lizardbeth | writing break

hm, you know, writing Helo and Starbuck in the same fic is... a pain. Kara and Karl. Bah, I think I'm going to have to use Helo, because the names confuse ME. I often read only the first letter of a name as I go along (it slows me down a lot if I have to concentrate on which J-name I'm dealing with), which is why in my original fic/characters I very rarely use the same initial letter in names.

I sincerely doubt Helo thinks of himself as Helo, but readers will just have to deal. Or I could switch to first person... No, like I need more things to discourage me from this fic.

--+---

There's a new kid's show "Ni hao Kai Lan", aimed at preschoolers. It's supposed to be like Dora the Explorer, in that the main character uses basic chinese phrases for the kids to learn. I thought it would be a good idea, since I like having the rugrat exposed to other languages. So we watched one.

ugh.

This show is the animated Chinese Sanrio (Hello Kitty and her friends, if that helps). It's full of characters obviously intended for marketing (and rip-off versions of Chococat and other Sanrio characters). The writing is painfully bad, and the music... well, we love 'Wonder Pets", where the show is scored by Broadway composers. This? not so much. And they spend half the show giggling like they're in a bad anime.

Good concept, but wow, bad execution.

Avoid if you have young ones.

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And now I'm avoiding my Shagathon fic again. *sigh*

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Actually, if it helps, there is some minor canon evidence that Helo does think of himself as Helo. Which made me think that Kara calls him Karl (and the one time Lee does it) is just to piss him off.

hm, really? I'm trying to think what that would be. And now I'm thinking - does Sharon call him Karl when she's mad at him in WK or is it more affectionate? I can't recall.

DOn't make me look it up dude. I need to work on this fic.

Wait a second... are you avoiding YOUR fic too? *squints at you suspiciously*

The instance I'm thinking of is in s1, Kobol's Last Gleaming 1. After he shot her and they're sitting in the rain and she says, "Helo," like she's starting to tell him something and it's in a tone that says they've known each other forever and the shouts at her not to call him that, not to pretend she knows him because she doesn't, she's not even human. If it was just a call sign, I really don't think it would have caused that much anger and frustration.

I'm not sure of the tone in WK, but if it was anywhere near when he walked on Hera's blanket, I'll bet it was snark. :P

Actually, I just watched a Moment at Kindreds and yeah, Sharon is definitely angry at Helo when she calls him Karl. It's during the argument they have when Helo goes off to save Dee when they say some pretty nasty things to each other.

And I'll have you know I've got 441 words written on my fic. We won't talk about the fact that the bunny wants the fic to be ginormous, along the lines of Letting Go...

Edited 2008-02-06 21:47 (UTC)

okay, I couldn't remember which of their conversations it was, just that she called him that for the first time in that ep. Good. Then I can use Helo with clean consciensce! :) (because man, do I hate writing Kara and Karl. Do TPTB do not think of my issues when they name characters?!?!?! *g*)

I have 1200 words on mine theoretically. I know, you're all 'cry me a river', but I have only barely set it up. This also wants to be ginormous.

And Helo is mean. It's hard to write my noble sir being a dick, even though he has a very good reason.

I seem to recall that when Penikett did an interview with a fansite, he was asked re: Sharon calling him Karl in TWK, he at first didn't remember that ever happening, and then responded that maybe it was because Sharon was mad at him. Which makes me think that Penikett's personal canon, at any rate, is that Helo doesn't much care for his given name. See also the fact that I don't think any one person has called him Karl more than once. Sharon in TWK (in the second half of Season 3, when she's always referred to him as Helo before), Kara in the 2nd season premiere, and Lee in AMoS.

I'd definitely say that Helo's incorporated his callsign persona into his identity, whereas both Kara and Lee seem to view Starbuck and Apollo very much as personas, roles they play but can step away from. Mind you, as Helo is an unassuming Raptor pilot rather than a Viper pilot who's supposed to be ego-driven and over-the-top, he probably feels less of a disconnect, because Helo, unlike Starbuck, isn't a larger than life role. I don't know if taking on his callsign as his identity is something that started developing long before the events of the mini (I mean, maybe he just got teased a lot at school, or was named after a relative he disliked, or something. It may not be meaningful), or if it's a response to the end of the worlds.

Incidentally, this show sure loves its lookalike/soundalike names. Karl, Kara, Hera, etc.

Really, I think it's way more normal to say Helo instead of Karl than it would be to, say, use Starbuck instead of Kara. I mean, Karl is Helo in a way Kara isn't always Starbuck. To me, anyway.

yeah, this is true. You'll notice how I didn't even list switching to Starbuck, instead of Kara, because that would read worse.

Plus it's longer, and I'm lazy. *g*

Though really this is all avoidance, I have to admit. It's hard to write Helo being mean. *whines*

I bet it'd be easy to write him being mean to Cain or Thorne or Roslin...

I was looking forward to this especially for my daughter, and the fact they will teach Manderin Chinese. I hope it gets better as it goes along.

Bob

she'll learn more chinese from your wife than she'll learn from the entire show (they did hello, one, two, three, jump, and grandfather - that's it), so it won't be a big loss. I'm VERY disappointed in how badly done it is. It might as well be a long commercial for toys that aren't made yet.

I suppose it's good in that it's a chinese character and does some cultural things, but I would think you have access to much better chinese children's shows. This one will drive you crazy in no time.

writing break

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