You're right - I slipped (r) -- La Femme Nikita Fan Fiction Message Board

[ Show ]

Support VoyForums

[ Shrink ]

VoyForums Announcement: Programming and providing support for this service has been a labor of love since 1997. We are one of the few services online who values our users' privacy, and have never sold your information. We have even fought hard to defend your privacy in legal cases; however, we've done it with almost no financial support -- paying out of pocket to continue providing the service. Due to the issues imposed on us by advertisers, we also stopped hosting most ads on the forums many years ago. We hope you appreciate our efforts.

Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your contribution is not tax-deductible.) PayPal Acct: Feedback:

Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):

[ Login ] [ Contact Forum Admin ] [ Main index ] [ Post a new message ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, [10] ]

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Date Posted: Tuesday, January 18, 11:53:05am
Author: Nell
Subject: You're right - I slipped (r)
In reply to: JayBee 's message, "Re: So - why not?" on Monday, January 17, 05:25:35pm

in that post and I was thinking about Paul and Section specifically as opposed to a more abstract female subordinate/male supervisor situation. In the posts before that I think I managed to stay in the more abstract space....

** curse voy and it's italics issues **I think if I were going to make an assumption it would be that she *was* interested in moving up/out independently from Paul....but I'm honestly not sure if that is based on what canon presented us with, or my own view of what a talented and intelligent woman *ought* to want to do.

....Do you think she had personal ambitions for herself inside Section/Center et al separate from her partnership with Paul? (not in opposition to, just her own and not necessarily linked with his....)? ****

With the more specfic case of Paul and Section, I did write:

****As for what a woman 'ought' to do? Well - in my world, a woman in Madeline's position would very definitely be looking to elbow Paul aside or out or dead and take all the glory she deserved directly onto her own shoulders....I'm not sure if she 'ought' to or not, but in the dog eat dog world of Section - it suddenly seems strange to me that Madeline didn't appear to be playing that game. ******

In the LFN case in particular, I guess my basic reason for thinking that 'a woman' - or in this case Madeline - would be at least considering the possibility of displacing her male superior - in this case Paul - is because A) that is what he would do himself in the subordinate position and to some degree would, I think, offer an ambitious subordinate (ie one more like himself) more respect than one who didn't want his job (I think that is why it was important to him to believe Michael wanted his job....). And B) that is a tactical mistake to be too closely linked to a particular leader because leaders seemed to change abruptly when they did change. I did say I wasn't sure if she 'ought' to do so, only that in the environment of Section it seems a sensible thing to be considering.

So, 'ought' Nikita consider elbowing Michael aside? I don't know.

Would she at least consider it? Absolutely, yes - well I think so anway. Michael (as we discussed before) didn't have much 'vision' for the world or for Section, and much as she cared about him I think this would drive her nuts, and yes, I think she would come to believe that she would be better in his job and that he ought to be displaced into some other position, or possibly out altogether (which you could argue is exactly what she *did* in S4 - push out her only serious oppositon to eventually succeed Paul) so as to make room for her to use Section to push for her more ambitious and specific agenda.

I've thought about these questions and have come up with my own answers, which I believe are consistent with canon and the characterization that we saw, but as I won't be able to "prove" them to you by virtue of a citation to an episode, I don't think you'll find them useful.

I'm not looking for proof - only wondering what you think about what you saw with regard to Madeline.

I know that my vision of the core four (I have no vision of Birkoff and Walter, which is too bad I know) is fairly idiosyncratic, and while it overlaps in large ways (obviously) with general fandom views, in the nitty gritty can be quite - well - unique to me. I didn't realize this for a very long time - due to the generallly large overlaps in character understanding - but eventually it penetrated my thick DON head. *g*

My own vision of Madeline is generally quite sympathetic and, if pressed, I could give you my somewhat garbbled view of how she operated and why. But I know you have thought much more closely and carefully about her than I have, so I just wondered what you'd come up with. (I know, I know - it's all in your fic....*g*).

So, you know, Madeline did strike me as a committed person - but I didn't think canon made it very clear what exactly she was committed to and so I wondered what you filled in that spot with. Also - I tend to belive that once you've committed to a cause - it is your personal agenda, so when I said that Madeline didn't seem to have a personal agenda, I meant that I didn't see in canon text *any* specific agenda, either hopelessly selfish (to monopolize all chocolate in the world) or romantically selfless (preserve civilization as we know it).

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Replies:

Hmmm (r) -- JayBee, Tuesday, January 18, 07:25:58pm
- I think this is a good observation -- sk, Wednesday, January 19, 10:13:02am
  - Yes, exactly (r) -- JayBee, Wednesday, January 19, 09:36:06pm