Catching Fire Bonus, Part We're Done
Jul. 5th, 2011 11:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
farlaThe Hunger Games ‘Pearl Plot,’ version 2.0
Let's wrap this disaster up.
He opens by saying he's been fielding questions (read:having people point out the fact he's misread various points) about the theory, and links to a string of them. He also, of course, characterizes everyone as agreeing, interested and asking questions or "unkind" skeptic assholes.
He says:
"I really don’t care if they’re right or wrong. It’s the literary device or symbolic tradition I can illustrate with the whacky idea that is for readers to take home.
Of course the guesses are going to be wrong! I’ve hit more bullseyes than I want to list here but no one was more surprised than I was when my longshots came home, to mix betting metaphors. If I could guess what great writers were going to write down to the plot point detail, I’d be writing novels myself, right?
The funny thing, consequently, is when readers, mostly of the snarky crowd, said it was almost certain that I was wrong and railed in some nasty ad hominempoints about my Gilderoy-esque self-importance and my need to get a life. Ummm… As I am not married to any of my theories, “pearls” before swine or no, wouldn’t that be more true of the folks with a sure idea of how wrong I am than it is of me?"
So there you have it. Having an English degree, or at least one you buy as he so evidently did, renders you incapable of figuring out where a YA novel is going. It is not explained if this is done as part of the necessary transaction for when he bought the degree, if they drain the intellect of whoever's name is written on them, or if they just radiate out moron waves and he types all this in his office with his framed degree a few feet away.
Also, he's a self-important smug asshole.
But anyway, his point is that all those other people with their "facts" and "reasons" and "not making up stupid shit based on something they misread" are the ones who are really wrong for thinking he's wrong, even though he's probably wrong, but it's because these books are SO CRAZY UNPREDICTABLE and they are JUST AS WRONG for thinking it couldn't happen.
But back to this final essay. He wrote about the alchemy and nonsense to "explain the premises of my speculation before rolling out the 2.0 version of what I believe Arabella first called the “Pearl Plot.
That was important because, while the Pearl Plot may make perfect sense without understanding the guts and gears of Ms. Collins’ craft, the only reason besides grins and giggles that I bother with speculation like this is to illustrate the principles or “keys” to understanding the best writing. Let’s have this out front right from the gate: the Pearl Plot, however credible or logical or just internally consistent (or not), is certainly wrong. The value of the exercise, then, outside of time spent with serious readers discussing a favorite book (no small thing that) is in gaining familiarity and facility with the tools that make reading more enjoyable, even exciting. "
Okay, that was a lot of bullshit at once. Let's go slow here.
"the only reason besides grins and giggles that I bother with speculation like this is to illustrate the principles or “keys” to understanding the best writing. Let’s have this out front right from the gate: the Pearl Plot, however credible or logical or just internally consistent (or not), is certainly wrong."
So, the speculation shows the keys to understanding the writing, except for the fact it's totally useless for understanding what's happening. Note also the "out front right from the gate". He's written a half dozen essays. Two weeks have passed. It's a bit late for that. (And it is still credible, logical and internally consistent, even though the reasons people disagreed were that it didn't even work within the text.)
"The value of the exercise, then, outside of time spent with serious readers discussing a favorite book (no small thing that) is in gaining familiarity and facility with the tools that make reading more enjoyable, even exciting. "
Except all those tools tell you nothing, because he's just admitted his theory based on them is wrong. But hey, he got to discuss his nonsense theory with serious readers! I'd say I'm impressed he didn't actually go all social experiment here, but the guy doesn't seem internet literate enough to even know that excuse.
Longterm followers of this sort of thing will recognize this as one of the hallmarks of the self-important idiot. They'll just say any sort of bullshit that comes into their head, then insist you do the work of explaining why it's wrong if you want them to stop saying it, then shrug it off and say they never really meant it and the many flaws don't mean they're an idiot, then vomit out some new nonsense and demand everyone "discuss" their newest brilliant idea. So much fun for everyone, right?
So anyway, the point is that if he gets anything wrong he totally meant to do that, and he doesn't think he's right. But he's also tightened up his theory to try to fix all the mistakes he doesn't care about and weren't mistakes, and also it's completely plausible and he has a great track record with this kind of thing once you factor in the AMAZING UNPREDICTABILITY of the mysterious superhumans known as novelists.
"The Back Story of District 12 Resistance "
Let's see just how badly he does.
"Let’s start at the beginning with a note about the obvious that the beginning of the story, like most tales, isn’t the beginning of the story. Like Homer’s Odyssey, we start out in medias res, in the middle of things,"
Eight published books and he doesn't fucking know what in media res means. Wikipedia, could you help us out here?
In medias res or medias in res (into the middle of things) is a Latin phrase denoting the literary and artistic narrative technique wherein the relation of a story begins either at the mid-point or at the conclusion, rather than at the beginning (cf. ab ovo, ab initio), establishing setting, character, and conflict via flashback and expository conversations relating the pertinent past. The main advantage of in medias res is to open the story with dramatic action rather than exposition which sets up the characters and situation. It can be employed in any narrative genre, epic poetry, novels, plays, or film.
Thank you Wikipedia.
Much like the dumbasses who say that pikachu is capitalized because it's the name of the species and names are proper nouns, he's thinking that because, like any story ever, this has some backstory and events that come before it, that means it starts in the middle.
Unless Katniss waking up, wandering around and expositing all over the place counts as "action", no, it did not. In media res would be to have started during the games. Say, when Katniss is standing on the plate, plotting her chances of getting to the bow, and everything before that is covered in flashback. Which, actually, already sounds more interesting, and might also make the flaws of those parts less evident.
Wikipedia, do you have any other suggestions for people who are confused?
What in medias res is not.
Thanks.
Anyway, ignorance of a basic literary term aside, he asks us where the story really began. He says it begins with the lullaby.
"this song, a lullaby that infants trust as truth, is, because of its age and meaning, the primordial aspect of life transcending Panem that Katniss taps into as her core strength and surety. "
The song is old, and? What does this have to do with when this particular story starts?
Anyway, the lullaby has to do with Katniss picturing a world where she could have kids, and she would have kids with Peeta, and Peeta's love is pure and perfect, and the pure perfect love is the center of the story, and therefore it's the origin of the story, and therefore the lullaby is the start of the story and I am not fucking kidding that is the reasoning. It's playing six degrees of Kevin Bacon with logic. And it still doesn't explain what this has to do with his idea that the real story started before the first book.
"Setting that primordial, atemporal paradise as our story “beginning” or principle,"
"As beginning or principle"? See this is why people hate English as an academic subject, it's because of the horrible stuff its supposed devotees do to the poor language. He just said "atemporal", as in, he's not using beginning in a chronological sense. Except that's how he started off just a few paragraphs ago. He's using different meanings of the same word. If you could commit war crimes against linguistics, this is what it would look like.
Not at all satisfied, we whiplash back to the literal sense and he lists the historical events Katniss tells us.
"the three events defining the Capitol’s metanarrative are:
1. the District Rebellion at least 74 years before Hunger Games’ opening,
2. the Capitol victory over the Districts and the Treaty of Treason, and
3. the establishment of the annual Hunger Games and occasional Quarter Quells to dramatically demonstrate each year the continued subjection of the Districts."
No.
The three events are:
1) The establishment of Panem in the wake of the disasters.
2) The rebellion against it.
3) The destruction of the 13th district and establishment of the Hunger Games with the capital's victory.
That's almost exactly how Katniss recounts it, in fact. The defeat is not a separate thing from the Hunger Games. The Treaty of Treason establishes them. (Treaty of Treason is, by the way, stupid, melodramatic and nonsense if you actually think about the words. I think it was picked for alliterative value.) The point is more than to "demonstrate each year the continued subjection", it's punishment. She says it's punishment. It makes no sense to not be punishment.
Anyway, he then says there's a lot of history Katniss is completely unaware of. You may recall I classed that as bad writing, since she's implausibly ignorant of basic events in her own home area.
"[Quick aside: if you still think the Reaping is a straight up and down lottery, please forgive me for thinking you have missed the point of the Games as well as the several points in the narrative where it is all but said that the Capitol or its minions choose the District Tributes in advance. They choose sacrifices whose death will especially discourage any spirit of identity or rebellion in the Districts. End aside.]"
I quote this just to demonstrate that this guy is a hypocritical ass. When people point out that he's misread the books left and right, he hides behind waffling about how no one really knows and he didn't really mean it anyway. When someone else misreads, he states that it's fact the lottery is rigged.
Then as a bonus, he gets it wrong: what's stated is that they pick the kids of the former winners, whose deaths would mostly crush any spirit from those winners. That the capital also picks kids based on popularity is just speculation, and not something that's really backed up. We know that in Katniss' district it's usually starving Seam kids, and that most of the other tributes were scrawny and underfed. I don't think kids whose parents couldn't feed them had much power or spirit. It's technically possible that the capital does occasionally fuck with the lottery when a district is getting uppity, but there's no real evidence for that yet. All we know is that they can fuck with the lottery and that their only known use for it is to get the kids of winners.
Back to the main essay, he's decided to make Haymitch's comment about how there used to be whipping into an example of history Katniss doesn't know about. This is a perfectly good idea, so he hurries to butcher it as fast as possible.
"He says, most obviously, that District 12 wasn’t always the quiet backwater that it is now. There “used to be a lot of whippings” means that, at some point before Katniss was born, the District had subversive elements that the Peacekeepers had to punish — and they chose to do it publicly and brutally to discourage others from joining them."
No, he says the peacekeepers used to actually enforce the rules. Basic reading comprehension. And indeed, after this there are a lot of whippings again for breaking all sorts of minor rules.
"Starting at the back, Haymitch in saying “we” is identifying himself either with the crowd that picked up rebel bodies out of Christian charity or with the rebels taking care of their own"
Or he's saying "we" as in "the people of the district", which would also work in the sentence. (Also where the fuck are you getting Christian here?)
And we see what the capital does to rebels. It isn't whip them and let them go back home.
" I think his being chosen for the Quell, the evident disdain he has for the Capitol and the Games that we see in his interview tape (Fire, page 197), and his brilliant strategy of attacking the framing story which wins the Quell marks him as a revolutionary and a leader, not part of anyone’s ambulance squad."
Yes, if we decide that the whippings were because they were rebels, and that Haymitch is too special to help the injured (probably because he's got a dick, unlike forced into healing Katniss), and that saying "I'll win because I'm smart" is not only attacking the "framing story" but somehow brilliant, then yes, he was definitely saying "we" because he was a member of the rebels.
"Her mother and by necessity her family, by treating the punished criminals whipped by the Peace Keepers to repress the locals, were relatively open sympathizers with the rebels."
Evidently the mom's not too important to be part of some lame "ambulance squad". And again, we know what they do to traitors, and that includes being openly sympathetic and aiding other traitors.
" The resistance in District 12 crossed Seam and City boundaries" as long as we say that all the other stuff he made up is also true. This entire thing ends up a mobius strip of invented reasons justifying each other.
Anyway, he then goes on to say that Katniss' mother's marriage was unusual in that it crossed those boundaries that he just said were crossed all the time by rebel solidarity.
"I confess to wondering how Mrs. Mellark, not the most forgiving or charitable of characters, or Katniss’ mother received this revelation from the Cave about the Baker’s feelings. " Because, of course, it's impossible the guy could have told Katniss' mother and gotten turned down, and of course his wife had no idea before now. (It is of course impossible that her being "not the most forgiving or charitable" could have anything to do with this, she's obviously just a huge bitch.)
"I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to think that Katniss’ father was a leader in the District 12 resistance to the Capitol and a friend of both Haymitch and of Gale’s father. "
What.
I mean, in terms of blind speculation, this actually isn't bad compared to most of the shit he's come up with. It's just random and unsupported, but like I said, this guy mostly analyzed Harry Potter and if there was any series of books designed to get people to do that, it'd be Harry Potter.
But as you've probably worked out by now, anything reasonable can and will be ruined, so we move on to the "evidence".
Exhibit A: He hunted and taught his daughter to hunt. There is obviously no reason to do this unless he thought that as a rebellion leader he might be killed and that Katniss would have to support them. Certainly that Seam families are generally hovering at the edge of starvation had nothing to do with it. And he definitely knew that Katniss would need to know all this because his wife would go catatonic after his death and be unable to do any work. His own hunting ability obviously came out of nowhere because it's not like poaching makes sense as a skill passed down the generations and that exact concept definitely didn't come up in the books already.
Exhibit B:"Mr. Everdeen dies in a mine explosion with Gale’s father." The only reason this could have happened, you see, is that they were both rebels, which is also why they both taught their kids to hunt. Katniss is teaching Madge and Gale's brother to hunt too, so she must have been a carded rebel member at the beginning of Catching Fire! Since that is the only possible reason to know how to hunt.
"That Katniss’ father died in a mine explosion — one set by the Capitol to “send a message” "
...yes, because the best way to send a message is by disguising it as an accident that happens by chance all the damn time.
" perhaps explains the catatonic depression of Mrs. Everdeen at his death and her willingness to let her children die of starvation. Their future, as she imagined it as a member of the resistance and the wife of a martyred leader, could only be one of continued punishment "
Except for the part where absolutely nothing bad happens to them after that point? Also, that kind of mindset is more the murder-suicide kind. If she thought the capital was coming for her and her kids next, she should have smothered them in their beds. Actually, a failed attempt to kill Katniss would have made for much better issues.
"The District 12 salute to Katniss when she volunteers for her sister Prim (Games,page 12) is a remarkable gesture that perhaps only really makes sense if her father had been some one they knew and loved and still miss. "
Yep. Because god knows nothing of Katniss' actual actions there were impressive or anything. All she did was volunteer to die to save her sister's life. Her dead dad, on the other hand? Totally the biggest deal ever. Katniss earns nothing of her own.
"Is it unreasonable to consider the possibility that the second Quell at the 50th Anniversary was similarly designed — and that this spectacle was not just in the quantity of Tributes taken on Reaping Day but also in specific qualities these young men and women had? "
No. But it is unreasonable to move from possibility to fact.
That's really the problem here. There's enough room in the text to say that it's possible Haymitch or Katniss' father were seditious. It's only when random sentences are getting twisted around to prove it that this becomes mockworthy. Like with the gum theory, there is not enough evidence to extrapolate anything detailed from.
" Might Haymitch and Maysilee both have been chosen because of their relationships with, even their participation in the District 12 underground resistance?
I think that’s a reasonable possibility. It sets up the alliance Haymitch and Maysilee have in the Quell"
To quickly recap: they join forces with the stated reason of "because we're from the same district", which is the standard reason for an alliance. Once the numbers get low, they split up, which is the standard end for an alliance that doesn't involve stabbing. If they were friends as part of the underground resistance, I'd expect a bit more from them. If nothing else, the moral spine to get to the end of the games together instead of splitting up and hoping someone else did the killing for them.
"And I think in that moment the outline of the Peeta-Katniss ‘Romeo and Juliet’ play, the ‘Pearl Plot’ was written in his heart. "
But.
Romeo and Juliet
I
How do you
WHAT IS
HOW DOES THAT EVEN
ENGLISH DEGREE HOW THE FUCK DO YOU HAVE ONE WITHOUT KNOWING WHAT ROMEO AND JULIET ARE YOU FUCKING MORON
"(assuming, of course, without any evidence more substantial than Katniss’ understanding from the Quell video that Maysilee’s unnamed sister didn’t go at the Reaping when her sister’s name was called because Maysilee had gifts the resistance fighters needed more than her skills). "
I like how this implies there's any evidence whatsoever from Katniss' viewpoint. There's a sort of brazenness to this.
He starts capitalizing Baker and Bakery a lot, because he wanted to get some general language abuse in there, as he goes on and on about how there's bread in the story. It's pretty much just a senseless ramble crying out in vain for an editor with a steady finger on the delete key, but at least it's factually accurate.
"But there is also a note here, something like a red flag, that Peeta would have been at the bakery the morning Gale says he traded a squirrel for a special loaf."
Nope.
It's repeatedly stated the baker trades for squirrel only when they catch him alone, and even if it wasn't, that doesn't mean Peeta "would have been" there at the time, just that it wasn't impossible.
"Could it have been Peeta that persuaded Gale that morning to urge Katniss to run away with him? Could they both have known that she was being set up that day, that, in fact, she had been groomed her whole young life for a trip to the Hunger Games? "
Nope.
And if they did they are the most colossal dicks ever (especially since they knew Prim would be called), and also the best actors ever.
"It’s not that big of a stretch."
This should be his catchphrase. His evidence? Peeta says Katniss is pure which obviously means naïve which obviously means he knows she was set up and didn't know. Obviously.
"She offers us little in the way of clues that there is a rebellion afoot in District 12"
That's because there isn't. In fact, we know this because we know Gale is the one trying to get a rebellion going and not having much in the way of success.
"even after President Snow comes for a visit, he tells her flat-out that she has been the cause of uprisings"
Uprisings in other districts. Indeed, when Katniss gets to the capital and chats with the other winners, we learn her district is one of the few that hasn't had any uprisings.
"She tells Haymitch she wants to start a rebellion oblivious to the reality that she is is in the midst of one and is its inspiration and guiding symbol. "
More, I'm irritated at the fact this requires Katniss to be an absolute moron. Everyone else in the story is a quadruple agent with incredibly complex decades long plans and a devotion to staying in character at all time that'd make a method actor weep, while Katniss apparently doesn't even know about a rebellion after she joins with her other notboyfriend's rebellion plans.
So he sums it up: Their dads were rebellion members betrayed by spies and killed secretly instead of publicly because fuck knows. I will grant that the logical flaws in this are minor, since the book has had worse already. Katniss meeting Gale in the woods was also planned, although he doesn't even try to explain how or why, especially when the meeting involved Katniss stumbling upon Gale and not the other way around. What happened was, the rebels decided to respond to mine explosions by stopping actual resistance in favor of going along with the capital and working out a way to send a message to all the districts, because that's definitely how human being act.
" The obvious means to those goals — obvious at least to Haymitch Abernathy and the sister of Maysilee Donner — would be to use the annual Hunger Games broadcasts to send a message that was clearly contrary to the Capitol’s punitive and spirit-crushing meaning."
This is supervillain-level absurd.
Anyway, the way to do this is to secretly groom two people to play out the narrative in the games, which was accomplished by not doing anything much at all.
He then lists the people involved in "writing" this "narrative". Haymitch once again.
"At her death, he realized just how wrong he had been. And this remorse, this rue, left him determined to write the play and organize the cast of stage hands and players to act out that drama he and Maysilee should have starred in, a work to destroy the Hunger Games and its soul-destroying message that power is reality."
Okay so what I'm getting out of this is they chose Rue for her name as garnish to their story because they are absolute monsters. This is why you shouldn't try to force puns into everything.
Also, Madge's mom is still totally his fellow playwright, because.
Now on to the rest of them, because this isn't awful yet.
"Not knowing Katniss at the time but perceiving the genius of the plan, he would have signed on to protect and train her to take his revenge on the Capitol through her for his father’s death — and Katniss’ father’s death as well. Gale keeps his hands off her in the forest, not because he is an Edward Cullen wanna be, but because her innocence and purity, her ability to fall in love with Peeta, are as essential as her archery skills to her victory in the Arena "
Yes. The only reason a boy could be alone with a girl in a forest without doing anything is because her virginity is required for the cause. Also, Gale is a monster.
This is also apparently all they did to groom their perfect candidate, make sure she knows snares. They bring up her archery skills, but Gale didn't teach her archery. That was something she already knew how to do. It was a partnership where each helped the other, not Katniss learning everything from Gale.
"Peeta Mellark, the artist, actor, and Boy with the Bread (TM), is probably recruited by his own father, a resistance man from before the second Quell, who recognizes in this son the exact gifts the thespian conspiracy needs. In addition to being able to persuade anyone of almost anything, Peeta loves Katniss-the-Mockingjay/Phoenix with all his heart and is willing to die in his role to insure her victory. "
Able to persuade anyone but Katniss. Once again we see the central shipper flaw here - there's nothing Peeta has that Gale doesn't, but there's a lot Gale has that Peeta lacks. (No explanation is even attempted for yet another dad being definitely a resistance guy.)
Next is Madge, which can mean Pearl, so she was named by the unnamed mom "either as a reminder of the ‘coal into pearls,” light-in-the-darkness resurrection theme of her life’s work or because she expected Madge to play this part. "
Because yes, this is a ridiculously intricate plot they've kept secret from everyone for twenty years, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't name your daughter after the secret plot you want her to secretly be taking part in.
"They assign Gale to groom Katniss’ survival skills and to be sure she is eating enough (while keeping his hands off her!). Peeta is brought into the conspiracy nearer the Games’ Reaping Day but with enough time that he and Gale could have had a heart-to-heart about getting her out of District 12 and saving her from the Games (though they know this will mean her sister’s death "
You know, forget the fact the people involved in this are horrible people, I'm starting to wonder about the guy writing this.
Then, even more bizarrely, we're told Thresh and Rue are the backup story in case Katniss doesn't play her part right. You know, Thresh and Rue who spend the whole games apart from each other?
Also, the brilliant conspirators' best idea was to take their backup pair and chuck them into the games at the same time instead of keeping them in reserve for next year, risking losing all of them for nothing.
Anyway, naturally the capital team is all in on this too. Really, that's the smallest jump of logic we've had so far.
"I understand that the thought of Gale and Peeta both being in on this plan to use Katniss as the symbolic accelerant to inspire the Mockingjay Rebellion really bothers a lot of readers. As much as we readers identify with Katniss because we experience the story through her, this feeling of betrayal and abuse is in one sense inevitable. I’d only note that both men are heroically loving, protective, and, while seeming to adore her, simultaneously respectful of her desires not to be forced into a relationship."
Okay, moved beyond wondering about the writer into visceral disgust at him. How the fuck do you write this.
Also, I would like to draw everyone's attention to the fact that "respectful of her desires not to be forced into a relationship" is apparently compatible with both forcing her to kiss them.
I would not want to be in a room alone with this guy.
Next he suggests that Gale actually loves her like a sister and the kiss was staged. Because he says so. Even though Gale was willing to run off and have kids with her in the mountains but threw a fit at the idea of her taking Peeta. And staged for what?
"I think they wanted the Third Quell to be a Victor’s recall and had to bait President Snow into over-playing his hand"
You know, in some ways this insanity might have to do with the literary nature of this. Sometimes people get locked into the idea only one set of things could happen because that's what happened in the book, missing that there are practically infinite things Snow could have done, many of which didn't even involve the Quell.
Or, shipping has eaten his brain. Especially given how Gale is every bit the jealous lover.
"Within Peeta’s narrative of marriage and pregnancy, she becomes in the popular mind the Bride of the Immaculate Conception giving birth Phoenix-like as the Mockingjay to a Panem-wide rebellion."
The whole point of the marriage and pregnancy thing was that she had sex. Also the Immaculate Conception refers to Mary's birth, who Catholic doctrine (or, as Dad calls it, heresy) holds was created by God as free from the stain of original sin to be the vessel for Jesus. You can't be the bride of it. Also this is so fucking random.
We get more Katniss is stupid reasoning when he says that she doesn't understand what's going on even when faced with the mockingjay bread and District 8 rebels, except for the part where she does understand but I guess that'd get in the way of how we keep getting told Katniss is stupid and that's why she doesn't notice all this stuff, because it's impossible it could just not be there.
In conclusion, I'd like to quote the last commenter on the essay:
What? NO.
The central symbol of the series is the mockingjay bird — a bird of unintended consequences.
So let's me make my counter predictions using the massive intellectual standing I have as someone who doesn't have an English degree.
1) Katniss is the fucking mockingjay.
2) Madge's mom is not a huge deal.
3) There was no gigantic conspiracy shaping Katniss' life.
4) Haymitch is not the chief architect of whatever plans there are.
5) The book continues to have a bunch of hamfisted references to television instead of some arty bit about "real author".
6) Also, instead the book introduces a bunch of new people and we have a plot about them instead of finding out how a lot of District 12 people in the past did shit.
Next up, the actual damn book.
Let's wrap this disaster up.
He opens by saying he's been fielding questions (read:having people point out the fact he's misread various points) about the theory, and links to a string of them. He also, of course, characterizes everyone as agreeing, interested and asking questions or "unkind" skeptic assholes.
He says:
"I really don’t care if they’re right or wrong. It’s the literary device or symbolic tradition I can illustrate with the whacky idea that is for readers to take home.
Of course the guesses are going to be wrong! I’ve hit more bullseyes than I want to list here but no one was more surprised than I was when my longshots came home, to mix betting metaphors. If I could guess what great writers were going to write down to the plot point detail, I’d be writing novels myself, right?
The funny thing, consequently, is when readers, mostly of the snarky crowd, said it was almost certain that I was wrong and railed in some nasty ad hominempoints about my Gilderoy-esque self-importance and my need to get a life. Ummm… As I am not married to any of my theories, “pearls” before swine or no, wouldn’t that be more true of the folks with a sure idea of how wrong I am than it is of me?"
So there you have it. Having an English degree, or at least one you buy as he so evidently did, renders you incapable of figuring out where a YA novel is going. It is not explained if this is done as part of the necessary transaction for when he bought the degree, if they drain the intellect of whoever's name is written on them, or if they just radiate out moron waves and he types all this in his office with his framed degree a few feet away.
Also, he's a self-important smug asshole.
But anyway, his point is that all those other people with their "facts" and "reasons" and "not making up stupid shit based on something they misread" are the ones who are really wrong for thinking he's wrong, even though he's probably wrong, but it's because these books are SO CRAZY UNPREDICTABLE and they are JUST AS WRONG for thinking it couldn't happen.
But back to this final essay. He wrote about the alchemy and nonsense to "explain the premises of my speculation before rolling out the 2.0 version of what I believe Arabella first called the “Pearl Plot.
That was important because, while the Pearl Plot may make perfect sense without understanding the guts and gears of Ms. Collins’ craft, the only reason besides grins and giggles that I bother with speculation like this is to illustrate the principles or “keys” to understanding the best writing. Let’s have this out front right from the gate: the Pearl Plot, however credible or logical or just internally consistent (or not), is certainly wrong. The value of the exercise, then, outside of time spent with serious readers discussing a favorite book (no small thing that) is in gaining familiarity and facility with the tools that make reading more enjoyable, even exciting. "
Okay, that was a lot of bullshit at once. Let's go slow here.
"the only reason besides grins and giggles that I bother with speculation like this is to illustrate the principles or “keys” to understanding the best writing. Let’s have this out front right from the gate: the Pearl Plot, however credible or logical or just internally consistent (or not), is certainly wrong."
So, the speculation shows the keys to understanding the writing, except for the fact it's totally useless for understanding what's happening. Note also the "out front right from the gate". He's written a half dozen essays. Two weeks have passed. It's a bit late for that. (And it is still credible, logical and internally consistent, even though the reasons people disagreed were that it didn't even work within the text.)
"The value of the exercise, then, outside of time spent with serious readers discussing a favorite book (no small thing that) is in gaining familiarity and facility with the tools that make reading more enjoyable, even exciting. "
Except all those tools tell you nothing, because he's just admitted his theory based on them is wrong. But hey, he got to discuss his nonsense theory with serious readers! I'd say I'm impressed he didn't actually go all social experiment here, but the guy doesn't seem internet literate enough to even know that excuse.
Longterm followers of this sort of thing will recognize this as one of the hallmarks of the self-important idiot. They'll just say any sort of bullshit that comes into their head, then insist you do the work of explaining why it's wrong if you want them to stop saying it, then shrug it off and say they never really meant it and the many flaws don't mean they're an idiot, then vomit out some new nonsense and demand everyone "discuss" their newest brilliant idea. So much fun for everyone, right?
So anyway, the point is that if he gets anything wrong he totally meant to do that, and he doesn't think he's right. But he's also tightened up his theory to try to fix all the mistakes he doesn't care about and weren't mistakes, and also it's completely plausible and he has a great track record with this kind of thing once you factor in the AMAZING UNPREDICTABILITY of the mysterious superhumans known as novelists.
"The Back Story of District 12 Resistance "
Let's see just how badly he does.
"Let’s start at the beginning with a note about the obvious that the beginning of the story, like most tales, isn’t the beginning of the story. Like Homer’s Odyssey, we start out in medias res, in the middle of things,"
Eight published books and he doesn't fucking know what in media res means. Wikipedia, could you help us out here?
In medias res or medias in res (into the middle of things) is a Latin phrase denoting the literary and artistic narrative technique wherein the relation of a story begins either at the mid-point or at the conclusion, rather than at the beginning (cf. ab ovo, ab initio), establishing setting, character, and conflict via flashback and expository conversations relating the pertinent past. The main advantage of in medias res is to open the story with dramatic action rather than exposition which sets up the characters and situation. It can be employed in any narrative genre, epic poetry, novels, plays, or film.
Thank you Wikipedia.
Much like the dumbasses who say that pikachu is capitalized because it's the name of the species and names are proper nouns, he's thinking that because, like any story ever, this has some backstory and events that come before it, that means it starts in the middle.
Unless Katniss waking up, wandering around and expositing all over the place counts as "action", no, it did not. In media res would be to have started during the games. Say, when Katniss is standing on the plate, plotting her chances of getting to the bow, and everything before that is covered in flashback. Which, actually, already sounds more interesting, and might also make the flaws of those parts less evident.
Wikipedia, do you have any other suggestions for people who are confused?
What in medias res is not.
Thanks.
Anyway, ignorance of a basic literary term aside, he asks us where the story really began. He says it begins with the lullaby.
"this song, a lullaby that infants trust as truth, is, because of its age and meaning, the primordial aspect of life transcending Panem that Katniss taps into as her core strength and surety. "
The song is old, and? What does this have to do with when this particular story starts?
Anyway, the lullaby has to do with Katniss picturing a world where she could have kids, and she would have kids with Peeta, and Peeta's love is pure and perfect, and the pure perfect love is the center of the story, and therefore it's the origin of the story, and therefore the lullaby is the start of the story and I am not fucking kidding that is the reasoning. It's playing six degrees of Kevin Bacon with logic. And it still doesn't explain what this has to do with his idea that the real story started before the first book.
"Setting that primordial, atemporal paradise as our story “beginning” or principle,"
"As beginning or principle"? See this is why people hate English as an academic subject, it's because of the horrible stuff its supposed devotees do to the poor language. He just said "atemporal", as in, he's not using beginning in a chronological sense. Except that's how he started off just a few paragraphs ago. He's using different meanings of the same word. If you could commit war crimes against linguistics, this is what it would look like.
Not at all satisfied, we whiplash back to the literal sense and he lists the historical events Katniss tells us.
"the three events defining the Capitol’s metanarrative are:
1. the District Rebellion at least 74 years before Hunger Games’ opening,
2. the Capitol victory over the Districts and the Treaty of Treason, and
3. the establishment of the annual Hunger Games and occasional Quarter Quells to dramatically demonstrate each year the continued subjection of the Districts."
No.
The three events are:
1) The establishment of Panem in the wake of the disasters.
2) The rebellion against it.
3) The destruction of the 13th district and establishment of the Hunger Games with the capital's victory.
That's almost exactly how Katniss recounts it, in fact. The defeat is not a separate thing from the Hunger Games. The Treaty of Treason establishes them. (Treaty of Treason is, by the way, stupid, melodramatic and nonsense if you actually think about the words. I think it was picked for alliterative value.) The point is more than to "demonstrate each year the continued subjection", it's punishment. She says it's punishment. It makes no sense to not be punishment.
Anyway, he then says there's a lot of history Katniss is completely unaware of. You may recall I classed that as bad writing, since she's implausibly ignorant of basic events in her own home area.
"[Quick aside: if you still think the Reaping is a straight up and down lottery, please forgive me for thinking you have missed the point of the Games as well as the several points in the narrative where it is all but said that the Capitol or its minions choose the District Tributes in advance. They choose sacrifices whose death will especially discourage any spirit of identity or rebellion in the Districts. End aside.]"
I quote this just to demonstrate that this guy is a hypocritical ass. When people point out that he's misread the books left and right, he hides behind waffling about how no one really knows and he didn't really mean it anyway. When someone else misreads, he states that it's fact the lottery is rigged.
Then as a bonus, he gets it wrong: what's stated is that they pick the kids of the former winners, whose deaths would mostly crush any spirit from those winners. That the capital also picks kids based on popularity is just speculation, and not something that's really backed up. We know that in Katniss' district it's usually starving Seam kids, and that most of the other tributes were scrawny and underfed. I don't think kids whose parents couldn't feed them had much power or spirit. It's technically possible that the capital does occasionally fuck with the lottery when a district is getting uppity, but there's no real evidence for that yet. All we know is that they can fuck with the lottery and that their only known use for it is to get the kids of winners.
Back to the main essay, he's decided to make Haymitch's comment about how there used to be whipping into an example of history Katniss doesn't know about. This is a perfectly good idea, so he hurries to butcher it as fast as possible.
"He says, most obviously, that District 12 wasn’t always the quiet backwater that it is now. There “used to be a lot of whippings” means that, at some point before Katniss was born, the District had subversive elements that the Peacekeepers had to punish — and they chose to do it publicly and brutally to discourage others from joining them."
No, he says the peacekeepers used to actually enforce the rules. Basic reading comprehension. And indeed, after this there are a lot of whippings again for breaking all sorts of minor rules.
"Starting at the back, Haymitch in saying “we” is identifying himself either with the crowd that picked up rebel bodies out of Christian charity or with the rebels taking care of their own"
Or he's saying "we" as in "the people of the district", which would also work in the sentence. (Also where the fuck are you getting Christian here?)
And we see what the capital does to rebels. It isn't whip them and let them go back home.
" I think his being chosen for the Quell, the evident disdain he has for the Capitol and the Games that we see in his interview tape (Fire, page 197), and his brilliant strategy of attacking the framing story which wins the Quell marks him as a revolutionary and a leader, not part of anyone’s ambulance squad."
Yes, if we decide that the whippings were because they were rebels, and that Haymitch is too special to help the injured (probably because he's got a dick, unlike forced into healing Katniss), and that saying "I'll win because I'm smart" is not only attacking the "framing story" but somehow brilliant, then yes, he was definitely saying "we" because he was a member of the rebels.
"Her mother and by necessity her family, by treating the punished criminals whipped by the Peace Keepers to repress the locals, were relatively open sympathizers with the rebels."
Evidently the mom's not too important to be part of some lame "ambulance squad". And again, we know what they do to traitors, and that includes being openly sympathetic and aiding other traitors.
" The resistance in District 12 crossed Seam and City boundaries" as long as we say that all the other stuff he made up is also true. This entire thing ends up a mobius strip of invented reasons justifying each other.
Anyway, he then goes on to say that Katniss' mother's marriage was unusual in that it crossed those boundaries that he just said were crossed all the time by rebel solidarity.
"I confess to wondering how Mrs. Mellark, not the most forgiving or charitable of characters, or Katniss’ mother received this revelation from the Cave about the Baker’s feelings. " Because, of course, it's impossible the guy could have told Katniss' mother and gotten turned down, and of course his wife had no idea before now. (It is of course impossible that her being "not the most forgiving or charitable" could have anything to do with this, she's obviously just a huge bitch.)
"I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to think that Katniss’ father was a leader in the District 12 resistance to the Capitol and a friend of both Haymitch and of Gale’s father. "
What.
I mean, in terms of blind speculation, this actually isn't bad compared to most of the shit he's come up with. It's just random and unsupported, but like I said, this guy mostly analyzed Harry Potter and if there was any series of books designed to get people to do that, it'd be Harry Potter.
But as you've probably worked out by now, anything reasonable can and will be ruined, so we move on to the "evidence".
Exhibit A: He hunted and taught his daughter to hunt. There is obviously no reason to do this unless he thought that as a rebellion leader he might be killed and that Katniss would have to support them. Certainly that Seam families are generally hovering at the edge of starvation had nothing to do with it. And he definitely knew that Katniss would need to know all this because his wife would go catatonic after his death and be unable to do any work. His own hunting ability obviously came out of nowhere because it's not like poaching makes sense as a skill passed down the generations and that exact concept definitely didn't come up in the books already.
Exhibit B:"Mr. Everdeen dies in a mine explosion with Gale’s father." The only reason this could have happened, you see, is that they were both rebels, which is also why they both taught their kids to hunt. Katniss is teaching Madge and Gale's brother to hunt too, so she must have been a carded rebel member at the beginning of Catching Fire! Since that is the only possible reason to know how to hunt.
"That Katniss’ father died in a mine explosion — one set by the Capitol to “send a message” "
...yes, because the best way to send a message is by disguising it as an accident that happens by chance all the damn time.
" perhaps explains the catatonic depression of Mrs. Everdeen at his death and her willingness to let her children die of starvation. Their future, as she imagined it as a member of the resistance and the wife of a martyred leader, could only be one of continued punishment "
Except for the part where absolutely nothing bad happens to them after that point? Also, that kind of mindset is more the murder-suicide kind. If she thought the capital was coming for her and her kids next, she should have smothered them in their beds. Actually, a failed attempt to kill Katniss would have made for much better issues.
"The District 12 salute to Katniss when she volunteers for her sister Prim (Games,page 12) is a remarkable gesture that perhaps only really makes sense if her father had been some one they knew and loved and still miss. "
Yep. Because god knows nothing of Katniss' actual actions there were impressive or anything. All she did was volunteer to die to save her sister's life. Her dead dad, on the other hand? Totally the biggest deal ever. Katniss earns nothing of her own.
"Is it unreasonable to consider the possibility that the second Quell at the 50th Anniversary was similarly designed — and that this spectacle was not just in the quantity of Tributes taken on Reaping Day but also in specific qualities these young men and women had? "
No. But it is unreasonable to move from possibility to fact.
That's really the problem here. There's enough room in the text to say that it's possible Haymitch or Katniss' father were seditious. It's only when random sentences are getting twisted around to prove it that this becomes mockworthy. Like with the gum theory, there is not enough evidence to extrapolate anything detailed from.
" Might Haymitch and Maysilee both have been chosen because of their relationships with, even their participation in the District 12 underground resistance?
I think that’s a reasonable possibility. It sets up the alliance Haymitch and Maysilee have in the Quell"
To quickly recap: they join forces with the stated reason of "because we're from the same district", which is the standard reason for an alliance. Once the numbers get low, they split up, which is the standard end for an alliance that doesn't involve stabbing. If they were friends as part of the underground resistance, I'd expect a bit more from them. If nothing else, the moral spine to get to the end of the games together instead of splitting up and hoping someone else did the killing for them.
"And I think in that moment the outline of the Peeta-Katniss ‘Romeo and Juliet’ play, the ‘Pearl Plot’ was written in his heart. "
But.
Romeo and Juliet
I
How do you
WHAT IS
HOW DOES THAT EVEN
ENGLISH DEGREE HOW THE FUCK DO YOU HAVE ONE WITHOUT KNOWING WHAT ROMEO AND JULIET ARE YOU FUCKING MORON
"(assuming, of course, without any evidence more substantial than Katniss’ understanding from the Quell video that Maysilee’s unnamed sister didn’t go at the Reaping when her sister’s name was called because Maysilee had gifts the resistance fighters needed more than her skills). "
I like how this implies there's any evidence whatsoever from Katniss' viewpoint. There's a sort of brazenness to this.
He starts capitalizing Baker and Bakery a lot, because he wanted to get some general language abuse in there, as he goes on and on about how there's bread in the story. It's pretty much just a senseless ramble crying out in vain for an editor with a steady finger on the delete key, but at least it's factually accurate.
"But there is also a note here, something like a red flag, that Peeta would have been at the bakery the morning Gale says he traded a squirrel for a special loaf."
Nope.
It's repeatedly stated the baker trades for squirrel only when they catch him alone, and even if it wasn't, that doesn't mean Peeta "would have been" there at the time, just that it wasn't impossible.
"Could it have been Peeta that persuaded Gale that morning to urge Katniss to run away with him? Could they both have known that she was being set up that day, that, in fact, she had been groomed her whole young life for a trip to the Hunger Games? "
Nope.
And if they did they are the most colossal dicks ever (especially since they knew Prim would be called), and also the best actors ever.
"It’s not that big of a stretch."
This should be his catchphrase. His evidence? Peeta says Katniss is pure which obviously means naïve which obviously means he knows she was set up and didn't know. Obviously.
"She offers us little in the way of clues that there is a rebellion afoot in District 12"
That's because there isn't. In fact, we know this because we know Gale is the one trying to get a rebellion going and not having much in the way of success.
"even after President Snow comes for a visit, he tells her flat-out that she has been the cause of uprisings"
Uprisings in other districts. Indeed, when Katniss gets to the capital and chats with the other winners, we learn her district is one of the few that hasn't had any uprisings.
"She tells Haymitch she wants to start a rebellion oblivious to the reality that she is is in the midst of one and is its inspiration and guiding symbol. "
More, I'm irritated at the fact this requires Katniss to be an absolute moron. Everyone else in the story is a quadruple agent with incredibly complex decades long plans and a devotion to staying in character at all time that'd make a method actor weep, while Katniss apparently doesn't even know about a rebellion after she joins with her other notboyfriend's rebellion plans.
So he sums it up: Their dads were rebellion members betrayed by spies and killed secretly instead of publicly because fuck knows. I will grant that the logical flaws in this are minor, since the book has had worse already. Katniss meeting Gale in the woods was also planned, although he doesn't even try to explain how or why, especially when the meeting involved Katniss stumbling upon Gale and not the other way around. What happened was, the rebels decided to respond to mine explosions by stopping actual resistance in favor of going along with the capital and working out a way to send a message to all the districts, because that's definitely how human being act.
" The obvious means to those goals — obvious at least to Haymitch Abernathy and the sister of Maysilee Donner — would be to use the annual Hunger Games broadcasts to send a message that was clearly contrary to the Capitol’s punitive and spirit-crushing meaning."
This is supervillain-level absurd.
Anyway, the way to do this is to secretly groom two people to play out the narrative in the games, which was accomplished by not doing anything much at all.
He then lists the people involved in "writing" this "narrative". Haymitch once again.
"At her death, he realized just how wrong he had been. And this remorse, this rue, left him determined to write the play and organize the cast of stage hands and players to act out that drama he and Maysilee should have starred in, a work to destroy the Hunger Games and its soul-destroying message that power is reality."
Okay so what I'm getting out of this is they chose Rue for her name as garnish to their story because they are absolute monsters. This is why you shouldn't try to force puns into everything.
Also, Madge's mom is still totally his fellow playwright, because.
Now on to the rest of them, because this isn't awful yet.
"Not knowing Katniss at the time but perceiving the genius of the plan, he would have signed on to protect and train her to take his revenge on the Capitol through her for his father’s death — and Katniss’ father’s death as well. Gale keeps his hands off her in the forest, not because he is an Edward Cullen wanna be, but because her innocence and purity, her ability to fall in love with Peeta, are as essential as her archery skills to her victory in the Arena "
Yes. The only reason a boy could be alone with a girl in a forest without doing anything is because her virginity is required for the cause. Also, Gale is a monster.
This is also apparently all they did to groom their perfect candidate, make sure she knows snares. They bring up her archery skills, but Gale didn't teach her archery. That was something she already knew how to do. It was a partnership where each helped the other, not Katniss learning everything from Gale.
"Peeta Mellark, the artist, actor, and Boy with the Bread (TM), is probably recruited by his own father, a resistance man from before the second Quell, who recognizes in this son the exact gifts the thespian conspiracy needs. In addition to being able to persuade anyone of almost anything, Peeta loves Katniss-the-Mockingjay/Phoenix with all his heart and is willing to die in his role to insure her victory. "
Able to persuade anyone but Katniss. Once again we see the central shipper flaw here - there's nothing Peeta has that Gale doesn't, but there's a lot Gale has that Peeta lacks. (No explanation is even attempted for yet another dad being definitely a resistance guy.)
Next is Madge, which can mean Pearl, so she was named by the unnamed mom "either as a reminder of the ‘coal into pearls,” light-in-the-darkness resurrection theme of her life’s work or because she expected Madge to play this part. "
Because yes, this is a ridiculously intricate plot they've kept secret from everyone for twenty years, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't name your daughter after the secret plot you want her to secretly be taking part in.
"They assign Gale to groom Katniss’ survival skills and to be sure she is eating enough (while keeping his hands off her!). Peeta is brought into the conspiracy nearer the Games’ Reaping Day but with enough time that he and Gale could have had a heart-to-heart about getting her out of District 12 and saving her from the Games (though they know this will mean her sister’s death "
You know, forget the fact the people involved in this are horrible people, I'm starting to wonder about the guy writing this.
Then, even more bizarrely, we're told Thresh and Rue are the backup story in case Katniss doesn't play her part right. You know, Thresh and Rue who spend the whole games apart from each other?
Also, the brilliant conspirators' best idea was to take their backup pair and chuck them into the games at the same time instead of keeping them in reserve for next year, risking losing all of them for nothing.
Anyway, naturally the capital team is all in on this too. Really, that's the smallest jump of logic we've had so far.
"I understand that the thought of Gale and Peeta both being in on this plan to use Katniss as the symbolic accelerant to inspire the Mockingjay Rebellion really bothers a lot of readers. As much as we readers identify with Katniss because we experience the story through her, this feeling of betrayal and abuse is in one sense inevitable. I’d only note that both men are heroically loving, protective, and, while seeming to adore her, simultaneously respectful of her desires not to be forced into a relationship."
Okay, moved beyond wondering about the writer into visceral disgust at him. How the fuck do you write this.
Also, I would like to draw everyone's attention to the fact that "respectful of her desires not to be forced into a relationship" is apparently compatible with both forcing her to kiss them.
I would not want to be in a room alone with this guy.
Next he suggests that Gale actually loves her like a sister and the kiss was staged. Because he says so. Even though Gale was willing to run off and have kids with her in the mountains but threw a fit at the idea of her taking Peeta. And staged for what?
"I think they wanted the Third Quell to be a Victor’s recall and had to bait President Snow into over-playing his hand"
You know, in some ways this insanity might have to do with the literary nature of this. Sometimes people get locked into the idea only one set of things could happen because that's what happened in the book, missing that there are practically infinite things Snow could have done, many of which didn't even involve the Quell.
Or, shipping has eaten his brain. Especially given how Gale is every bit the jealous lover.
"Within Peeta’s narrative of marriage and pregnancy, she becomes in the popular mind the Bride of the Immaculate Conception giving birth Phoenix-like as the Mockingjay to a Panem-wide rebellion."
The whole point of the marriage and pregnancy thing was that she had sex. Also the Immaculate Conception refers to Mary's birth, who Catholic doctrine (or, as Dad calls it, heresy) holds was created by God as free from the stain of original sin to be the vessel for Jesus. You can't be the bride of it. Also this is so fucking random.
We get more Katniss is stupid reasoning when he says that she doesn't understand what's going on even when faced with the mockingjay bread and District 8 rebels, except for the part where she does understand but I guess that'd get in the way of how we keep getting told Katniss is stupid and that's why she doesn't notice all this stuff, because it's impossible it could just not be there.
In conclusion, I'd like to quote the last commenter on the essay:
What? NO.
The central symbol of the series is the mockingjay bird — a bird of unintended consequences.
So let's me make my counter predictions using the massive intellectual standing I have as someone who doesn't have an English degree.
1) Katniss is the fucking mockingjay.
2) Madge's mom is not a huge deal.
3) There was no gigantic conspiracy shaping Katniss' life.
4) Haymitch is not the chief architect of whatever plans there are.
5) The book continues to have a bunch of hamfisted references to television instead of some arty bit about "real author".
6) Also, instead the book introduces a bunch of new people and we have a plot about them instead of finding out how a lot of District 12 people in the past did shit.
Next up, the actual damn book.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2011-07-05 06:36 am (UTC)The truth is, he's actually SMeyer in disguise!
Hmm. Mockingjay...I've been trying to remember what happens in that book. ...Stuff happened and your predictions are pretty damn good?
no subject
Date: 2011-07-05 02:30 pm (UTC)They're not particularly specific predictions I have to admit. Still, I can guess they're more accurate than his.
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Date: 2011-07-05 03:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-05 05:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-05 10:57 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-05 02:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-05 02:58 pm (UTC)I hate when people pair district partners together romantically. It's so tacky, and wasn't the rareness of that happening why Peeta and Katniss were so ~ * ~ * ~ SPESHUL ~ * ~ * ~ ?
Okay, so I take some of this guy's evidence (that don't back up what he said) and actually think about what it could mean. Like you just did. :D For example, Haymitch's comment about how Mrs. Everdeen was "the one we took [flogged people] to" just meant there was more law enforcing back then until they got Cray. (or something? Cray comes and everything is lazy and calm? WHY) Or how Mr. Everdeen taught Katniss how to hunt... exactly what you said. He's a freaking coal miner who could die in an accident any day and wants to be sure his family can still support themselves. Smart, thinking ahead. And then this guy makes it as though he's groomed Katniss into being a rebellion leader? A coal miner from D12, the WORST DISTRICT, is in charge of the rebellion figurehead!?
I do like how he's so concerned about how important Haymitch is, though. Obviously he's a key part of the rebellion plan, as were the other victors, so it was probably more of the victors getting together and plotting instead of the people of D12.
no subject
Date: 2011-07-05 08:07 pm (UTC)But instead he insists that everyone in the rebellion is in 12 already and came up with the plan all on their own, and apparently no one else anywhere had any ideas.
no subject
Date: 2011-07-13 01:58 pm (UTC)"Much like the dumbasses who say that pikachu is capitalized because it's the name of the species and names are proper nouns"
In Black/White, species names are capitalized.
"A wild Patrat appeared!"
That's how it's written. "Gym Leader", "Trainer", and even "Potion" are capitalized as well.
no subject
Date: 2011-07-14 01:41 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-14 12:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-17 01:59 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-15 02:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-11-15 02:34 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-06 08:01 am (UTC)Is really the only sensical reaction to this whole screed.