(no subject)

[meganbmoore]

So, based on the first 2 episodes, The Lizzie Bennet Diaries is about Lizzie finding clever ways to display internalized misogyny?  Utter contempt for her mother, slutshaming Lydia, gearing up to ranting about how Jane is disgustingly perfect then turning into sweetness and light when Jane walks in, and Charlotte Lucas (now asian) appears to be there to do whatever Lizzie tells her to while Lizzie jokes about Charlotte wanting to be in control of everything.

Comments

[dorothean]

Ugh!

[meganbmoore]

Yup. I mean, I'm sure it has plenty of good qualities, but it chose the worst possible way to introduce itself for me.

[chaila]

Yeah, pretty much. It doesn't necessarily get better, but 1) it comes and goes, and 2) I think this adaptation challenges the internalized misogyny kind of inherent in Austen/Lizzie Bennet more than the original or anything else I've ever seen done. It's still there though. But she gets challenged. (ETA: To be clear, it's not challenged as misogyny or sexism, but it's challenged as judgement and as a way to behave towards other people).

I will say they kinda lost me over Caroline Bingley eventually, though at first I liked what they were doing with her character. I should probably post about it...

[meganbmoore]

My thing is that this is how the writer CHOSE to introduce Lizzie: two episodes that are basically nothing but Lizzie looking down on and displaying disdain for other women, except for when they're doing what she wants. There are so many ways she could have introduced Lizzie, but she chose the one in which our main narrator is enthusiastically embracing all the ways society tells us to look down on other women.

[chaila]

Well one writer has indicated that she did basically do it on purpose, or at least part of it, though that post is also weirdly defensive about more than just that (oh, we all just want Lizzie to be likeable and not challenging? um okay?) And as lots of people pointed out, sexism against others is still framed to serve Lizzie's growth. It has its good points, but I also think it got rather overpraised in general...

[shiegra]

That doesn't sound like Lizzie at all. Certainly she followed in her father's footsteps of a certain kind of judgemental superiority, but she herself in the text criticizes and pokes fun at herself for it, and her exasperation with Lydia, while not very sympathetic to her sister's position, always seemed more based in highly different temperament than misogyny. (It's been a while but I thought I remembered a certain - slightly shamefaced - recognition in me at Lizzie's irritation at Lydia's blithe disregard for both her own and Jane's fate.)

I saw some clips but never quite twigged to; she never seemed at all Lizzie to me. Lizzie was amused and self-possessed and through the book grew to be more aware of her own harsh judgements on the people opposed to or infringing on her, but this Lizzie seems more...desperately insecure with over-the-top looking down the nose and venom.

[elsane]

Yeah. They were called out on the slut shaming and actually listened and apologized, but, yeah.

I've stopped watching, despite the bits of cleverness; their Lizzie just misses the mark for me, and this is one of the major reasons why.

[elsane]

(This is what I was thinking of.)

[laceblade]

ty, I was trying to figure out what was bugging me so much about the few episodes I watched.

[meganbmoore]

I was planning to sit here and binge on it for several hours tonight, yet...