And allowing room for people to see Jack as a guy who just puts it about a bit, who comes on to one colleague, is rebuffed and moves on to the next, really FUCKS THAT UP for me.
My interpretation of KKBB hinges on two things. I read the line, "I came back for you," as Jack saying to Ianto that he came back for him, which happened before the awkward scene of awkward with Gwen; and I believe that while Jack ducks questions and gives ambiguous answers and has more secrets than MI-6, he doesn't say things that aren't true, which means that when he told Ianto that he had been thinking about asking him out on a date while he was gone, it meant that he had actually spent at least part of the Year That Never Was thinking about Ianto, which also happened before the awkward scene of awkward with Gwen.
I realise that not everyone saw that episode the way I did, which is kind of the point you're making about the writing leaving room for the kind of interpretation that you don't like, but that's the fantastic thing about television and characters whose heads we don't see inside. If there wasn't room for us to make our own interpretations and for other people to make interpretations that we see as really, really whacked out, we wouldn't need fandom.
Having said all of that, I also think that a lot of the seeing Ianto as Jack's sex toy comes from early Season 1 characterisation (and specifically Everything Changes) and from the Lisa thing. Once upon a time, Ianto WAS probably Jack's sex toy and that's the way he WANTED it to be, and to view their relationship as differently now, you have to be able to understand that relationships grow and develop and change, and theirs has, but not everyone gets that.
That, plus there will always be people who believe in Jack and Gwen's one twoo wuv and who will pull interpretations out of the clear blue sky if it means they can explain the pesky canon relationship out of the way in order to fulfill their OTP.
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Date: 2008-05-13 04:44 pm (UTC)My interpretation of KKBB hinges on two things. I read the line, "I came back for you," as Jack saying to Ianto that he came back for him, which happened before the awkward scene of awkward with Gwen; and I believe that while Jack ducks questions and gives ambiguous answers and has more secrets than MI-6, he doesn't say things that aren't true, which means that when he told Ianto that he had been thinking about asking him out on a date while he was gone, it meant that he had actually spent at least part of the Year That Never Was thinking about Ianto, which also happened before the awkward scene of awkward with Gwen.
I realise that not everyone saw that episode the way I did, which is kind of the point you're making about the writing leaving room for the kind of interpretation that you don't like, but that's the fantastic thing about television and characters whose heads we don't see inside. If there wasn't room for us to make our own interpretations and for other people to make interpretations that we see as really, really whacked out, we wouldn't need fandom.
Having said all of that, I also think that a lot of the seeing Ianto as Jack's sex toy comes from early Season 1 characterisation (and specifically Everything Changes) and from the Lisa thing. Once upon a time, Ianto WAS probably Jack's sex toy and that's the way he WANTED it to be, and to view their relationship as differently now, you have to be able to understand that relationships grow and develop and change, and theirs has, but not everyone gets that.
That, plus there will always be people who believe in Jack and Gwen's one twoo wuv and who will pull interpretations out of the clear blue sky if it means they can explain the pesky canon relationship out of the way in order to fulfill their OTP.