Cesur ve Güzel: The other side of the coin

After reading this sweet, amazingly relaxing and very thoughtful review of Cesur ve Güzel, I decided to write this post adding what I thought might further enrich the discussed aspects from my point of view.

My post is solely inspired by the not so great memories that were awaken by the nicely put critisim offered in that review that wasn't nicely presented before. So please excuse me for focusing majorly on the cirtical stuff when the addressed review was a pleasure to read.

Shows' ratings and human bias

First of all, let me begin by recalling this basic psychological rule that I recently got to learn about: The human mind tends to search for cues to justify and understand a certain outcome based on what's stored in its data from past experience. What does this mean is that we often give meanings to certain stuff just because that's the main meaning we learned to give to a similar thing before. That would be sometimes the search of flaws in the case of what might be perceived as a negative outcome, and the search of bright sides when that outcome is perceived to be positive. Often, from my own experience and not necessarily always as in the linked review, with a bit of exaggeration.

This tendency, I suppose, could in fact be very much connected to self-blame before anything else: the idea that when I am getting great results then I am most likely doing great or doing bad when I am getting not so good results. The reality is: it is not all about you, and you sometimes cannot tell whither an outcome is solely good or bad or mixed, which it is definitely is, and so it is, naturally, not all about the thing you attribute the success or failure to, and also perceived failures in one aspect are not necessarily absolute failures and perceived successes in one aspect might not be the absolutes too. You could be just different, and that certainly doesn't mean you are flawed !

No absolute shortcomings; Synchronicity

Therefore, it hit me the use of the words 'shortcomings', or 'flawed' in the way was mentioned in the review to describe this love story that I consider more 'different' and maybe 'heavy for a romance' or 'challenging' than being 'flawed,' just because it is not what we are used to for a romance., and also to justify the less than expected ratings it earned.

Therefore, I wouldn't use these words in my attempt to understand the drop in a show ratings, unless high rating is all that I care about. And even then, different factors could come into play that goes beyond the show's intrinsic strength/weaknesses. These factors I will choose to put all under the title of 'lack of synchronicity' between the show material and the targeted audience under certain demographic groups.

By lack of synchronicity I mean that what the viewer's life experince and what they, at the time, feel, think and beleive is different than what the show presents. You could have a show following the same amazing structure that drew the audience in yet its ratings would fluctuate for no clear reason from week to week. The sad thing for me here, is that most commentors commenting on the change would jump to bring all kind of criticism and bring up points that they wouldn't probably pay attention to had the ratings were the best.

That's why I will focus on this lack of synchronicity and discuss the other side of it here.

Side characters' purpose in the story: When the universe heals itself

Now, let me give you an example of synchronicity when it comes to our show. Let's say you are a viewer that has a prior idea on how the universe might metaphorically heal itself, and you so much into it. In that case, all the plotlines in the story of CvG would make a better sense to you, in fact they would seem much interesting that you wouldn't want to miss the majority of the scenes that a person who doesn't have this prior idea/interest or realisation might not be interested in. That's because you would have a higher synchronicity with the show material than the person who didn't hear of that idea or realised its presentationin the show. You may still be unsatisfied with some details because nothing is perfect, but you will tackle that from a different mindset.

Styling, characters' inner world and emotional stability

The same applies to the styling of the characters. If you followed closely, like me, the styling of different shows you would realise how important the styling is in representing the inner world of a character. Just yesterday I was watching a show on Netflix where in the female lead almost never wore matching peices, probably to reflect the conflict or clash of cultures she was going through. A side character, considered to be from the minorities, that barely appeared in a couple of scenes, on the other side, was amazingly dressed, probably to serve the political cause she was representing. So back to the case of cvg, the styling of suhan was so much in sync with her character, emotional status, inner harmony/conflict and her journey throughout the story from a collected woman with some masculine qualities to conflicted still masuline character to the more feminine woman in her both harmonious and conflicted versions. Again, I am not saying everything was perfect I am just trying to address the most likely major purposes, aside from the details, which could have been better or worse like with everything.

Less focused vs more focused stories: intimacy vs excitement

I like the idea that the author raised on how a more focused love srory would probably make the 'viewing a more intimate experience'. I am just not sure how much more excitement might it bring to the same viewer in return. It is hard for me to imagine that the excitement I lived with this show or other shows would be the same had the story been more focused (read too easy to watch, sometimes even boring). In fact, cvg is the most exciting watching experience that I ever had, and hence I probably don't have a bench mark to say that a more focused love story would feel more exciting to me.

More likely than not, I don't think it will since the less available something is the more valuable it feels, which I think was the main reason of the less focused on the love story approach. Or was I too in love with the show that I had to bring this excuse? No joking. I certainly think there are two sides for everything. And I think that's the positive side here. Otherwise, a much smoother approach could have been used though the over-full closure may not have left the same influence on me as a viewer.

More personal vs more thought-provoking

A more personal viewing experience has its own attractiveness and ability to reach more and more audiences. We all love it. But just like everything in life, there would always be another side of the coin. What might yeild a more personal exploration to Suhan's character, might bring the narrative out of its theme to the more ordinary dramatic one we are all used to. A downside of that is less thought-provoking and less intellectually pleasurable viewing experience, which I don't see fitting with the mystery the show was created around.

Last words

I just would like to highlight that every choice has its pros and cons. I tried here to explore the pros of what was majorly considered as cons, for the sake of balance as well as other personal issues of a fan-girl lol.