Oh right, I get you now. As I said, I am not familiar with a great many fandoms, so I should really have said I was speaking for the two or three I even vaguely know of. You can see I am a bit of a novice at this meta discussion lark.
Perhaps I didn't express myself clearly enough. I appreciate that there *are* family units in these shows, it's just that in my opinion - in the shows I know - they seem to take very much of a back seat. It's as if the protagonists make their own, alternative if you like, family out of the other main characters. By removing the conventional family of spouse/children/parents etc. from the inner circle, you allow the character to emote about the loneliness & the various incidental characters. And that to me looks like the easy way out, because achieving this in a normal domestic setting would be very difficult. That's what I meant.
If you take Farscape, for example, yes, the connection with the father is there, but they are physically separated, and all the "adventures" happen with the people on the ship, without the bloke's family getting in the way of the action(sorry his name escapes me at the moment, but I know who you mean). On top of that, there's all the angst about him being away from home and all that.
That's what I was trying to say. It is a lot harder, in my opinion, to create convincing drama within a well-established and stable family unit. And you'll forgive me, but the families in Heroes look hardly well-adjusted, so there's plenty of scope for drama there. *g*
If the other shows you mention do that then that's good. BTW I am really enjoying this discussion, but I have to be up and at the airport in - oh dear - 4 hours, so if I don't reply to anything for a couple of days it won't be out of rudeness.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2007-04-08 12:14 am (UTC)Perhaps I didn't express myself clearly enough. I appreciate that there *are* family units in these shows, it's just that in my opinion - in the shows I know - they seem to take very much of a back seat. It's as if the protagonists make their own, alternative if you like, family out of the other main characters. By removing the conventional family of spouse/children/parents etc. from the inner circle, you allow the character to emote about the loneliness & the various incidental characters. And that to me looks like the easy way out, because achieving this in a normal domestic setting would be very difficult. That's what I meant.
If you take Farscape, for example, yes, the connection with the father is there, but they are physically separated, and all the "adventures" happen with the people on the ship, without the bloke's family getting in the way of the action(sorry his name escapes me at the moment, but I know who you mean). On top of that, there's all the angst about him being away from home and all that.
That's what I was trying to say. It is a lot harder, in my opinion, to create convincing drama within a well-established and stable family unit. And you'll forgive me, but the families in Heroes look hardly well-adjusted, so there's plenty of scope for drama there. *g*
If the other shows you mention do that then that's good. BTW I am really enjoying this discussion, but I have to be up and at the airport in - oh dear - 4 hours, so if I don't reply to anything for a couple of days it won't be out of rudeness.