faced with in a case, how they're gonna go about solving it, and how it's gonna affect them.
Me personally, imo, Mac and Stella oughtta remain solely long time friends and partners. It is such a rare thing, especially to see on tv, and I hope that line is never crossed between them. It might be fun sometime to see a flashback of them first meeting and being assigned as partners, because if any flirting was likely to have happened, that's when it probably woulda, in jockeying to figure out their dynamics. It might also be fun to see one of Stella pushing Mac to ask Claire out or something like that, or it could be interesting to see Mac confide in Stella after that one kiss with Quinn happened. There are lots of ways to be fun and/or insightful in looking at their particular partnership
other than romance.
I was, and still am, very much holding my breath that Flack/Angell is handled well, and in many ways I think hints of it are far better than overt depictions and devoted storylines.
As for the dramallama, I can't even begin to tell you how much I've grown to detest DL over the past few seasons. I just don't think the pairing has made for good tv, nor that it's done either of the characters any good at all.
Sometimes, stuff is just best at a level of flirtation. Not everything needs outright screentime. And some stuff is just best left left to the imagination alone.
I do appreciate and actually like seeing the core characters have a life referenced outside work, especially in how it may inform how they approach their job in general. I like it whether it's conversational, like Adam talking about one of his many ex-girlfriends, or his father, or Sid inviting Mac over for a holiday dinner. I also like where sometimes it's actually depicted, like a Knicks game with Flack and Danny, Stella out on a date, though hopefully in future not with a psycho, a stalker, or too much of a lightweight; Stella going over to Danny's with soup was also good, Flack and Mac visiting Sid in the hospital to watch a Rangers game, Mac playing his bass on occasion is okay, etc. Those sorts of scenes let us in without detracting from the show, sometimes even serve it well at the same time.
I don't like scenes of Danny moping after Lindsay or spilling his guts to grieving parents, don't like Lindsay having snits where Danny's concerned, wasn't a fan of the belly smooch, or even Flack and Angell's kiss. I dunno why, but Mac and Peyton overall got up my nose less in how they were depicted, and before Stella's men went off the deep end in their respective cases, I didn't mind how her personal life was handled.
The show is still ultimately about their work solving homicides, and I hope the show never loses that focus. If it's done well, you still like and care about the characters, because you're in their world, watching what they've each chosen to devote their professional lives to, and at what cost. And yes, a personal life helps to keep an inner balance, so by all means, talk about it and have the occasional scene.
-
I'm always relieved and heartened in reading interviews done with the actors where they voice sentiments on the show and the characters that resonate with my own, because I feel that I'm reading things in their performances that they wanted to come across. In Melina's case, she was asked about Mac & Stella's relationship, and echoed that she thought the two should remain unentangled romantically, that they're more brother/sister with a great friendship, and that neither would jeopardize it.
(the interview I'm talking about was one of Kristing Huntley's from Dec. 2007;
http://www.csifiles.com/interviews/melina_kanakaredes.shtml )
There's a far wider world to reference than that of just romance, so how about some creativity from the writers and directors to dig into that a little more...?
(and fer chrissakes, someone
please give reveal a little more about Hawkes sometime? I'd far rather that than screentime given a wedding, or anything to do with the first CSI franchise bairn...)
