B7 Thoughts - Avon's Appeal, WTF?

[fangrrl_squees]

I've been reading a rather good thread on vilakins' journal which boils down to "Why on earth are some of you folks so bloody fascinated with Avon?" I mean the B7 character, obviously. Cosmetics are discussed elsewhere.

Vilakins has a point, y'know. I've got my reasons, but more to the point, I was quite impressed by comments made by various people on the thread. I'd like to quote the thread directly, but I think that might be bad netiquette so, here's an Inigo-Montoya-ish summary:

The character is contradictory, complex and occasionally unpredictable. (BTW, I applaud the contributors who made a point of noting whether that was attributable to brilliant writing/direction or lousy same is unknown and unknowable.)

Characters with a trainwreck of a life are just more interesting to watch than (general) one-note characters. I agree with vilakins that all of the B7 characters could be as engaging, but Avon's messiness was splatted all over the screen and viewers, bless them, can be a lazy bunch. We're not all ficcers who can stay up late creating inferring nifty backstories and psychological motivations. ;)

Paul Darrow's performance just screams for attention and is too hard to ignore - and yes, you can take that as a dig, imho.

Finally, there was a point made in several places that was a bit of a clue-by-four at my end of the net. Avon tries to be a badass, you can tell he really, really wants to be, but he isn't. He's not a political rebel motivated by some lofty goal of liberty for all. He's a profit-motivated computer hacker who happened to fall into the company of a political rebel and found it convenient to remain with him and his crew.

Not so deep-down inside, I think Avon's black (leatherette) soul seethes with jealousy that Blake's the Federation's Most Wanted and possesses something resembling a moral compass to guide him through the spirtual murkiness of everday life. And, of course, chicks dig the poli-sci majors. Avon constantly chafed at being a second banana, we see that throughout his interactions with Blake. But Avon's not cut out to be a brutally pragmatic leader-of-men type. Pragmatic? Only when it comes to number one. Brutal? See previous. Leader of men? Not a chance...

And all of this stuff, I need to keep in mind.

Oops, I need to get back to work. More later.

Comments

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

I'm still somewhat puzzled that such a pragmatic and self-centred bastard suddenly took up Blake's cause in season 4 after a lot of aimless (if occasionally geeky) wandering around in season 3.

[fangrrl-squees.livejournal.com]

The bluntly cynical answer would be: "Because the writers realized that the Season 3 of wandering-about-rather-aimlessly was a wash, and they needed to get back to the show's roots of takign potshots at the Federation"

The kinder, more meta answer, I sorta gave already in your journal - more of Blake rubbed off on Avon than he cared to admit, and felt obligated to take u the mantle after Blake left/got chased off.

My cynical-meta answer: Because Avon figured that the end of the Federation was *inevitable* and he wanted to be first in line for a big slice of the pie once it got reapportioned by the new regieme. "Hey, remember who got you organized? Remember who told you about Pylene 50? I'm your buddy! Now, give me a nice fat sinecure of a job while I go rummaging around these banking mainframes for a while..." It salves his conscience about (temporarily) abandoning Blake's ideals *and* lines his pockets *and* gives him an air of legitmacy which he'll happily accept, if it's paid well enough, methinks.

That's just my opinion, of course. :)

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

I like the third answer best. :-)

Sorry, I did see your comment after I posted here. I suppose the accepted answer in fanon is that Avon took over Blake's role after Servalan told him on Terminal that Blake was dead, but it's still not something I can see Avon doing. Hmm. Unless he found out that Blake was alive after all earlier than he let on and wanted something to give him to somehow set himself free. But I like your answer better.

[britgeekgrrl.livejournal.com]

(hilarious icon, btw)

I think that my third answer is the most plausible within the boundaries of Avon's behavior for the first 2.5 - 3 seasons AND within what the group was up to overall. Avon and Vila are both cheerfully larcenous at heart (although I s'pose Avon would have some withering riposte to the notion that he has anything in common with Vila except maybe a well-honed survival instinct) and so I prefer to think in terms of "What is in it for Avon - in cold, hard cash?" and a lot of questions resolve themselves quite easily that way. :)