The problem with Spider Rose
My problem with Spider Rose
The only Season 4 episode I liked was Spider Rose (it is actually a dramatic improvement on the source story). But there is one problem I can't ignore.
Here is the description of *Colonel Doctor* Jade Prime from Bruce Sterling's story:
"A Shaper's face appeared, one of the Oriental-based gene lines, smooth raven hair held back with jeweled pins, slim black eyebrows arched over dark eyes with the epicanthic fold, pale lips slightly curved in a charismatic smile. A smooth, clean actor's face with the glittering ageless eyes of a fanatic."
Shapers are the genetically perfected Übermensch counterparts to Spider Rose's cyborg Mechanist set. The two scientists in Swarm were Shapers. They are physically perfect (which is why Swarm wanted to breed a human caste of symbiotes with them), and their minds bred for high IQ to the point where some became hyperintelligent enough to be seriously unstable.
They were not jagged toothed scarfaced monstrosities like the Jade Prime of the episode.
My problem is this: the animators had such Hollywoodesque contempt for the IQ of their audience, that is, us, that they had to uglify Jade Prime so we would know him for a villain. Because he's ugly.
It irritates me out of all proportion, but there it is.
The only Season 4 episode I liked was Spider Rose (it is actually a dramatic improvement on the source story). But there is one problem I can't ignore.
Here is the description of *Colonel Doctor* Jade Prime from Bruce Sterling's story:
"A Shaper's face appeared, one of the Oriental-based gene lines, smooth raven hair held back with jeweled pins, slim black eyebrows arched over dark eyes with the epicanthic fold, pale lips slightly curved in a charismatic smile. A smooth, clean actor's face with the glittering ageless eyes of a fanatic."
Shapers are the genetically perfected Übermensch counterparts to Spider Rose's cyborg Mechanist set. The two scientists in Swarm were Shapers. They are physically perfect (which is why Swarm wanted to breed a human caste of symbiotes with them), and their minds bred for high IQ to the point where some became hyperintelligent enough to be seriously unstable.
They were not jagged toothed scarfaced monstrosities like the Jade Prime of the episode.
My problem is this: the animators had such Hollywoodesque contempt for the IQ of their audience, that is, us, that they had to uglify Jade Prime so we would know him for a villain. Because he's ugly.
It irritates me out of all proportion, but there it is.
- dockbillin-28225
- 31 may 2025