(no subject)
Sep. 26th, 2005 05:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
katallisonA recent discussion in ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
brooklinegirl's LJ, pursuant to her viewing of Homicide, has me thinking more about that story I've always wanted to write, the one where (as I said in a comment to that entry) Fraser and Frank Pembleton are sitting around late at night, talking about good and evil and the nature of justice. I don't think it'll ever get written, because I don't think I have the chops to write Pembleton, alas, but thinking about it moved me to make the following list of ways in which Fraser and Pembleton, for all their noteworthy differences, are in some respects two-sides-of-the-coin versions of the same character.
So --
1. They are both really, really, smart. Like, really smart. (And they know it.)
2. They both are exceptionally competent at their work, with peculiar areas of uber-brilliance (Pembleton in the box, doing interrogations; Fraser with all his freaky skill sets). And they have a very high level of confidence in their professional abilities, which verges at times on arrogance. ("Verges" might be an understatement...)
3. They both have a quality of alienness; both are not only from elsewhere (Pembleton from New York, Fraser from the Northwest Areas), but they act, dress, speak in ways that allude (subtly or overtly) to their "foreign" roots. I would also argue that Pembleton's status as a black man, while clearly not unique in the Baltimore PD in the same way that Fraser's Canadianness is in Chicago, still carries with it an overtone of outsiderhood; more than any of the other black detectives on Homicide, I think, he exhibits a sharp and flinty awareness of racism, racial politics, and the way that his race sets him apart from the mainstream of the police hierarchy. There's a crucial difference in that Frank's assertiveness about his identity makes him read to others (inevitably, perhaps, in modern America) as "uppity," while Fraser's equal though differently expressed level of assertiveness is usually cast in a comic light.
4. They are both extraordinarily well-defended individuals, expert at keeping people from getting too close to them (Pembleton with his prickly abrasiveness, Fraser with his politeness).
5. They both characteristically Do Not Play Well With Others, and don't form personal bonds or partnerships with most colleagues, who usually regard them with some mix of awe, suspicion, and befuddlement.
6. Despite this, they both end up forming a deep and intense partnership with a highly unlikely individual (or in Fraser's case, individuals), which ends up significantly affecting their lives.
7. They both have a religious background/upbringing (Pembleton's Jesuit education, Fraser's missionary grandparents) that could be seen as bringing them to a deeper and more nuanced consideration of, and a higher valuing of, questions of morality, right and wrong, ultimate purpose, justice, evil, than is typical of their fellow police officers.
8. I would argue that they both would test out on the Enneagram as Type Ones (fuller description, specifically with reference to Fraser, here, but as a shorthand: " Basic Desire: To be right; Characteristic Vice: Self-righteous anger; Characteristic Complaint: I am right most of the time, and it would be a better world if people listened to what I tell them.") They have high standards, moral rigor, they tend to see things in black and white, they can be ruthless in pursuit of their ideals and in their judgments of others.
9. They are both Masters of the Mindfuck -- Pembleton overtly, Fraser subtly. This is part of what makes them so effective at their work, the ability to quickly read what's going on in people's heads and emotions and then use that knowledge to manipulate them. (Usually for good ends, fortunately.) (Which leads me to add that in an alternate universe they would each be *stunningly* effective master criminals. God, there's *another* story that needs to be written...)
10. Despite their deep devotion to justice and the law, they both are ultimately inner-directed individuals, guided by an intrinsic moral compass, which can lead them to act against orders/procedure/convention, regardless of the disapprobation it brings down on them. They don't *need* anyone else's approval to let them know they're doing the Right Thing. They are both more than willing to go it alone. They both are more than willing to say "If the law supposes that, the law is an ass." They both could have as one of the mottoes on their escutcheon: I Dissent.
*sigh* God, I love these guys. God, I wish I could write that story.
brooklinegirl's LJ, pursuant to her viewing of Homicide, has me thinking more about that story I've always wanted to write, the one where (as I said in a comment to that entry) Fraser and Frank Pembleton are sitting around late at night, talking about good and evil and the nature of justice. I don't think it'll ever get written, because I don't think I have the chops to write Pembleton, alas, but thinking about it moved me to make the following list of ways in which Fraser and Pembleton, for all their noteworthy differences, are in some respects two-sides-of-the-coin versions of the same character.So --
1. They are both really, really, smart. Like, really smart. (And they know it.)
2. They both are exceptionally competent at their work, with peculiar areas of uber-brilliance (Pembleton in the box, doing interrogations; Fraser with all his freaky skill sets). And they have a very high level of confidence in their professional abilities, which verges at times on arrogance. ("Verges" might be an understatement...)
3. They both have a quality of alienness; both are not only from elsewhere (Pembleton from New York, Fraser from the Northwest Areas), but they act, dress, speak in ways that allude (subtly or overtly) to their "foreign" roots. I would also argue that Pembleton's status as a black man, while clearly not unique in the Baltimore PD in the same way that Fraser's Canadianness is in Chicago, still carries with it an overtone of outsiderhood; more than any of the other black detectives on Homicide, I think, he exhibits a sharp and flinty awareness of racism, racial politics, and the way that his race sets him apart from the mainstream of the police hierarchy. There's a crucial difference in that Frank's assertiveness about his identity makes him read to others (inevitably, perhaps, in modern America) as "uppity," while Fraser's equal though differently expressed level of assertiveness is usually cast in a comic light.
4. They are both extraordinarily well-defended individuals, expert at keeping people from getting too close to them (Pembleton with his prickly abrasiveness, Fraser with his politeness).
5. They both characteristically Do Not Play Well With Others, and don't form personal bonds or partnerships with most colleagues, who usually regard them with some mix of awe, suspicion, and befuddlement.
6. Despite this, they both end up forming a deep and intense partnership with a highly unlikely individual (or in Fraser's case, individuals), which ends up significantly affecting their lives.
7. They both have a religious background/upbringing (Pembleton's Jesuit education, Fraser's missionary grandparents) that could be seen as bringing them to a deeper and more nuanced consideration of, and a higher valuing of, questions of morality, right and wrong, ultimate purpose, justice, evil, than is typical of their fellow police officers.
8. I would argue that they both would test out on the Enneagram as Type Ones (fuller description, specifically with reference to Fraser, here, but as a shorthand: " Basic Desire: To be right; Characteristic Vice: Self-righteous anger; Characteristic Complaint: I am right most of the time, and it would be a better world if people listened to what I tell them.") They have high standards, moral rigor, they tend to see things in black and white, they can be ruthless in pursuit of their ideals and in their judgments of others.
9. They are both Masters of the Mindfuck -- Pembleton overtly, Fraser subtly. This is part of what makes them so effective at their work, the ability to quickly read what's going on in people's heads and emotions and then use that knowledge to manipulate them. (Usually for good ends, fortunately.) (Which leads me to add that in an alternate universe they would each be *stunningly* effective master criminals. God, there's *another* story that needs to be written...)
10. Despite their deep devotion to justice and the law, they both are ultimately inner-directed individuals, guided by an intrinsic moral compass, which can lead them to act against orders/procedure/convention, regardless of the disapprobation it brings down on them. They don't *need* anyone else's approval to let them know they're doing the Right Thing. They are both more than willing to go it alone. They both are more than willing to say "If the law supposes that, the law is an ass." They both could have as one of the mottoes on their escutcheon: I Dissent.
*sigh* God, I love these guys. God, I wish I could write that story.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-26 11:01 pm (UTC)*with fascination*
If there's anything I could do to persuade you otherwise... because I think you could, and I wish you would.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-26 11:22 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-26 11:27 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-26 11:46 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-26 11:53 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-27 01:05 am (UTC)Of course, I also want someone to write me Pembleton and House and Toby, stuck in the bar at BWI...
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-27 03:10 am (UTC)::whimpers pathetically, too stunned to beg::
~
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-27 01:09 am (UTC)Fanning myself vigorously now.
I can more easily envision them meeting somewhere that's emphatically the turf of neither: it's hard for me to place Fraser in Baltimore, or Pembleton in Vecchio's Chicago. I can see them on a Hawaiian beach, both there unwillingly, both not quite ready to make the best of it, and their eyes meeting. Pembletown would probably speak first.
Alas, I don't think I have the Frank chops either.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-27 02:04 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-27 05:14 am (UTC)just kibitzing here
Date: 2005-09-27 07:11 am (UTC)With scientific names of the various pests involved and everything.
(EVen funnier if this happens when he's drunk off his ass for some reason.)
And yes, don't we *all* know folks who can perfectly well articulate like that, just before they hit the floor?
Can't they all be stuck in that bar as a result of a grounded plane flights all heading out to elsewhere? I hate to stick them all in a bar in an airport hub (not Denver, please!) but I understand there's some very bigtime law enforcement conferences held in HI all the time. You could see House being there as a result of the terrorism/rare disease CDC angle.
(Come to think, that might drag in some *other* interesting forensics charactes too, now that I think about it.)
And (not knowing the character as well as some, but what I've seen is lovely) wouldn't Pembleton have some sharp things to say about being *forced* to take a working vac in a place like HI?? Thinking of how *alien* he'd seem in a place like that?
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-27 02:48 pm (UTC)"Sucking cock and robbing banks. Fraser just hadn't been the same since prison."
*g* It sounds fascinating.
(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-27 04:51 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2005-09-27 10:19 pm (UTC)(no subject)