Caroline Forbes: Woman Love Fest, Day 1
Sep. 9th, 2011 07:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
semeleOk, now that I'm more or less finished with being stunned by all the ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
womenlovefest awesomeness and I've regained the ability to express myself coherently, I shall proceed to meta writing ;). I've spent the last three days on adrenaline rush I'm recovering from right now, so I'm afraid my meta is more like a stream of consciousness rather than a proper essay. This entry is focused rather on season one than season two, but there are season two references, hence the spoiler alert. I was simply re-watching some episodes from early season one with a friend just last week, and now I seem to take most of my examples from there. Tonight I plan on seeing some season two episodes, just for a change ;).
I've managed to talk![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
juana_a into making this wonderful banner for me. Since she is a Caroline fan herself, it wasn't hard to persuade her :D.
Miss Caroline Forbes Presents ― Character Development
Spoilers up to TVD 2x22
A/N: I'm not a native speaker of English. I use English on everyday basis, but I still make mistakes. I'm extremly self-conscious when it comes to writing in English, because I feel that my writing is still worse than my speaking when they should be equally good. I don't mind people correcting me; I just wanted you to know that any mistakes you may find here come from the lack of knowledge, not lack of respect for my readers.
idrilka, thanks for beta-reading!
I didn't love Caroline right away. To be honest, I didn't love The Vampire Diaries right away. I'm a big Buffy fan, so I basically spent the first three or four episodes of TVD mocking the show for trying to be Buffy (there is a girl, and a good vampire, and a bad vampire, and the best friend is a witch, and there's a troubled sibling, etc.). At first I thought Caroline was a self-centered, Cordelia-like character, but I assumed the writers wouldn't have enough skill to make her as interesting as Cordelia turned out to be, so I gave up on her and focused on other characters. And then, ladies and gentlemen, Caroline Forbes started developing.
The further the show is progressing, the more different aspects of Caroline we get to see. First she is a popular high school girl with typical teenage problems, then she is a victim trying to cope with being abused by Damon (I don't want to go too deep into this right now, because I might write a separate entry about it), she is an active community worker, she is a girl from quite a wealthy family, she is Miss Mystic, and, finally, she is a vampire. We see how she is with friends, we see how she is with a boyfriend, we see how she is with family, we see how she is with grown-ups, we see how she is with schoolmates. Of course she is also a very dynamic characters who grows up and matures and changes, but that's not the point here. This is not a meta about what Caroline Forbes is like, this is a meta about how Caroline Forbes is being written.
First the writers make us believe that they're going to construct Caroline almost like a stock character. You know, she is pretty (like, Disney-Princess pretty), she likes boys, she makes an insensitive comment to Elena right after she first appears on screen, so you just assume that her main function in the plot would be to provide comic relief and embarrass herself with her selfishness. That's what stock characters are for ― they do exactly what you expect them to do. I feel that in the beginning the writers consciously made Caroline just a bit unlikeable, not enough for the viewer to hate her guts, but just enough to wish her a broken heel from time to time. The scheme is broken when she meets Damon, because her sort of stock character is supposed to say nasty things, buy new clothes and amuse us with her blown out of proportions vanity, but not to experience true suffering.
So after the Caroline/Damon arch the viewer realizes that Caroline is not so stereotypical and she certainly isn't a stock character. The writers, having already shown her from the outside, switch to showing her from the inside. They give her a huge backstory: we get to see her house, her mother, her love life, her ambitions, her friends, her issues. And here strikes a marvellous plot device ― the other characters don't know all those things about her. Even if they're close to her and generally like her, they are at least a little deceived by her good looks and carefree attitude (see: Matt saying "No offense, Care, but deep's really not your scene"; Bonnie and Elena not really noticing that Caroline felt like a second best until she told Elena so).
By the end of season two we have Caroline as a complex, logically built and consequently written character that sometimes is still underestimated by others. I realize that this Caroline appreciation post has turned into writers appreciation post, but I decided to go for it; before I started creating this meta I was so overwhelmed by the awesomeness of Caroline as a person that I didn't really notice how wonderfully written she was! The sole idea of starting the show by picturing her as the people see her, then forcing the viewers to acknowledge that she is being abused and she suffers, and in the end proving that there is more to Caroline than meets the eye was excellent. The one-dimensional Caroline from 1x01 became flesh and blood. She is so realistic that when I'm watching, I tend to forget that there are no such things as vampires.
Dear writers! Please, keep up the great work on creating the awesomeness that is Caroline. Love, me.
Note: I don't approve of what Damon did to Caroline. As a human being I find it wrong in every sense; there can be no excuse for Damon. But there are all sorts of horrible things happening in the world (murder, rape, other types of violence, hatred, abuse etc) and I believe that fiction shouldn't avoid showing them as they are. But you can depict rape as abusive and sick behaviour that causes suffering or you can depict it as a fun thing to do when you are an alpha male and have a free afternoon, and The Vampire Diaries used the first pattern, not the latter. I really appreciate the writers because of Elena confronting Damon about Caroline, and because Caroline confronting Damon herself as soon as she got her memories back. The only grudge I hold against them is that they didn't bother to write anything like that for Andy in season two.
womenlovefest awesomeness and I've regained the ability to express myself coherently, I shall proceed to meta writing ;). I've spent the last three days on adrenaline rush I'm recovering from right now, so I'm afraid my meta is more like a stream of consciousness rather than a proper essay. This entry is focused rather on season one than season two, but there are season two references, hence the spoiler alert. I was simply re-watching some episodes from early season one with a friend just last week, and now I seem to take most of my examples from there. Tonight I plan on seeing some season two episodes, just for a change ;).I've managed to talk
juana_a into making this wonderful banner for me. Since she is a Caroline fan herself, it wasn't hard to persuade her :D.Spoilers up to TVD 2x22
A/N: I'm not a native speaker of English. I use English on everyday basis, but I still make mistakes. I'm extremly self-conscious when it comes to writing in English, because I feel that my writing is still worse than my speaking when they should be equally good. I don't mind people correcting me; I just wanted you to know that any mistakes you may find here come from the lack of knowledge, not lack of respect for my readers.
idrilka, thanks for beta-reading!I didn't love Caroline right away. To be honest, I didn't love The Vampire Diaries right away. I'm a big Buffy fan, so I basically spent the first three or four episodes of TVD mocking the show for trying to be Buffy (there is a girl, and a good vampire, and a bad vampire, and the best friend is a witch, and there's a troubled sibling, etc.). At first I thought Caroline was a self-centered, Cordelia-like character, but I assumed the writers wouldn't have enough skill to make her as interesting as Cordelia turned out to be, so I gave up on her and focused on other characters. And then, ladies and gentlemen, Caroline Forbes started developing.
The further the show is progressing, the more different aspects of Caroline we get to see. First she is a popular high school girl with typical teenage problems, then she is a victim trying to cope with being abused by Damon (I don't want to go too deep into this right now, because I might write a separate entry about it), she is an active community worker, she is a girl from quite a wealthy family, she is Miss Mystic, and, finally, she is a vampire. We see how she is with friends, we see how she is with a boyfriend, we see how she is with family, we see how she is with grown-ups, we see how she is with schoolmates. Of course she is also a very dynamic characters who grows up and matures and changes, but that's not the point here. This is not a meta about what Caroline Forbes is like, this is a meta about how Caroline Forbes is being written.
First the writers make us believe that they're going to construct Caroline almost like a stock character. You know, she is pretty (like, Disney-Princess pretty), she likes boys, she makes an insensitive comment to Elena right after she first appears on screen, so you just assume that her main function in the plot would be to provide comic relief and embarrass herself with her selfishness. That's what stock characters are for ― they do exactly what you expect them to do. I feel that in the beginning the writers consciously made Caroline just a bit unlikeable, not enough for the viewer to hate her guts, but just enough to wish her a broken heel from time to time. The scheme is broken when she meets Damon, because her sort of stock character is supposed to say nasty things, buy new clothes and amuse us with her blown out of proportions vanity, but not to experience true suffering.
So after the Caroline/Damon arch the viewer realizes that Caroline is not so stereotypical and she certainly isn't a stock character. The writers, having already shown her from the outside, switch to showing her from the inside. They give her a huge backstory: we get to see her house, her mother, her love life, her ambitions, her friends, her issues. And here strikes a marvellous plot device ― the other characters don't know all those things about her. Even if they're close to her and generally like her, they are at least a little deceived by her good looks and carefree attitude (see: Matt saying "No offense, Care, but deep's really not your scene"; Bonnie and Elena not really noticing that Caroline felt like a second best until she told Elena so).
By the end of season two we have Caroline as a complex, logically built and consequently written character that sometimes is still underestimated by others. I realize that this Caroline appreciation post has turned into writers appreciation post, but I decided to go for it; before I started creating this meta I was so overwhelmed by the awesomeness of Caroline as a person that I didn't really notice how wonderfully written she was! The sole idea of starting the show by picturing her as the people see her, then forcing the viewers to acknowledge that she is being abused and she suffers, and in the end proving that there is more to Caroline than meets the eye was excellent. The one-dimensional Caroline from 1x01 became flesh and blood. She is so realistic that when I'm watching, I tend to forget that there are no such things as vampires.
Dear writers! Please, keep up the great work on creating the awesomeness that is Caroline. Love, me.
Note: I don't approve of what Damon did to Caroline. As a human being I find it wrong in every sense; there can be no excuse for Damon. But there are all sorts of horrible things happening in the world (murder, rape, other types of violence, hatred, abuse etc) and I believe that fiction shouldn't avoid showing them as they are. But you can depict rape as abusive and sick behaviour that causes suffering or you can depict it as a fun thing to do when you are an alpha male and have a free afternoon, and The Vampire Diaries used the first pattern, not the latter. I really appreciate the writers because of Elena confronting Damon about Caroline, and because Caroline confronting Damon herself as soon as she got her memories back. The only grudge I hold against them is that they didn't bother to write anything like that for Andy in season two.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2011-09-09 06:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-09-09 06:48 pm (UTC)I'm so glad you liked my post :D. To be honest, I wish there was more about Caroline's relationship with Damon in season two. After she confronted him, I hoped we'd get to see her dealing with the memories. I understand why they skipped it - TVD is not a Caroline-centric show, and Caroline had more pressing issues to focus on (like: all the new traumas) to waste time and energy for thinking about the past traumas. So, plot-wise, I get why they did it, but I'd still love to see Caroline struggling with the great comeback of her memories. Well, I guess that's what fanfiction is for.
no subject
Date: 2011-09-11 04:52 am (UTC)YES! I would have loved to see this as well. And I actually think it was important because we see Caroline and Damon interact quite casually for the rest of the season (Damon is in her bedroom at one point early in the season??). But on some level, Caroline MUST be thinking of Damon as the person who sexually and emotionally abused her and then erased her memories because how could she not. Unfortunately a lot of that was really glossed over, and then even worse so where Andie was concerned. :|
no subject
Date: 2011-09-09 07:53 pm (UTC)I wasn't paying attention to how is she written, and you spot it perfectly. I can subscribe to the first paragraph (but I think it took a bit longer in my case), I went from not liking her at all (for being shallow and too stereotypical) to her became one of my favourites (how she changed!).
no subject
Date: 2011-09-09 08:16 pm (UTC)I'm glad you like the meta :D. I was a bit afraid to post it, because of what I wrote about Damon. There is a fine line here between writing things about plot devices and saying nice things about sexual abuse, and one stupid mistake (a sentence badly structured or a word I didn't know had a double meaning) would be enough to cross that line. So, you know. Uffffffffffffff.
no subject
Date: 2011-09-09 10:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-09-09 10:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-09-10 09:40 am (UTC)cieszę się, że piszesz o Caro :)
no subject
Date: 2011-09-11 07:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-09-10 03:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-09-11 08:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-09-11 04:53 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-09-11 08:24 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-09-12 12:13 pm (UTC)Most of the time I want to give her a big hug because she really need it. She so damn strong all the time, crying only when she's alone and no one can see it.
I wish someone would noticed how strong Caroline has become (other then her mother just before her memories are wiped clean).
I don't know, but I think Caroline is my favourite character in TVD now. I hope they'll continue with her awesomeness in the next season.
no subject
Date: 2011-09-12 12:15 pm (UTC)If they don't, they'll have the wrath of us to cope with. Writers, beware!