Frank Blacks Style

[Guest Heath328]

Exactly. But I don't think M&W's rebranding of the show and of Frank was entirely motivated by a desire to increase ratings. Quite possibly a part of it, as you say (ironic that they ended up sinking them), but I think a bigger factor was their own personal preferences for such things. For example, they said that they made Frank like Bobby Darin simply because they liked Bobby Darin, and bringing in nerdy sci-fi computer geeks is, I would imagine, how they see themselves and their fans (witness the Lone Gunmen).

I think they like cool dude heroes with trendy clothes, big guns, gadgets, and pop-culture one-liners, and thus they tried to remould Frank Black in that image. Lance Henriksen didn't like it, and I didn't either. I find it particularly fitting (and hilarious) that Darin Morgan crafted the ultimate parody of this type of character in the form of Rocket McGrane in the midst of all this.

Right on.

What made Frank so unforgettable in the first place was that he didn't fit the mold of the "cool dude heroes with trendy clothes, big guns," etc.

He was a fully realized human being. An adult.

The same could be said for the rest of the characters (with the exception of Jordan, who was fully realized but not an adult).

I think there were other ways to jump-start the show without resorting to the kind of overhaul of the show that Morgan and Wong hatched. I thought getting away from the killer of the week idea was wise, but tinkering with the Millennium Group baffled me as an idea. What if the Morgan and Wong had instead created a villainous foil group, something along the lines of the Nazi group in "Owls/Roosters," but with more millennial-mystic designs?

Lance Henriksen was right to feel betrayed at the changes inflicted on the show in Seasons 2 and 3.

I liked the Bobby Darin thing. It makes sense that with Frank being of a certain age, he would enjoy Darin, and liking something for the pure joy of it goes along with the whole Yellow House package. Frank was an optimistic human being who lived in a dark world, and I'm glad that idea continued even as "Millennium" endured changes that ultimately killed its run.

[Guest ZeusFaber]

I concur that it is comforting to give an overview of a character based on your prejudices but the 'Frank' of 'Season Two' deserves more than ripping through 22 episodes to skim scant examples from the top of the custard that support your assertions. Whilst it is true that there is a tonal shift in the colour of 'Frank' it is worryingly absurd to conclude that 'Season Two' depicted him as a gun-toting-wisecrack artist who 'Morgan and Wong' enriched with nothing more than examples of their own interests.

I don't claim that Frank was always mischaracterized all the time in the second season, and indeed there are several times when the old Frank shines through, but alongside that there are too many instances of a rebranded and remoulded Frank for my tastes. The instances I describe are not meant as a blanket dismissal of all of Frank's scenes in the entire season, but their inclusions always felt forced to me, and their frequency offended my sensibilities. Elements were imposed on his character that just weren't there in the preceding year, and some outright contradicted the man we had come to know.

I am wholly respectful of the characterisation of Frank in 'Season One' but the eternally dour and yawningly profound is a grotesque misinterpretion of the human complex. A man enjoys a drink, listens to music, enjoys TV and quotes the odd bit of rubbish from his favourite film. In reality no individual submerses themselves in a quagmire of misery. I am a human, a fact that many may contest, and I cannot remember a second of my life that I didn't smile, sing a song, act macho (poorly) and so and so forth.

What you're describing there is an everyman. While an everyman character may be more "true to life" and "realistic" of the type of people you might meet in everyday situations, such characters are not always the stuff of good drama. Frank Black was not an everyman character. He was different to the people around him. From the pilot, we see Bletcher and Giebelhouse as the everyman characters, those with more in common with the audience, those who don't see the bigger picture and the larger patterns in life. Frank isn't like them. In the second season, they tried to force him more in that direction, and for me, as for Lance Henriksen, it felt incongruous.

I may finish by adding that the issue of ratings is highly debatable since no soul has produced them, but, Millennium is an archaic thing and not one member of this group is here because of ratings. We are here out of an interest to discuss the stories and few of us are concerned with how many people watched what and when.

On that point, we can most certainly agree.

[Guest ZeusFaber]

Right on.

What made Frank so unforgettable in the first place was that he didn't fit the mold of the "cool dude heroes with trendy clothes, big guns," etc.

Yes, that's how I feel about it.

I think there were other ways to jump-start the show without resorting to the kind of overhaul of the show that Morgan and Wong hatched. I thought getting away from the killer of the week idea was wise, but tinkering with the Millennium Group baffled me as an idea. What if the Morgan and Wong had instead created a villainous foil group, something along the lines of the Nazi group in "Owls/Roosters," but with more millennial-mystic designs?

I will refrain from adding my opinions to that in the interest of not rehashing old arguments and staying focused on the issue of Frank's style. But if you're interested, my more general feelings toward the second season as a whole are well documented around here, and use of the search function is likely to turn up several hefty topics with heated debated from several members.

I liked the Bobby Darin thing. It makes sense that with Frank being of a certain age, he would enjoy Darin, and liking something for the pure joy of it goes along with the whole Yellow House package.

I like Bobby Darin's music, I'm just not sure of it's place in Millennium. Perhaps I would have found it more palatable for Frank to be a big fan if it was kept to the lighter, sanctuary-like moments, just as the yellow house represented such things (as you say), instead of having Frank listen along to it while viewing vicious crime scene photos (as we see in "Beware of the Dog"), or dancing along over an autopsy (as we see in "A Single Blade of Grass" -- although that was the Squirrel Nut Zippers, but the point is the same). In S1, Frank kept his work securely locked away in the basement and thus psychologically and literally compartmentalised. He never mixed levity with depravity as we see him do so callously in S2.

[Guest Heath328]

Yes, that's how I feel about it.

I will refrain from adding my opinions to that in the interest of not rehashing old arguments and staying focused on the issue of Frank's style. But if you're interested, my more general feelings toward the second season as a whole are well documented around here, and use of the search function is likely to turn up several hefty topics with heated debated from several members.

I like Bobby Darin's music, I'm just not sure of it's place in Millennium. Perhaps I would have found it more palatable for Frank to be a big fan if it was kept to the lighter, sanctuary-like moments, just as the yellow house represented such things (as you say), instead of having Frank listen along to it while viewing vicious crime scene photos (as we see in "Beware of the Dog"), or dancing along over an autopsy (as we see in "A Single Blade of Grass" -- although that was the Squirrel Nut Zippers, but the point is the same). In S1, Frank kept his work securely locked away in the basement and thus psychologically and literally compartmentalised. He never mixed levity with depravity as we see him do so callously in S2.

Those are good observations about the character.

I can see where the moments in the program that you described would have bothered you, but I found them acceptable because they ring true. If Frank listened to Bobby Darin while looking at a crime scene photo, it didn't take away from the fact that he respected his work and the people whose lives were taken. What he was doing was akin to surgeons listening to rock music while cracking open a person's chest to operate on their heart. He was doing it to maintain his sanity.

I've been around law enforcement officers (I'm not one myself, I'm a former cops reporter for a newspaper) enough to know that they sometimes engage in little quirks or gallows humor just to be able to do an often grim job.

It takes effort not to let oneself grow cynical and cold, and I think that motivated Frank more than anything. Maintaining his humanity.

[ethsnafu]

Fascinating points made by all concerned.

Here's my thing (haven't said that in moons but boy does it feel good.)

Whatever tonal shifts Morgan and Wong introduced into Frank's matrix I do not think they were significant enough to neatly bisect the character into 'Old Frank' and 'New Frank'. I don't believe characters should be a fixed concept where any deviation along the axis is perceived as an untruth. Characters always evolve through the course of the narrative, they become ripe, full bodied and complex entities and it would have been short sighted to expect that a new and energised creative team could have taken Frank through such an anfractuous collection of episodes without experiencing the need to afford the character a degree of evolution.

Because new characteristics are introduced and 'Season Two' did not allow Frank to remain unexplored as a 'man' does not sit at odds with me. I remember much bemoaning on this subject with regards to Agent Scully who, for so long, remained the ever sceptic in light of such undeniable evidence.

I respectfully add that anyone who believes that the Frank of 'Season Two' was 'trendy' must have all the fashion savvy of my Father who despite being a wonderful chap is surgically attached to a duffle coat. Whilst Frank may have been allowed clothes instead of languishing in a 'costume' he was hardly bedecked in Abercrombie & Fitch.

I also agree with comments that the concurrent use of the kitsch and the vitiated has it roots grounded in reality and should be not highlighted as a moment of wanton silliness. During my student years and the gladly passed days of autopsies and anatomy jars my sanity was maintained, repeatedly, by 'The Greatest Hits of Cilla Black' as it was the daftest thing I could lay my gloved hands on. There is no way on this earth or fullers could I have found comfort in something so profoundly jarring by immersing myself in the viscera in a silent room. No disrespect was ever shown to those, who in death, had allowed us to hone our skills as the next generation of clinicians but somewhere in the consideration your soul has to be catered for too.

Edited November 26, 2007 by ethsnafu

[Guest ZeusFaber]

Gosh, the phrase "tough room" comes to mind. I see I face quite a challenge here in opining without being seen as negative or conservative, but nonetheless...

If Frank listened to Bobby Darin while looking at a crime scene photo, it didn't take away from the fact that he respected his work and the people whose lives were taken. What he was doing was akin to surgeons listening to rock music while cracking open a person's chest to operate on their heart. He was doing it to maintain his sanity.

I've been around law enforcement officers (I'm not one myself, I'm a former cops reporter for a newspaper) enough to know that they sometimes engage in little quirks or gallows humor just to be able to do an often grim job.

Absolutely. I don't deny that for a second. But again, these kinds of people are the ones we see in Bob Bletcher and Giebelhouse, the more typical law enforcement characters, the more quirky and humourous, the more everyday. As I said earlier, throughout the first season we see how Frank is deliberately marked apart from them. He's different. He sees the world differently. He's not the sort to gossip about a case or the sort to derive humour or quips from them (as we see right from the beginning of the pilot, with Giebelhouse and friends setting him up for a Silence of the Lambs joke with a chuckle, but Frank very much not taking the bait and staying true to the seriousness of the case. Had this been in S2, he would almost certainly have responded, "with some fava beans and a good chianti" and smiles along with them). That was much of the point in juxtaposing Frank with Bletcher and Giebelhouse, while S2 diminished the contrast.

I'm sorry, but I must have somehow missed Frank "Dancing long" to the Squirrel Nut Zippers! From what I recall, it was a very STRANGE coroner woman.... who even Frank looked at like she was a bit daft several times.

Fair enough, he wasn't literally dancing, but I was just trying to succinctly remind us all of the scene. Granted, the M.E. was doing the dancing, but Frank was enjoying the music too and having a good chat about his musical tastes despite being in a morgue surrounded by murder victims. Just a subtle different to the way he behaved in the first season when he was more subdued and even opposed to the morbid curiosity of others around him, declining to look at corpses at all unless it was necessary for his work.

I don't believe characters should be a fixed concept where any deviation along the axis is perceived as an untruth. Characters always evolve through the course of the narrative, they become ripe, full bodied and complex entities

Believe me, I embrace character development and evolution. I'm not advocating that characters should never grow over the course of a series. But there are ways of doing this, times when characters grow logically as a result of circumstance and experience. In my own individual opinion, I do not think that was the case with Frank Black in the second season. His style and quirks changed out of nowhere to me, and he suddenly had tastes and habits that he showed no signs of before, if not outright reversed them.

But again, I'm not saying he was a different person entirely. I'm talking about his style and his mannerisms.

I remember much bemoaning on this subject with regards to Agent Scully who, for so long, remained the ever sceptic in light of such undeniable evidence.

And then there are those which still bemoaned her growing belief in the paranormal from around S7 onwards (I'm not one of them, I might add). It seems you're damned if you do and damned if you don't, at times.

I respectfully add that anyone who believes that the Frank of 'Season Two' was 'trendy' must have all the fashion savvy of my Father who despite being a wonderful chap is surgically attached to a duffle coat.

Ha ha. No, I don't claim that he was suddenly a fashion icon, just that he was comparitively more trendy. Chris Carter himself observed that Frank's wardrobe changed considerably by the end of S2, and I agree.

[ethsnafu]

I absolutely get where you're coming from my friend. The sudden emergence of nuances unsupported by the narrative has 'every man and their mother' eye-rolling in wonder but the embellishments to Frank's attributes did not emerge from an abyss without narrative support. The 'Frank' of Season One was an assured soul with an harmonious family who delved into areas he had comforting expertise in. With the dissolution of his marriage, the alienation from his daughter and the continuos revelations that emerged from his journey towards initiation it would have been counterfactual to have presented him as previous year did. The meltdown of a partnership is psychologically understood as one of the most stress inducing events in a mortal lifetime. For those of us who have waved a partner goodbye we all know that the first instinct is to diet, join a gym, buy a new outfit and show a few moves on the nearest dance floor and in Frank's reserved way he changed his world as we all do.

Morgan and Wong, for all their faults, are masters of the human condition and understand the complex schema that forms the bricks and mortar of our psyche. To take a character and move them through a relationship breakdown with the fictitious additions of new attributes is totally in keeping with the course of life Frank would have experienced.

In my mind those who detract from what was achieved in Season Two fail to afford Frank any realism. To suppose that he would have remained as stoic and solid to the sounds of carillon playing deny that character a humanism.

I also have trouble with the notion that 'Darin' has no place in Millennium which for all my deep consideration I fail to understand. Bobby Darin is featured in your own virtual season, you had no mandate to include his music and yet you did. If it so grotesque of 'Season Two' to add of bit of Darin to the recipe why did you choose to do the same?

[Guest ZeusFaber]

The 'Frank' of Season One was an assured soul with an harmonious family who delved into areas he had comforting expertise in. With the dissolution of his marriage, the alienation from his daughter and the continuos revelations that emerged from his journey towards initiation it would have been counterfactual to have presented him as previous year did. The meltdown of a partnership is psychologically understood as one of the most stress inducing events in a mortal lifetime.

Sure, I'd buy all that, but part of my distaste for the style changes stems from my dissatisfaction with some of those very aspects mentioned above. Seperation from Catherine was something I embraced at first, but the longer it went on without any hope of resolution, the more dissatisfied with it I became. I would have been much more content with it as a 6 episode arc or so, rather than being a permanent change for the whole season that never truly had any resolution. Also, the idea of his "journey towards initiation". I also found that hard to swallow, since there was no such idea of "candidacy" or elaborate, ritualistic "initiations" from the first season.

So you could say I'm at odds with the causes and at odds with the effects. We started out with the effects in terms of style, and it seems now we've hit upon the causes.

In my mind those who detract from what was achieved in Season Two fail to afford Frank any realism. To suppose that he would have remained as stoic and solid to the sounds of carillon playing deny that character a humanism.

Again, I don't seek to deny humanism or character growth, but I'd have prefered to see something that matched with the human we had got to know in the previous season, rather than something that grated against it.

I also have trouble with the notion that 'Darin' has no place in Millennium which for all my deep consideration I fail to understand.

Again, I don't think Bobby Darin has no place in the series at all, but I object to some of the ways it was used. The aforementioned case of Frank listening to it alongside his examination of brutal crime scene photos of dead victims being a case in point. I'd have been much more at ease with it had it been reserved for moments of peace with Jordan and relaxing days off, rather than breaking down the partition Frank used to keep between his horrible, sombre work and his humanistic home life. Also, a little less frequency would have helped stem a sense of overload.

Bobby Darin is featured in your own virtual season, you had no mandate to include his music and yet you did. If it so grotesque of 'Season Two' to add of bit of Darin to the recipe why did you choose to do the same?

Ahh, well you'll note that it was never in an episode I wrote. I actually did scale back on it at times when some writers put several references in, but I didn't want to be so authoritarian as to eliminate it completely, (bearing in mind that once S2 put it on the table, it became a part of Frank whether I liked it or not, and that many fans, such as yourself, would enjoy such moments).

And I never said it was "grotesque". ;)