Eerie, Indiana rewatch 2015: episode seven, Heart on a Chain

[froodle]

Take up your pencils, class; we are going to discuss the death of Mercutio. Love is stronger than death tonight, as we watch Heart on a Chain.

Comments

[slinkhard.livejournal.com]

Aw, I love this one. And meta wise, I think outside the Dash episodes, this and the 'Dead Letter Office' most strongly support a queer reading of Mars.

Devon at least seems to like Melanie on some kind of genuine level (so much as young teenagers can) - it's interesting that Mars says he likes Melanie because she's 'living on the frontier of life and death' (as is Devon, of course, with his little death wish, and later literally) whereas Devon terms his feelings as fixing her problem ('I'd give her my heart!') rather than liking her because of she's 'weird'. (And yeah, giving her a crappy present!)

It's also Mars who first identifies the competitive aspect that lead to their threeway bonding (lol) with his 'Not if I get there first!' remark.

It's pretty much 'subtext rapidly becoming text', imho, (within the confines of a bunch of 13 year olds in a kids show, lol) - there's the 'I hung out with him because in Eerie, we were both outsiders' line; how Melanie is explicitly linked to Mars' feelings for Devon, both because of the heart and because of their shared 'weird'ness and association with death.

Then how kissing Mars makes Devon's heart beat faster; and Melanie giving Mars Devon's heart necklace at the end... (Oh, and Mars exiting with Simon, Casablanca-style.)

I also love how hilariously grown-up all the kids are, not just with the Romeo and Juliet plotline, but how the boys consult each other on whether it's okay to ask out Melanie, as well as Marshall's 'Welcome to Mars' line.
(And Devon must have had some extraordinarily well-prepared parents with how quickly his heart was donated. I'd expect nothing less from Eerie, tbh.)

The 'Melanie had changed' bit is funny, like she's active and takes risks, oh noes! I mean, you get what they're trying to do, but the paternal 'Do you think you should be doing that?' to her...playing with a pencil is ridic. She's spent her whole life unable to do anything, even aside from Devon dying, there's reason enough to go a little ott.

[froodle]

I love everything about this comment, just so you know. also I wanna rewatch casablanca so I can write a ridiculous ei/casablanca crossover thingie.

I think milk truck related death in eerie is like vampire related deaths in sunnydale - every parent knows theres a good chance their kids wont make it to adulthood and adpats their expectations accordingly. melanies parents probably moved here because there are so many kids dying and leaving their organs around, they knew it was their best chance at picking up a spare heart.

I knew a kid in highschool who did that pencil trick with a compass. he was totally the badass of our whole class.

[deifire]

There is an episode of Carmilla where the title character is doing the trick with a very large knife in the background.

I may have squeeed a lot when I saw that.

[froodle]

I need that watch this. I still have a few eps of gravity falls to watch and then camilla is next on the list.

so weird and awesome how an ei rewatch ended up introducing me to a load of other shows... it reminds me of when lj was a bit livelier and you got that kind of awesome crosspollination more often

[deifire]

I miss LJ. I sort of lurk on tumblr, since that's where most of fandom seems to have migrated to, but it's just not the same.

I think next up for me is Night Vale, then Gravity Falls.

[froodle]

I like tumblr for the comedy memes etc but I find it really hard to interact with people on there. its just loads of likes and reblogs and the commenting system is dead unfriendly

[deifire]

She's spent her whole life unable to do anything, even aside from Devon dying, there's reason enough to go a little ott.

Yep. I've always read the "I wish I could do that" aspect as part of her attraction to Devon in the first place. And when she finally can, well, who can blame her? Except Mars, apparently. Then again, he just did watch the other part of their OT3 get squashed by a milk truck, so it's easy to see why he might be feeling a bit overprotective.

[froodle]

so im totally off to the fic fest to ask for devon/melanie/mars fic.