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fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermillion
1x20 & 21 Victoria's Secret
Guilt issues: Fraser has them massively, considering he has one glimpse of the back of Victoria's head and goes on a sad three-minute fantasy to Sarah McLachlan music. I don't think the take-home lesson here is that Fraser loses his head over love, necessarily, or lust, or whatever-the-hell it really is for Victoria; it's that he's powerfully attracted to her and it gets entangled with his empathy for people and need to help them.
I also don't think his relationship with Victoria should get confused with some desire to reform her or to cure her pain with his love; I don't think those ideas are even really in Fraser's mental vocabulary. It's that he wants to help her and, separately, he wants to be able to love her, as selfishly as he ever wants anything. I think 'selfishly' is the right word, because when he's chasing after her he actually pushes people out of the way. It's this singular scary intensity Fraser gets around Victoria -- which is in large part what makes it ridiculously easy for her to take advantage of him, in combination with his willingness to believe in the innate goodness of people.
Switching gears wildly, I really like Ray's reminiscing about his dad playing pool. There is genuine admiration in that; like maybe Ray had affection he wanted to give his father, only that was pretty much impossible, so he sort of channeled it into watching his dad playing pool. Oh Ray.
Much like Fraser's first Victoria monologue, where we can only see his reflection in the window, I like that in the one in the confessional, we're seeing Fraser through the dividing screen; it's sort of as though, if we're going to witness Fraser laying himself bare, there still needs to be some sort of barrier there, if that makes any sense. It's interesting that Fraser does have Victoria monologues plural, too -- if there'd been the mention of being in love in Invitation to Romance, and then this, it would signpost upcoming love interest well enough. I'm sure from a technical standpoint they just had the first Victoria monologue and liked it so much that they decided to use it as the basis for this episode, or something of the kind, but within the narrative structure, the fact that Fraser tells this exact story, with some of the same exact words, not once but twice, is important. It means that Victoria has become one of the structural narratives of Fraser's life: she's had time to become something understood, so when she really turns up, he already has specific ideas about how things should work -- which is yet another reason why he allows himself to be guilted and manipulated. "It was as though I had known her forever, across a thousand lifetimes," is probably the most telling thing he says. Oh Fraser, baby, way to set yourself up for a fall by assuming you know her at all!
And oh Father Behan the recurring Catholic priest from Belfast! I love everything about him, not least that even before Fraser tells him about Victoria, he already knows the right thing to say, which is of course You need to learn to forgive yourself. That will take Fraser another few episodes, though.
I'm endlessly fascinated by Fraser's "only woman I ever loved" deal. I mean, really? I suppose he was moving too often to form any lasting romantic attachments as a teenager, and when he hit, mm, twenty or so, he joined the RCMP and probably didn't want to date because of fraternization and such; and I suppose he did meet Victoria for the first time in his mid-twenties, which is respectable enough. I'd say I was astonished that someone hadn't managed to sleep with him before that, but I guess that's the point: in Victoria's favor is the fact that not for a single moment does she do the goggle-eyed ohmygod a hot Mountie! thing. Which also explains why he hasn't been with anyone since meeting Victoria, either, although I suspect in part it's some sort of skewed idea of fidelity, which, oh, Fraser, no. If he never loved any woman besides Victoria until after this episode, too, it goes some way towards explaining the sheer insanity of some of his behavior: when you're young you have these crazy sweeping notions about love (generally speaking) -- loving your partner even if they do unwise things, following them stupid places like, say, onto a train, those are things you do the first time, before you get burned or jaded or whatever. Alternately Fraser could just be like that, and given that I assume he feels things very deeply, it's quite possible.
Bob's story about arresting Caroline for speeding is flipping adorable. I secretly ship Bob/Caroline quite a lot except I would feel less guilty about it if Caroline wasn't Martha Burns, dammit. Anyway, I'm sort of astonished by how many great things this episode has.
By the way, Victoria is damn good at what she does. Watching her (coincidentally, haha) run into Fraser, and then almost walk away, and then come home to make awkward domestic dinner with him, I believe her. I believe that she's hurt but that she loves him, and so it's a total gut-punch when she calculatedly screws him over, because honestly? in her own special Victoria way, I think it works so well because she genuinely does love him.
I'm completely fascinated by the way that Fraser acts around Victoria like he does around no one else ever. They're attracted to each other and it makes them a little fumbly but it doesn't make him the sort of blushingly awkward he is at any other time, even those other times when the attraction is reciprocated. What I do like is that Fraser genuinely in love is Fraser not pretending to be anyone at all; I think he nearly gets there with the Rays, if with no one else, but Victoria is a unique little, heh, snowflake.
I remember feeling possibly irrationally relieved when Fraser and Victoria actually slept together, because I'd been afraid that the show wouldn't go there; like, yes, Fraser is technically a functioning adult, but even if most of the women around him are obviously Mountiesexual, Fraser is going to be an entirely asexual being. That he canonically has sex still makes me happier than possibly it should. That his canonical sex includes Victoria pushing him around a bit and him murmuring that he probably deserves it: not healthy, Fraser! Let me give you a hug.
By the way, nngh. There is a very good reason I really like listening to Possession on repeat. Most apt song ever.
The best measure of how weird everything is in Fraser's head is the fact that he just slept in and didn't go to work. And then it is Really Awkward Conversation Time with Ray! Ray takes it pretty well, actually, with his not-really-forced grin and his "Way to go, man!" Actually, hell, Ray takes the entire Victoria debacle amazingly well, even if their first conversation about Victoria is ridiculously awkward. It's okay, Fraser approves! He gives everything the awkward half-dressed just-been-shagged dorky Mountie thumbs-up. :D
Fraser also forgets about Ray's party, forgets to pay Ray back on time, and forgets that his Stetson is on top of the Riv. It's the little things. I do love that Ray's friendship is still valuable enough to him that he'll chase Ray half-dressed out into the street to apologize, though.
The conversation between Fraser and his father about whether they actually know the women they love is, um. I'm absolutely sure Fraser is being unfair when he tells Bob that he wasn't around long enough to really know Caroline; as well as having enough surrounding evidence to the contrary, Fraser is also actually raising his voice, getting genuinely upset, so he's definitely lashing out and trying to hurt Bob, probably because he's terrified he doesn't know Victoria. I like that he admits that she frightens him; I'm fairly sure she frightens him in large part because even if she did kill Jolly in cold blood, and shoot Diefenbaker, and set Fraser and Ray up for a fall, even though all her crimes are really personal, not only can Fraser not hold her to the same standard of justice he does everyone else, the fact is that in large part her crimes just don't matter to him; he still loves her. It's that "I know her in her soul" thing, and I still haven't been able to decide whether that's true; I do think she does genuinely want him to come with her, though if she loves him it's in a way that's twisted and skewed and gone ugly. (I was going to say that at the very least there has to be something good in her for Fraser to be attracted to her, but it could just as easily be argued that they have some sort of cosmic balance thing going on: Fraser is Good, in a weird pure way, so maybe Victoria is evil in a weird pure way and thence the attraction? Who knows.)
Oh wow, and Bob wants to know if it's snowing out. I'm probably making things up, but ... it snows inside Fraser's head for the entire two episodes. It snows when he first thinks of Victoria, when they're watching North by Northwest together, when they kiss for the first time, and at the train platform at the end; and of course Bob, living as he does in a sort of liminal space mostly inside Fraser's head, would notice the ambient temperature. I love the way snow is used in this episode, honestly: a blizzard is beautiful, but you're going to die.
I LOVE HOW THE ENTIRE DIVISION SUPPORTS FRASER AND RAY. My god. Victoria sets them up good and even Louis is defending them. <333
Okay, and here's the part where I start hugging myself and trying like hell not to cry. It starts with the sheer love Ray's showing Fraser, posting his bail and refusing any deals and saying gently, "Benny, not in your lifetime." And then there's the damn scene with the damn candles, Fraser trying to light up or burn out all the darkness and call Victoria back to him with a white beacon, and when Bob asks why Benton would possibly want Victoria back, he sort of wraps his arms around himself and says, "Because -- because I -- I need -- oh god ..." which would probably break me even without the rest of it. Bob assumes he means he desperately needs that second chance, and that's true, but his body language says more than that -- Fraser is just so damn alone and it's -- like the man said, it's easier to think that you're in love than to think that you're alone.
I think I should assert that Victoria really does love Fraser. She did do all of it for revenge, but like pretty much everything she does, she has at least a double layer of motivation. In this case, she wanted to get Fraser into so much trouble with the law that he'd be bound to her and forced to come -- which is ridiculous, because it means that just as Fraser doesn't know her, she really doesn't know him. Fraser wants to come with her anyway, not because of any emotional blackmail. This doesn't make it healthy for either of them -- in fact, it's one of the most honestly emotionally abusive things I've seen on tv -- and it kind of breaks my heart for both of them, although at least Fraser is salvageable.
Oh god, the way Fraser loses it, by which I mean his heart and mind are already way away from where they normally are, but it kind of happens to his body too: to begin with, it's like he loses all his strength around Victoria (weak-in-the-knees but his whole body) and then sort of to make up for it he does things big with all his fine motor control shot, like when he completely wrecks Ray's house searching for the key.
Apropos of very little, I really love Fraser's handwriting.
And I love that Fraser was able to set Victoria up in turn -- they have a sort of twisted yin/yang thing going on, honestly. I love that he kept his head enough for that, even though he tried to go with her at the end, which ... my god, I think if he'd done that he would've burned up, just withered and died, because there's a difference between being no one but yourself and losing yourself.
Let's all thank Vecchio for shooting Fraser in the back and saving his life.
1x22 Letting Go
Okay, what Ray must be going through. Fraser's romance with Victoria almost cost him his job and seriously wrecked his house; he posted Fraser's bail and had to mortgage the damn thing, whereupon Fraser nearly skipped bail by running away with Victoria, which would have gotten Ray in a hell of a lot of trouble aside from everything else; he knows that Fraser almost ran with her, because Fraser said to him "I should be with her;" despite all of this he still has this urge to protect Fraser; and he has the gnawing guilt of having just shot and nearly killed his best friend. And apparently he's come to visit Fraser every day, no matter how antsy it's making him. Oh Ray.
I don't actually know how I got through the double feature of Victoria's Secret and Letting Go the first time, honestly; watching them back-to-back is wrenching. I'm pretty sure I started crying the first time I got to the end of VS, because I had the first shock of discovering that Fraser can't make everything okay. I'm not sure if it's better or worse this time through, because I've come to terms with the notion of Fraser as a fallible and slightly tragic creature, but I also suspect that I love him at least twice as much. Can I have a show of hands for anyone who loves Fraser inexpressibly? I know I'm not the only one.
HELLO, JILL KENNEDY. <3 Jill Kennedy the physical therapist is probably one of my favourite one-shot characters, possibly specifically because she is [a] an extremely attractive youngish woman and [b] not even remotely a love interest. She's professional and she's interesting and she's a friend, and she even sort of does double-time as his emotional therapist too.
BOB IN FULL UNIFORM FLOATING IN THE POOL. That is another one of my single favourite moments.
Oh Ray. I know Fraser's been all sorts of damaged, but Ray is still one of the most forgiving friends in the world. He buys him power saws, wants to rebuild the cabin, wants get a bathroom for it, is so relieved when Fraser wants him to stay. But he should learn to not even say the word 'Victoria' because it puts Fraser in a tailspin -- a really interesting one, too, where he keeps on remembering them being all sweet and tender and not wanting to admit to all the fun emotionally abusive stuff.
I love that Ray's even able to gently tell Fraser that Victoria wasn't his fault, that he was blindsided, that it could've happened to anyone. I don't know if that's strictly true, but the gesture is good. More than that, Fraser accepts it; it's the point at which he admits that he was going to go with Victoria, and the point at which he understands that Ray knows this and has already forgiven him, which means he's finally able to forgive himself, too, for maybe everything about Victoria. I imagine it's more complicated than that, and some of the damage is pretty deep, and I don't know what he'd do if Victoria ever came back, but at least after that point he's Fraser again.
It is perhaps a little worrying that Fraser feels a little pleased that Ray was shot -- the guy just took a bullet for you, Fraser, it's not like anyone else
DONE WITH FIRST SEASON. \o/ Now I really want to write the rest of this WIP I have, an eventually-Fraser/Kowalski fic about Victoria returning to Chicago and blackmailing the hell out of both of them and trying to get Fraser to come with her and probably a heist or two and it will be AWESOME. But not tonight, because I think I am officially out of words.
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And I cannot watch VS or Letting Go. Like, at all. I WANT to, but it's the same as Juliet is Bleeding - I can't watch that, either. Don't know why it's just those four eps.
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I have so much YES for everything in this post that to single just this one bit out for YESing seems unfair, but, dude, seriously, YES.
Fraser/Victoria is one of my strongest ships. I just love them, I do, I love everything that she brings out of him, everything glorious and shameful and amazing that we know is burning in him all the time. And I love how he twists her up inside, and how she is so totally fucked up that she can't just accept his love, she has to make him love her, even when it's not necessary, and, and, oh! Your post has sent me into a flaily handed tailspin of LOVE for them both, and oh, for Vecchio, too, and oh, oh, they are all so damned beautiful.
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Fraser/Victoria is one of my strongest ships.
\o/! I was under the vague impression that I was the only one -- like, people think Victoria is an interesting character, but no one actually ships them. But what you said, all the glorious and shameful and amazing stuff, that is EXACTLY IT, and slfjhdfdsh. *waves hands*
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YES YES YES. This is a story he's told himself over and over, and maybe even one he's poured out into other ears.
Re: the only woman he ever loved - I defer to Speranza's awesome Some Strange Prophecy: "Yeah, well, he said something about how they had sex near some church—'within sight of the steeple,'" Ray repeated, as the phrase came back to him, "and you know, I think that for Fraser, that would be pretty much enough." It's a very plausible read, IMO, that Fraser would find a way to feel so committed to Victoria between the strength of their emotional responses to each other and the implications of the intimacy they've shared that he would consider their relationship tantamount to marriage. Something, maybe from the Victorian (heh) morals of his grandparents about sex being limited to marriage.
I love the way snow is used in this episode, honestly: a blizzard is beautiful, but you're going to die.
I adore this sentence. I can't believe I never read the snow like that before, because this is a PERFECT take on it.
Okay, and here's the part where I start hugging myself and trying like hell not to cry. It starts with the sheer love Ray's showing Fraser, posting his bail and refusing any deals and saying gently, "Benny, not in your lifetime." And then there's the damn scene with the damn candles, Fraser trying to light up or burn out all the darkness and call Victoria back to him with a white beacon, and when Bob asks why Benton would possibly want Victoria back, he sort of wraps his arms around himself and says, "Because -- because I -- I need -- oh god ..." which would probably break me even without the rest of it.
I have to stop quoting things, because I'll wind up with most of your post in here, but this is also YES. I cry SO HARD when I watch these parts of VS, almost every time. Especially the candles.
And to end on a happier note, I also enjoy Bob floating in the pool! And the weird bit with Fraser's grandmother haunting Bob - I love that his ghost has a ghost.
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(Also, I'm totally looking forward to the Fraser/Kowalski + Victoria fic. :D!)
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Aria. No. It's because he's gay as a Mountie*.
*Which is actually apparently not very gay at all! the RCMP hates gay people. But, you know. Bear with me.
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Hi thar, tl;dr that happens when you accuse Fraser of being gay as a Mountie! Oh dear.
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I am actually enjoying this series of posts, even though or perhaps because I never intend to see the show. Paul Gross in the half-shagged cap is pretty smoking ... which helps ... but your analysis is fun to follow.
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I am curious how much sense the posts make if you have not watched the episodes? I have no idea if I am giving surrounding context at all. I am pleased that it is apparently followable, though. (Also I am curious as to why you never intend to see the show! "I have other things to do with my time" is valid answer, I guess, but Emma, surely there is nothing wrong with giving a few hours of your life to watching the man who is basically the poster-boy for the Army of Light!)
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...Kowalski on the other hand is running after that train. This is secretly one of the biggest reasons I am all for the Fraser/Kowalski, you see: neither of them would actually become freaked out by each other's massive codependency.
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No but really, if Vecchio hasn't run screaming from Fraser yet he can put up with anything. Goddamn I want to write more OT3 fic now. I've been meaning to do it anyway but I was going to write the F/K with Victoria in first. Ahhh.
Edited for tiny typo, woo.
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aslfsdfjd you have no idea how excited that makes me! Or perhaps you do, because I obviously have a Fraser/Victoria headspace thing going now too, but that sounds fantastic.