Tag: meta

Hey, I was just curious to hear more of your thoughts on the writers intent re the plantation? It’s something I’ve felt conflicted over since I watched the ending (yes, I’ve been conflicted about this going on an entire year now). I know where I stand (I think your thoughts line up pretty closely with mine), but the lack of clarity over whether or not the writers felt that the plantation was actually not such a bad place is the one thing about the ending that left me slightly uncomfortable

flintsredhair:

flintsredhair:

2/To add to my previous ask, I never actually read any of the writers interviews after watching the finale, mostly because I just wanted to sit with my own thoughts and feelings about it and I’m generally a fan of death of the author, so my vague idea of what they have said is largely out of context quotes from people on tumblr. Right after I watched the finale it didn’t actually occur to me that the plantation could be interpreted as anything but completely awful

Honestly – I think the writers did something… not very subtle at all with the end of the show and the plantation and I think that what I have a problem with is not what they wrote but with the way that people didn’t really dig into what’s there in the show. I haven’t read too many creator interviews because I’m very much of the school where the author is dead and what is in the show is what I spend my time on. Anything else is just too exhausting, and having come to Black Sails from the Tolkien fandom, I’ve learned my lesson about “well Tolkien said this,” because let me tell you that man contradicted himself a lot. So – bottom line, I see the plantation as a negative that is being painted as a positive by two people in the show who have very, very good reasons to lie to themselves about what they’re doing to other people. We hear that the plantation is a place where people are sent to be taken care of from Max, and we hear from Silver that it’s a place where people go to disappear. 

Unfortunately, in both of these cases, we’re also presented with the knowledge that the person speaking is speaking to someone they need to have on their side. Max is speaking to Silver, who has her as a captive in an upstairs room of the tavern. She can’t afford to tell him that she was planning on seeing him enslaved as the perceived lesser of two evils because who sits there and hears that and doesn’t get furious at the person who planned to do that to them? She also needs to believe, for her own peace of mind, that she WAS choosing the lesser evil, I think. I think Silver needs that same belief so he can live with himself at the end of the story, and I think that Madi is there specifically for us to see the hypocrisy of the story that both Silver and Max are telling themselves. It’s the ultimate callout, really – Silver is standing there telling his BLACK FORMER SLAVE girlfriend that he sold her friend, essentially, and then asking her to believe him when he says that he did right. We also have the metaphor about strangling the cat earlier in the show, and I think we’re meant to see that analogy in use with the plantation, and see the horror of both situations. In a just world, the cat would not get strangled. The abusive bastard husband who is beating his child for being kind would be the one punished. Similarly, in James’ case, in a just world, he would not be punished for effectively yowling at the door – for fighting for a better world. Instead, the institution that created the problem he’s fighting should be torn down, but instead, Silver elects to strangle the cat as the simplest way to make what he sees as an untenable situation stop without any real justice. I think what the writers put out there is pretty clear – the plantation is not a good place. It’s not a just place. It’s a solution – but not a good one or a pretty one (in fact it’s what I’d call a fucking disgusting one). Look at the way they say that there’s tragedy to what’s been done at the end of the show – they’re saying that what happens to James and Thomas isn’t right, and I have to agree with them. It isn’t. 

#i understand why certain characters in the show want to believe or present the plantation as a good place#but for me as a member of the audience it would be impossible to see it that way#it’s not a good place and it isn’t right or just to put people like thomas there#enslaved for his entire life for the ‘crime’ of Having Opinions While Gay#it’s absurd to me to think that that place could be anything but completely revolting#i mean sure it was better than bethlem#but that’s setting the bar so low it’s in the mariana trench#the very idea of some people being human debris that should be locked away for their entire lives is appalling#and it makes me feel uncomfortable that apparently some people watching the show think that it’s a pretty good place#for people like james and thomas#:(#i mean…#it’s interesting the way some characters defend that place#but i think we as the audience should think for ourselves and see the place for what it is#instead of relying on a character’s word for it#especially when the characters have very good reasons to claim the plantation is a much better place than it is#black sails#meta via @blacksailsflint

#bs spoilers#consider this: thomas was not only a lover to james but a symbol of what drove his fight throughout the years#to be truthful of oneself to know no shame in one’s truth and to insist against all sanity a world of forgiveness in fault and need possible#to have the story concluse with that very symbol (not just to james but to the show and viewers once he’s shown in flashbacks) IN A GAY MAN#hidden. enslaved. wrung out. erased. is heartbreaking. and to put him in the embrace of his lover’s arms after a decade of it#a man who himself became the symbol of the insistent fight for those v things thomas is is NOT RESOLVE?? IT’S WORSE??#to have hope and fight symbolized by 2 gay men lie together in the dark unknown unexplored and subdued into nonexistence is soft finaldefeat#how in the FUCK does anyone watch this ending and think#enslaving two gay men to lifetime of secluded labor is GOOD FOR THEM?? is REWARDING??#(labor for the very empire that shunned them robbed them of their love for one another and those who’ve been denied it most by civilization)#how in the fuck is ensurinf james and thomas’ disappearance from known society and the snuffing out of their core just cause#that was the drive of the entirety of their fucking narrative#a GOOD ending??#it’s tragic and maddeningly painful it ACHES with unfinishedness#there is nothing beautiful or resolved about it#the only balm was thomas the only reason james mind calmed its burning in the last scene is thomas#but if you think both of them trapped and in one another’s arms as they are are CONTENT you have MISSED THE SHOW#they fought bc they wanted to fight for the world and the world told them the comfort they take in one another’s hands while facing it#will be their downfall#but their first fight was not against shame but injustice#and england correlated their justice to what is they made shameful#i just…don’t understand how anyone can look at this story of two gay men who fought first and foremost and ONLY for the justice of others#and think they’d find satisfaction in only one another’s arms??#both pairs of hands are ones that won’t rest till they tug at justice by the neck and place it at the mercy of the oppressed#this is not a happy ending it’s just not a dead one#i gotta stop but i’m still REELINF with the horror of this conclusion#the writers’ attempted balm is kind but the honesty of the horror is harrowing#civilization needs its monsters

Is it just me or the place where the action takes, uh, place… effects our outlook? I mean… If Black Sails took place in India during British colonization and it was a story of a failed revolution there, for some reason I don’t think there would be any questions of “Should they have rebelled? Was it worth it?” You know what I mean?

I know exactly what you mean, Anon, but somehow I’m not certain that the place would have made much of a difference. The fact is that the debate over whether rebellions and revolutions should have taken place happens pretty much anywhere there is a revolution, and it is fueled by the simple fact that to people who have never been oppressed, the idea of armed revolution seems like an extreme reaction. People who have never faced death or torture for being who they are do not understand that there comes a point at which words are not enough, and a lot of people who HAVE faced oppression of that sort have families to consider whom they are rightly concerned for, because to them, a failed rebellion means death. I can see what you’re saying – in India, rebellion against the British empire worked eventually thus proving that such an endeavor was a possibility and no one today doubts whether change was possible, whereas in the Americas, we still very much have slavery at an institutional level in the form of the American prison system. It seems like an impossible pursuit, thus, I think, fueling at least part of the debate about “could Flint and Madi’s war have worked.” Still – I’m fairly certain we’d be having this debate over any historical piece, especially about India, since India as a country didn’t gain their independence until after WWII. 

primarybufferpanel replied to your link “Reclamation – Chapter 1 – DreamingPagan – Black Sails [Archive of Our…”

Vane/Madi?! I’m intrigued. I’m there

Honestly, they’d work well together, I think. They’re both former slaves, she’d get his issues with not being quite sure if what he’s doing is what he wants or what someone has told him he wants, and he’d understand her rage at what’s happened to her and her people for years. They both share that “don’t you dare try to sacrifice the larger cause for my sake” mentality. They’re both clever as hell, they both understand leadership that’s based on respect rather than shame. They’ve both lost a father recently, both to the English, they both hate Rogers, they both loved Eleanor. They’ve both been through extremely messy breakups. Charles is respected and obeyed by his people in much the same way that Madi is by hers. 

at the end of the show, james flint who refused to bow to the system that ruined his life ends up in a place where he is supposed to toil for the benefit of the said system. because his friend sent him there. to a place that england created for people like him to disappear and never bother her again. england won, because his friend let her win. delivered him to her on a silver plate. returned him to her clutches so he could continue to break his back for her. but it’s ok, it’s love…

Fully and totally agreed. I don’t think I’m ever going to be over the simple fact that after all that struggle, all that sacrifice, all that pain – England won, because one man decided that the fight wasn’t worth it. I find it hugely ironic that the moment someone starts trying to define Silver as a monster in the same derisive, degrading way people have with Flint all his life, he literally stomps that man’s head in, but when James Flint practically begs Silver not to allow the world to remember him as nothing more than a monster, Silver decides that he suddenly doesn’t care about stories. It’s been six months, and I’m still not over this and I don’t suspect I ever will be, because the reality is that he made Flint’s worst nightmare a reality and in the process, he left Thomas Hamilton to remain a slave. I’m sorry, but none of this is any version of love. 

S*lver: I instructed them to kill Captain Flint. S*lver stans: but he DIDN’T mean it, he was trying to save him :(, he knew Flint would survive. So S*lver sent six men to their deaths for no reason then? What a HERO.

*snort* fully agreed, Anon. No matter how you slice that, it’s a shitty thing to do, and a stupid one to boot – Rogers’ only bargaining chip at that point was Madi. He was hardly going to kill her and risk Flint blowing him out of the water. I get why Silver panicked, and I get why he was angry, but let’s not call it what it’s not. In that moment, he was worried about one person – Madi, not Flint.

I’m really sorry to know that you have been victim of child abuse. And I have know in the first place what that means. I just want to say that when in a tv show or in a movie or in a book there are characters who are abusive that is always adfirmed by the creators and by the actors. Now where are the evidence of that in *bs*? How can the authors omit that their co-protagonist is an abusive character? How can the actor omit it and be surprised by the hate that his ch. Is receving?

Thank you, Anon, and in response to your question: I have no idea. The writers have, honest to gods, written a character that is, make no mistake, abusive, whether he means to be or not. It’s well-portrayed, it’s chilling to those of us who have experienced similar, and neither the writers or the actor himself seem to get that that’s what is there in the script, on the screen, in the show. I’ve never been 100% comfortable with the character, and the more I look at him in retrospect, the more I understand why that is. To be fair, it took me a while to realize, even having the experiences
I’ve had, so I suppose it’s possible they genuinely don’t realize what
they’ve put out there.

I would have thought, though, that the ending of the show was fairly cut and dried on that front – S*lver basically tells both Flint and Madi that they’re not capable of making good decisions on their own so he’s making decisions for them. He treats Madi and her people like that, and then when she tells him to get out – when she tells him she wants nothing more to do with him after what he’s done – he refuses to leave. He tells her he’ll wait until she comes around to understanding what he’s done and why and my gods does that sound like every abuser ever telling someone they’ve hurt them for their own good and that it’s their fault they had to do it. He tells Flint the same – I’m selling you for your own good, Thomas is there, go quietly. If you hadn’t insisted on your war (here read: if you hadn’t had convictions and ideals you believed in strongly enough to die for) I wouldn’t be doing this. I could quote considerably more of the show at you – it’s woven through s1 to s4, but I’ll stop here, because this isn’t meant to be a long, drawn out meta.

But when did the parallel between Silver’s decision and Alfred’s became a bad thing? O_O Some of the most prominent s*ilverfl*nt blogs have done it in the past. The parallel *is* there. The reasons are different, but the parallel is there. Why is it a problem now? Because a non-s*ilverfl*nt shipper has done it? captain-flint(.)tumblr(.)com/post/159649086888/flint-is-gone-retired-from-the-account-he-was gaysails(.)tumblr(.)com/post/159321573042/i-dont-know-why-you-did-this-but-i-know-you-did

annevbonny:

sidewaystime:

annevbonny:

sidewaystime:

Anon, I don’t even know. Not making that comparison is like, idk, not analyzing that Pearl in The Scarlet Letter is named for the biblical verse or that Nick in the Great Gatsby is queer enough to sleep with dudes. It’s explicit enough in the text that there is an existing comparison to be made between Peter Ashe and Silver that they use the same dialogue. They use the same justification! Like, I hate Peter Ashe as much as the next person, but he is very clear that he did it because Alfred Hamilton threatened his future and threatened his daughter. How is that any less of a justification than doing it for Madi and the future that Silver wants with her? He is just as clear! He says to Flint that he sees a future with Madi and wants it. It’s right there in the text. It’s not like, “ho ho, i want to find the worst possible read on Silver because he is a mustachioed villain.” It is because everyone has a reason for doing what they’re doing. If you’re extending sympathy to Silver because he is afraid and wants to save Madi and is trying to have a future where he saves lives, you should be able extend that sympathy to Peter Ashe for wanting the same things. If you are using Silver’s practicality as it regards Madi and Flint’s end goals to justify what he does, you should be able to give that same acknowledgment to Peter Ashe who, again, does the exact same thing. Just because we see the fall out of what Peter Ashe does and not the full fall out of what Silver does doesn’t mean that those things don’t happen. 

One of the moral and ethical complexities of this show is that you can have good reasons for what you are doing, really sympathetic understandable reasons, and still do terrible things. The good sympathetic understandable reasons don’t make the terrible things less terrible. They don’t make the people who pay the price of them less hurt. Does anyone who burned in Charlestown or any of the other towns Flint sacked give a solitary shit why he did it? No. Is the first runaway slave to get turned away from the Maroon camps or returned as per the terms of the treaty going to give a single fuck that Max and Jack and Madame Guthrie and John Silver made it so that the treaty was part of the terms of surrender in a war the Maroons hadn’t actually lost? I doubt it. Is that person going to care that Julius wants to preserve the things they have instead of risking the future? God knows I wouldn’t.

AND THEN. Yeah, let’s get into Alfred Hamilton and John Silver because this is where I think things get really interesting. Let’s throw Hal Gates in there too, because he does this to Flint as well.

There are three pivotal moments in Flint’s life where someone looked at him and essentially said, “What I want matters more than what you want and I am going to make you go away to get it.” Do they all have good reasons for it? I’m sure Alfred Hamilton thought the preservation of his name, power, and influence was more than enough reason to make an officer from the lower classes and his troublesome daughter in law go the fuck away. But do we think that? No. Because it hurt characters we’re invested in. Because the reason isn’t good enough for what he did and he only ruined three lives. Hal Gates wanted Flint and Miranda to go away because Flint maybe possibly killed Billy and didn’t care about his men. Were his reasons good? Maybe. To Billy, sure. To Dufresne and Degroot and the rest of the crew, yes. Good enough to make it so they thought that Flint should hang for killing him. 

So what makes John Silver’s actions different? His reasons are good to him. He wants to save Madi at all costs. He wants not to go to war. These are all fantastic reasons, much like Gates’ reasons are fantastic reasons. Alfred Hamilton’s reasons are excellent reasons to him. But the end result for Flint is the same: he loses all the things he’s worked for, he is made to go away, and someone else dictates the terms of his story. 

Silver has his reasons for wanting the war to end. Max has her reasons. Julius has his. Flint and Madi and the pirates and maroons who came to fight England had theirs for wanting it to continue. Everyone counted up the costs to what they were doing and decided those costs were worth it and that put them into opposition with each other. That doesn’t make one side objectively right or wrong. It means that you take the reasons the show presents and compare them to your own ethics and morals and fucking engage with the text on those terms. And, much like the show, everyone watching it has their reasons for their reaction and those reactions are entirely valid based as they are in our own lived experiences and our beliefs and our histories. 

This is why that assertion that the people criticizing Silver for what he does in the ending are flattening the ending or losing the moral complexity of it by comparing what he does to previous antagonists really really irk me: the ethical complexity of the show is LITERALLY the point of the comparisons. Good people do terrible things. Terrible people do good things. Everyone contains multitudes. Everyone’s reasons for what they are doing are good and justifiable to them. Whether those reasons are good or justifiable to anyone/everyone else is the one of the points of the show. 

Hey! Really good and well discussed meta above, however I’d like to contest something. What Silver did in the end may be comparable to both Alfred Hamilton and Peter Ashe’s actions in terms of “he had his own excellent reasons and so he sent Flint away,” and so they may look similar on the surface but they are absolutely not comparable when you consider the way those characters felt about Flint. Alfred Hamilton considered Flint to be disposable. He probably barely gave him any consideration. Peter Ashe betrayed both Thomas and Flint in the process and separated them for ten years, and when Flint showed up at his door asking for pardons he continued the ruse and thought it a better idea to expose Flint to London’s ridicule and judgement rather than admit to what he did and tell him about Thomas still being alive. (You could argue Silver does this for half of s4 and you would be right. Except Silver comes clean and Peter does not. The threat of Alfred Hamilton no longer exists. He could tell Flint, and yet he doesn’t.) 

The closest betrayal to Silver’s is probably Gates. Gates loved Flint, in some ways, and Flint loved him in some ways. This betrayal is also completely different to the ones mentioned above. I think its doing a disservice to both Gates and Silver to throw them together into this pile of shit. 

Silver literally reunited Flint with the man he loves. Silver did the exact opposite of what both Peter and Alfred did. It still served to take Flint out of the picture but it still has to be taken into consideration when judging the moral rightness vs. wrongness of his actions, and especially when considering their relationship. It’s not the same thing. It’s not. It might stem from the same motivation (to protect their own), but the way they go about it and the repercussions that Flint ultimately faces is completely different. It is absolutely a betrayal, but it’s not of the same kind. Gates and Silver both loved Flint, and wanted on some level to keep him safe. This is an aspect that needs to be considered and I don’t think that’s contestable. It’s still paternalistic and it is most definitely robbing Flint of any agency, but the underlying relationships between these characters definitely have to be considered. That’s what’s being flattened when both Silver and Gates are lumped together with Alfred Hamilton. 

Let’s also remember: Silver sent six men to kill Flint and tried to kill him himself literally hours before he reunites him with the man he loves. Reuniting him with Thomas wasn’t the goal, which we know because he doesn’t do it when Flint is of use to him; reuniting him with Thomas was the carrot to keep him away from restarting the war.

But in the end, i would argue that whatever the feelings motivating the actions don’t actually matter to the person being disposed of. We don’t know how Peter Ashe felt about James McGraw or Thomas, just that when weighed against his wife and daughter, they were worth less to him. Flint, when weighed against Billy, was worth less to Gates. Flint, when weighed against Madi’s survival, was worth less to Silver. 

The relationships are context for the tragedy but they don’t actually change the action.

I’m not saying they change the action, I’m saying they should change the way the action should be judged. In the same way Flint killing Alfred Hamilton and Flint killing Gates is not the same thing. 

I also fundamentally disagree that Thomas was a….carrot. I think if the only goal was to keep Flint from starting the war, Silver could have just killed him. That’s surest possible way to keep him from restarting the war, wouldn’t you say? Why bother keeping him alive? Why bother hunting Thomas down? Why bother offering days and weeks and months of your time to convince Flint to let the war go other than just outright shooting him? Why bother taking Flint to Savannah at all? All of this is active effort in the middle of a war. Keeping him alive is Silver going out of his way to keep him alive. 

The way I see it, if Flint is alive, re-uniting him with Thomas was at least some part of the goal. If the goal was to get rid of him, there’s a sure fire way to do so. If Flint is alive, there is something that stays Silver’s hand. There’s is something that has him hunt Thomas Hamilton down, there is something that has Silver go on the ship to Savannah and deliver Flint to Thomas. That’s a thing that should be considered. That’s the way I see it. I don’t understand at all how that can be ignored. There’s complexity here that is being missed out on. That’s the whole point. 

This is addressed in the show. The reason Silver can’t kill Flint is named Madi, who would have continued the war in his name if Silver had martyred him by shooting him. I don’t deny that he cared about Flint or that Flint cared about him, but that wasn’t what stayed his hand, as evidenced by the fact that literally a few hours earlier, he was fine with sending men to kill Flint and then tried to do it himself. The difference is that in the time between then and the end of the finale, Flint had very publicly won a major battle in the war against England and had the loyalty of a lot of people from that, which meant that he could no longer be painted as a traitor to the cause. Instead, he had to be gotten rid of in a way that made it seem like he’d disappeared willingly. No one’s ignoring the complexity of anything, we’re simply saying that Silver had reasons other than fondness to do what he did. 

Well, since everyone’s in the mood to quote people behind the characters, how about this one from Luke Arnold himself: “Flint is who we want to be, but Silver is who we are.” There was another interview where he talks about eternal question of idealism (Flint) vs. pragmatism (Silver), but I’m too lazy to look it up.

So – I will admit, there is an element of truth in this, in that Flint is definitely who we want to be. He’s brave, selfless in a lot of ways, and he’s willing to do what needs to be done to bring about his vision – Thomas’ vision – of a better world – one that I think is definitely worth fighting for. He’s got his flaws – plenty of them, and some of his actions are pretty well indefensible, but on the whole, he’s a good man fighting for a cause I can believe in . And I know myself well enough to know that I am not even close to as talented or as driven as he is – you notice I’m not currently burning the system to the ground in pursuit of a better one, and I almost wish I had the courage and lack of give-a-fuck to be more like him sometimes. As to the second part of that statement though, I have one thing to say. 

The day that I start to be Silver is the day that I want someone to punch me so hard my ancestors feel it. If you follow me, you know how I feel about him as a person. I’m not going to go on a rant, but… no. I am not Silver. ‘nough said. 

Did Hennessey drink himself to death after betraying James? Or did he wait until tales of Flint for really bad, realised it was James getting his revenge, and just retire on the spot? As we don’t ever see Hennessey again I’m concluding that one of these two things happened. Sorry

comtessedebussy:

Well, the rather sad and out-of-story reason we never got to see Hennessey again is because the actor died. 😦 😦 

But, honestly, I can absolutely buy @flintsredhair‘s meta that Hennessey didn’t actually betray James, but that he had no choice, Alfred Hamilton was too powerful and the most he could do was intervene so that James only got exiled and not, you know, imprisoned and hanged (which is what really should have been the more likely outcome for a low-born gay man who pissed off a lord at this point in time). And that he said those things to make James leave quietly, because if James stuck around making trouble he definitely would be hanged. 

Honestly I’d kind of kill for an AU in which Hennessey in some way realizes James is Flint (idk how, since even Peter didn’t realize?) and secretly gives him aid? Tells him Peter colluded with Alfred Hamilton? Lets him know about the Maria Aleyne? I even rather like the idea of Hennessey speaking at James’ trial in Charleston, though logistically there is no way that could happen. 

I wonder if Hennessey had to get anyone else’s approval to dismiss James, though? I like to imagine him explaining it to other people in the navy, ‘oh yes, our most promising lieutenant had to be dismissed because, um…” And the war with Spain continues, and James wreaks havoc in Nassau, and all Alfred Hamilton wanted was power and control of Nassau and James has pretty much ensured that’s never going to happen. Alfred Hamilton must be going “oh shit” because that nice island in the new world that he wanted control over again? Yeah that ain’t gonna happen now. Oops. Maybe he shouldn’t have pissed off a certain redhead…

You know – you speculating about the reason that Hennessey gives the Navy made me wonder. Do you think he even actually told anyone why? Was James actually dismissed or did Hennessey tell him he had been and then pretend he had no idea what had happened to their most promising young lieutenant and act as if he had disappeared? If I were him I’m pretty sure I’d have found a way to pin James’ disappearance on someone Alfred had in his pocket knowing Alfred could say nothing because to do so would be to get Thomas killed and that evidently isn’t what he wanted. I need fic or meta about the politics going on after James’ and Miranda’s exile because I’m sure there was some definite maneuvering going on. As to that fic where Hennessey figures out who Flint is and helps him – I really do want to write a fic like that and @penflicks had prompted one not too long ago. It’s on the to-do list!