Stop. Just — stop.

[swan_tower]

(This post theoretically contains spoilers for Castle — but only if you consider it a spoiler when I talk about something done by practically every TV show ever.)

So my husband and I have been watching Castle lately. We really like the Castle/Beckett relationship; it doesn’t make the mistake committed by so many other buddy stories that pair up a free spirit with a by-the-book type, of making the by-the-book type a humorless automaton. Beckett gives as good as she gets, in her own way. And the show does a semi-decent job of explaining why it takes them years to get together: Castle’s had a string of failed marriages; Beckett has some major hangups. But eventually they do actually sort themselves out and start a relationship —

— whereupon, of course, the show has to start playing the OH MY GOD THEY’RE GOING TO BREAK UP card.

Foz Meadows had a post recently about bad TV romance wherein she rants quite eloquently about the investment of TV writers in the “will they or won’t they” dynamic. UST gets strung out for years, with the characters sitting on the fence long after the point at which they would have either hooked up or moved on — and then when they finally hook up, the implied verb of “will they or won’t they” is “split” instead of “get together.” Because the vast majority of TV writers (or possibly just the vast majority of the execs they answer to) have no freaking clue what to do with a romantic pairing that isn’t either impending or in peril.

And as Foz points out, the obnoxious thing is: they know exactly how to write that kind of thing, because they do it all the time — with male friendships. On Castle, Ryan and Esposito don’t always agree; sometimes they’re competing with one another or at odds over some issue. But in eight seasons, the show has never once relied on baiting us with the question of whether they’ll settle down as working partners, or whether they’ll split up and start working with other people. The writers don’t need those tricks to make the characters interesting to watch. Their banter is enough, and the pleasure of watching them do things together.

Ah, you say, but they aren’t the protagonists.

To which I say: so what? Why do the central figures of every male/female buddy show ever* have to not only get romantically involved with one another, but spend almost their entire existence in romantic limbo? Why can’t we have more Mr. and Mrs. Smith-style teamups? More couples with the exact same dynamic given to male/male buddy pairs, except with bonus smooching? As Foz points out, insisting on the uncertainty model for the romances means that all kinds of other tasty narrative material — “shared interests, complex histories, mutual respect, in-jokes, magnetic antagonism, slowly kindled alliances and a dozen other things” — is now off-limits.

It wasn’t entirely off-limits in Castle because the show let those things build between Castle and Beckett, during the period of time where they were sorting out their nonsense. But of course now we need Tension — we need Doubt in the Relationship — so all of a sudden they’re barely talking to one another. Bye-bye, in-jokes. Farewell, alliance. All those shared interests and complex histories? Irrelevant now. Because BY GOD we need the audience to be asking themselves “will they or won’t they?”

Even though the audience knows the goddamned answer.

Stop. Just stop. We know what’s going to happen with Castle and Beckett, and in the meantime, everything I like about their relationship has been squandered for the sake of that fake uncertainty. Quit it. Let the two of them behave like functional adults, and trust that the rest of the story is interesting even if that question has been answered.

.

*Exception that proves the rule: Will and Grace, because Will was gay. Though for all I know, the show spent its time pretending they weren’t going to wind up being best friends/oh my god maybe they’ll stop being friends.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

Comments

[bookblather]

aaaaauuuuuuGHHHHHHHHHHHHH would you mind saying when do they start doing the breakup thing? I want to stop watching before that so I can still enjoy the show.

[swan_tower]

It's basically a running thing in Season 8. The initial eps present a Giant Conspiracy, and then Beckett decides that she has to investigate it but anybody she cares about will be in danger so she has to semi-break up with Castle -- basically she intends to come back to him as soon as the investigation is done, but in the meanwhile she's pretending to have doubts about their marriage, and of course she doesn't bloody TALK to him about any of this so he's trying to get her back, etc etc etc. We're about halfway through the season now and Castle has at least figured out what she's doing, so now they're at least both in on the "our marriage is on the rocks" charade -- but seriously, that entire thing is annoying and really just detracts from the good qualities of all the early eps.

[gelsey.livejournal.com]

I do love this show but you're right. It always annoys me that they can't just be a couple. (I always loved Zoe and Wash on Firefly.) Why not show a strong relationship? Sure there will be ups and downs but show them handling it.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Because that just Not How It's Done.

(Unfortunately.)

[eve-prime.livejournal.com]

Castle is fun enough, but so ridiculously formulaic. We meet a person or two with a connection to the victim, then they bring in the obvious suspect, then that doesn't pan out and they do a bunch of investigating, only to end up with either Person or more often Two as the culprit. So I don't expect much from them in terms of deviating from the master formula. At least, as you note, Beckett is a reasonably well developed character. (But how often did the previous precinct captains go to a crime scene?)

I'm afraid that if they hadn't gone back to Will They/Won't They, they'd have proceeded to Baby Makes Three, which has its own tiresome tropes...

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Eh, formulaic isn't inherently bad: the point is not to be surprised by the shape of the story, but to enjoy the details on the way there. The status of the Castle/Beckett relationship, though, in no way has to affect the mystery-solving formula, and in fact separating the two of them like this just winds up detracting from the enjoyable details (because we've mostly lost the interactions between those two on the way to the conclusion).

On the other hand, yes, equally if not more annoying tropes associated with Baby Makes Three. Sigh.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Agreed this can be a tiresome trope, though God knows it's a venerable one, with a lineage running from Beatrice and Benedick, through Tracy and Hepburn, Moonlighting and beyond...

Looking for counter-examples... Maybe The X Files? Or something like Bones - not that I've seen enough of the latter to judge? But then we get into the territory of "this person is too wrapped up in her (usually her) work to have a relationship", so that relationships still become a defining characteristic, if only by their absence.

Or you can go back to Steed and Mrs Peel in The Avengers, or classic Who (UST started creeping in only with David Tennant). But then you've often got a hierarchical relationship keeping them at arm's length. The man is definitely senior, in years and authority, which has its own problems.

[batwrangler.livejournal.com]

Hart to Hart came from the Nick and Nora Charles school of solidly married detective couples.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

X-Files just strung the "will they or won't they" stage out to absurd lengths, half the time pretending that no, nope, there's nothing there, no UST here, no sirree.

I don't mind they "will they or won't they" dynamic in a one-off thing like a movie or a play, because it's just the story of how two (or more) people got together. It's only when you do it in a long series that I get annoyed, because it gets stretched out for so long.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I hate this so much.

I do think that it's the most common example of not trusting that if they use up an initial plot, they will be able to come up with more plot. And sometimes they're right, but it's because they've leaned on the one plot so long that they've created a self-fulfilling prophecy. The Mentalist had a double-whammy that way: they had the will-they-won't-they flirtation of Patrick and Theresa's relationship, and they had the plot of catching the big serial killer, Red John. They should have wrapped those up within the first season, season and a half, and come up with new plot. Instead they dragged it on and then also tried to not make it the series finale, so it had double the anticlimax.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

This is akin to the Big Mystery approach taken by the heirs of the X-Files (Exhibit A: J.J. Abrams). One of the things I liked about Supernatural* was that Kripke had the confidence to answer his questions and use them to build new ones, rather than stringing them out to literal Kingdom Come.

*All five seasons of it.

[chickwriter.livejournal.com]

Although not cop show, one of the things I adore about Madame Secretary is that the marriage between Elizabeth and Henry is solid and wonderful. They argue, there is friction, but underneath, there is a bedrock of a wonderful relationship.

So yeah, it totally can be done.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Good to know!

[klwilliams.livejournal.com]

Will and Grace added in a marriage for Grace, which led to the "Will they (Will & Grace, plus Grace & husband) break up?" storyline you're complaining about.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

I wish I could say I was surprised. >_<