#one man sessions | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

carpe-mamilia · 7 months

Text

Ghosts’ Larry Rickard Explains Why They Chose the Captain’s First Name

Photo: Monumental,Guido Mandozzi

It couldn’t be a joke. That was one rule laid down by the Ghosts creators when it came to choosing a first name for Willbond’s character. Until series five, the WWII ghost had been known only as The Captain – a mystery seized upon by fans of the show.

“It was the question we got asked more than anything. His name,” actor and writer Larry Rickard tells Den of Geek. “Once we got to series three, you could see that we were deliberately cutting away and deliberately avoiding it. We were fuelling the fire because we knew at some point we’d tell them.”

In “Carpe Diem”, the episode written by Rickard and Ben Willbond that finally reveals The Captain’s death story, they did tell us. After years of guessing, clue-spotting and debate, Ghosts revealed that The Captain’s first name is James. At the same time, we also learned that James’ colleague Lieutenant Havers’ first name was Anthony.

The ordinariness of those two names, says Rickard, is the point.

“The only thing we were really clear about is that we didn’t want one of those names that only exists in tellyland. It shouldn’t be ‘Cormoran’ or ‘Endeavour’. They should just be some men’s names and they’re important to them. The point was that they were everyday.”

Choosing first names for The Captain and Havers was a long process not unlike naming a baby, Rickard agrees. “It almost comes down to looking at the faces of the characters and saying, what’s right?”

“We talked for ages. For a long time I kept thinking ‘Duncan and James’, and then I was like ah no! That would have turned it into a gag and been awful!” Inescapably in the minds of a certain generation, Duncan James is a member of noughties boyband Blue. “Maybe with Anthony I was thinking of Anthony Costa!” Rickard says in mock horror, referencing another member of the band.

Lieutenant Havers wasn’t just The Captain’s second in command while stationed at Button House; he was also the man James loved. Because homosexuality was criminalised in England during James’ lifetime, he was forced to hide his feelings for Anthony from society, and to some extent even from himself.

In “Carpe Diem”, the ghosts (mistakenly) prepare for the last day of their afterlives, prompting The Captain to finally tell his story. Though not explicit about his sexual identity, the others understand and accept what he tells them – and led by Lady Button, all agree that he’s a brave man.

Getting the balance right of what The Captain does and doesn’t say was key to the episode. “It wasn’t just a personal choice of his to go ‘I’m going to remain in the closet’,” explains Rickard. “There wasn’t an option there to explore the things that either of them felt. That couldn’t be done back then – there are so many stories which have come out since the War about the dangers of doing that.

“We wanted to tell his personal story but also try to ensure that there was a level at which you understood why they couldn’t be open, that even in this moment where he’s finally telling the other ghosts his story, he never comes out and says it overtly because that would be too much for him as a character from that time.

“He says enough for them to know, and enough for him to feel unburdened but it’s in the fact that they’re using their first names which militarily they would never have done, and in the literal passing of the baton”.

The baton is a bonus reveal when fans learned that The Captain’s military stick wasn’t a memento of his career, but of Havers. As James suffers a fatal heart attack during a VE day celebration at Button House, Anthony rushes to his side and the stick passes from one to the other as they share a moment of tragic understanding.

“From really early on, we had the idea that anything you’re holding [when you die] stays with you. So it wasn’t just your clothes you were wearing, we had the stuff with Thomas’ letter reappearing in his pocket and so on. And the assumption being that it was something The Captain couldn’t put down, it felt so nice to be able to say it was something he didn’t want to put down.”

Rickard lists “Carpe Diem”, co-written with Ben Willbond, among his series five highlights. He’s pleased with the end result, praises Willbond’s performance, and loved being on set to see Button House dressed for the 1940s. He’s particularly pleased that a checklist of moments they wanted to land with the audience all managed to be included. “Normally something’s fallen by the wayside just because of the way TV’s made, it’s always imperfect or it’s slightly rushed, but it feels like it’s all there.”

Rickard and Willbond also knew by this point in the show’s lifetime, that they could trust Ghosts fans to pick up on small details. “Nothing is missed,” he says. “Early on, you’re always thinking, is that going to get across? But once we got to series five, there are little tiny things within corners of shots and you know that’s going to be spotted. Particularly in that very short exchange between Havers and the Captain. We worried less about the minutiae of it because you go, that’s going to be rewound and rewatched, nothing will be missed.”

The team were also grateful they’d resisted the temptation to tell The Captain’s story sooner. “We’d talked about it every series since series two, whether or not now was the time, but because he’s such a hard and starchy character in a lot of ways you needed the time to understand his softer side I think before you had that final honest beat from him.”

“What a ridiculously normal name to have so much weight put on it for five years,” laughs Rickard fondly. “Good old James.”

From Den of Geek

#bbc ghosts #bless you larry for doing all these den of geek interviews #I wonder if they just did one marathon session with him #inside ghosts was kind of disappointing this week #I guess Ben just wants to let the episode speak for itself and you're like yes but I would like to hear you talk about every detail #trust me we will be interested #long post #I really thought they loved the joke of nearly saying the Captain’s name so much that they'd never reveal it #so it's so lovely that they were like no this is not a joke name; he's a real man with an ordinary name #and we are going to tell you that in the most devastatingly romantic way #I am eating my words and they are delicious with that spread on top #also 'that's going to be rewound and rewatched' = 'I know you people are loopy so here is content specifically for you'#bbc ghosts spoilers

915 notes · View notes

quixtrix · 3 months

Text

let's talk BL manga lore; on grooming, identity, and racism

spoilers for the official captain laserhawk bl manga ofc, plus brief discussion of grooming I've refrained from speaking about it because of spoilers, but it's been well over a month and I believe that it's time to openly discuss it. if you would still like to read the manga before reading this discussion, here's the link to buy a physical copy and you can search up 'Captain Laserhawk: Crushing Love' in your digital book store for it. okay time to talk about two, basically three subjects; racism, identity, and grooming. i'm starting with the grooming first, because that's the main focus of this manga. i would have to preface this by saying i've already discussed this topic in an earlier post (albeit it is a prediction, but it is a spot on prediction.) i'll briefly elaborate on it right now with what we know.

dolph's very first day with alex was carefully calculated to where dolph would be exposed to the world, but heavily rely on alex. he is shown around to alex's friends and is able to buy his own clothes, but it is under the heavy scrutiny of alex. alex ultimately decides what dolph wears, alex decides how the day goes, alex leads dolph. even when they have a beach day, take note of how alex holds dolph, dragging him around.

even the romance and the events leading up to when alex takes dolph's virginity are calculated. note how alex grasps dolph's hand, grabbing on tight enough to almost press down on his knuckles, loosening his hand, making dolph relinquish control. the context for the fight page is that after their sweet lil beach day, alex takes dolph down an alley where alex knows that he'll come across people who aren't the fondest of him. this event was calculated, alex knew it was going to happen, and he used it to test out his new lil boytoy.

also, alex taking dolph out to fight isn't just so he can get in the pants of a barely 18 year old. while holloway notes during this flashback that adrenaline is the greatest aphrodisiac, this is a test to see how good the new weapon he picked up is. how the new boy works, to see how eden's boy robot can benefit his group, not just him. its literally in the morning panels we get where alex talks with that woman, anna. they're talking about how loaded he is with tech, and while alex does consider that, he still actively thirsts over dolph.

also im jus saying if i personally was talking with one of my greatest confidants and they refer to someone i'm thirsting over as KID, i would personally be icked out. i would have a conscious and not do some weird shit, like literally refer to dolph in passing as kid in the next page. dolph aint even the first one who alex has done this shit to, as evident by this line by one of his friends, grace.

alex is a groomer and groomed dolph, case closed.

anyways! time to get on with what i really wanted to talk about, how racism and loss of idenity ties into dolph's character!

in this manga, during pillow talk between dolph and alex, we get dolph's backstory. dolph literally has only known this man for a day and he's giving him lore because alex treats him more normal than eden did. god. ANYWAYS ENOUGH DWELLING ON DOLPH BEING A VICTIM IN ALL WAYS INCLUDING BEING ONE OF THE OXFORD STUDY, we get to know about his brief life before eden took him in.

now let me turn for a moment to the show, and how we were told about dolph's backstory. this is VASTLY different than what we got in the show, with it being implied that dolph's parents were a white prostitute and a darkskinned immigrant man. this adds onto the idea that this supposedly impoverished, crack addicted boy came into this world not as an act of love, but as a mistake. not just a mistake though, his parents are supposedly the epitome of immoral, a prostitute and a criminal. not to mention that this also ties into the idea of the uncultured brown man and pure white woman, basically a racist idea that the scary immigrants who aren't like us good white christian americans (and honestly jus any homogenous group in general, though in america its ofc more applicable to white people), are corrupting our mother marys, our women. eden takes on this perspective in order to subconsciously frame in the minds of post american viewers the idea of this man as an other that they are helping and didn't at all snatch up from his mother for child experimentation. the concept of other is something that finds it's origins in fascism, and in order to mask the presence of said fascism, someone who is seen as apart of the other is given a seat at the table with the collective us, (as in the majority, or the ones that are supposedly superior), and will ultimately serve as an example of why the other are labelled as such. i go into this more with my rayman analysis. I brought up the specific portrayal of dolph's backstory from eden's documentary to showcase how eden has manipulated the view people have of this man. eden has not only manipulated the view of the in universe audience, but eden has manipulated our view.

in the propaganda documentary, we are shown photos of this man being a captain, someone of relatively high rank in the military. you can't even normally earn that through having an education, you'd have to have years of experience. he's portrayed as older than he is.

another thing, dolph fans, let's be honest with ourselves; before the manga, it was not uncommon to headcanon that man as a FREAK. with both the supposed images of dolph at a nightclub and the flashback of alex and dolph meeting outside a club, it wasn't too hard to think that the hottest man alive in that show who was fully born human was a freak. a sexual deviant. someone that a christian mother would be horrified enough by that she faints. the manga however, shows us that dolph really isn't any of that. hell, he didn't even get to go to a club before he met alex. in reality, he's around 18 years and his only sexual experience is his groomer.

say that again with me, he's around 18. he's just around 18, he's a young adult, and the environment he's grown up in has stunted him by treating him as a subject, a thing, cutting him off from anything that would humanise this child by not allowing him to see his mother. hell, even his childhood best friend serves eden by being the one in his ear, having him at her beck and call all in the name of eden.

we get none of dolph's true backstory in the show for any number of reasons. maybe it's on purpose, maybe it's a result of having to possibly cut down episodes, who knows? what matters though is that this adds a layer to the core problem defining dolph's life; the perspective others have on him warping who he is.

back to the pages with dolph's memories of his mother, we see dolph as he was when he was just a boy. he's his mama's boy, her son, a child. even when eden takes him in, he stubbornly clings to that bit of him that's pure, untainted by the idea of him being an experiment, a tool. this bit of him, this hint towards who he is supposed to be as a person, is something he clings to desperately. it leads him to follow eden's orders again because they promise that they've found his mother.

and yknow what happened with who dolph was told was supposedly his mother?

she was just a random ass indian woman.

wasn't even the right woman. they just used his identity issues because he's indian, and she was indian and in a cult that eden needed to take care of.

this, while admittedly is kind of funny, (like the confusion is funny in the moment look at ts) is actually fucked up crazy racism. they literally said that this random ass woman who happened to be indian was his mother like HELL!?!??!?!?

this insane fr. lucy didn't even double check LIKE GIRL THAT'S SUPPOSED TO BE YOUR FRIEND'S MOTHER WHO HE HASNT SEEN SINCE HE WAS LIKE 6 AND YOU DIDNT EVEN DOUBLE CHECK IF SHE'S THE RIGHT PERSON?!?!?!?

moving on from that, this actually brings up a deeper layer of dolph's identity issues; the lack of cultural identity.

i want to preface this by saying that i am not entirely sure if this is the right term for this identity issue nor am i claiming to be an expert on the type of identity crisis that i am about to discuss. that being said, this specific disconnect of cultural identity that dolph has is actually reminiscent of those adopted from other countries, or transnational adoptees. there seems to be a need within these adoptees to find out more about their own heritage or their own mothers and families that they now struggle to find. while dolph does not actively go out to reconnect with his heritage, he does exhibit desires to find his birth mother. this type of identity issue seems to ask the question of 'what could I have been if...?,' and it tends to mess with the idea of the self. adoptees that struggle with this question hold a desire to go back, to almost reclaim what would have been. yes, dolph is not adopted into a family, but he is still a child under the care of eden, which became like his family, which is why i believe that this kind of identity issue could reasonably be applied to dolph. it explains why he does what he does in the manga, and how it's ultimately wrapped up by him losing this desire and moving forward. albeit he moves forward by alex instead becoming his main purpose, but this serves as the first chain of the past that he leaves behind. with this, he severs a tie that would have made him continue to be stuck under eden's control, and possibly find himself. he answers the question of what could have been with 'it doesn't matter anymore.'

but actually, he doesn't answer that question. he leaves it be.

i am reading way too into this tho lol. i would say that he doesn't explicitly say it, and that we do see a lack of dolph's past being used against him in that way because dolph has freed himself from that part, but in reality, it's because eden can't pull the same trick twice. im aware that the manga focuses HARD on dolph's grooming, but i feel like they really could have properly wrapped up dolph's identity arc with his mother if it was acknowledged at the end, but i fear we are left unsatisfied. that's one of my gripes with the manga. it gives us things that tie up loose ends, but some of these ties have entirely missed the holes they were supposed to secure. but what is done is what's done, and here we are.

tl;dr, dolph was groomed by alex. dolph's identity has also been warped by eden heavily, by how they dehumanised him as a child to be a weapon internally, to how he's shown to the public to be a case that they've saved, and yet he still becomes something that is "disgraceful." textbook example of this poor boy that we have saved that is actually jus like all the others that we know. dolph also suffers under similar identity issues as adopted children do, and this specific issue of his is let go in order to allow him to begin moving on and finding himself.

as always, im open to discussion and critique! my askbox is open as well if you want me to yap abt smth else in the show :P