Tag: parker

leverage-commentary:

“The episode is very Beth-centric, by the way. Oh, and those weren’t her parents who lived in that house she blew up. Now whether those nasty abusive people were still in there or not … choose the answer that you like. We’re never, ever going to tell you everything about these characters. For example, you have no idea exactly who Sophie was married to at age 17, do you? Or why when Eliot said “I don’t like guns” in the pilot, he added “… you know that.” to Nate. Why would Nate know that?”

— John Rogers on Kfmonkey, LEVERAGE: Stork Raving Mad/Open Thread

Star Wars, take note: you do NOT have to explain absolutely everything about a character and their backstory.

traveling-magpie:

Okay but consider:

Leverage urban fantasy
AU.

Nate is a reluctant vampire who got turned in the same
incident that killed his son. He only goes after bad guys, and he’s never
killed anyone (that he knows of) but substance abuse is substance abuse, and
the fact that he can’t look in a mirror and see how bad he looks gives Sophie
many a fretful morning of “You were out again all night, I can see it. You didn’t
even wash up” accompanied by grouchy grunts from a freshly-self-loathing Nate.

Eliot is a were-creature of some kind. No one knows what,
because no one who’s seen him fully transformed has lived to tell the tale.
Those who have seen glimpses just know there are a lot of teeth involved. A lot of teeth.

Parker isn’t quite girl and she isn’t quite ghost. She’s
stuck halfway between – the result of not getting out of a certain exploding
house quickly enough as a child – which makes snacking a task sometimes (and
kissing even more so) but the perks are worth it. Being able to literally walk
through walls has made her the world’s greatest thief.

Hardison is human. Completely and totally. But in a world
where vanilla humans are often prey, he’s learned to defend himself with a
grasp of both technology and actual magic that rightfully earn him the title “wizard.”
He frequently uses fictional mages as aliases and Eliot will never let him live
down the time a flustered “Agent Gandalf” got laughed out of an FBI field
office.

Sophie is fey – as fey as they come. No one knows how old
she is (and no one dares ask) and while her acting skills leave much to be
desired (the fey can’t actually lie, after all), when she casts a glamour it
takes a strong mind to see anything other than exactly what she wants them to
see.

Just imagine: magical
Leverage.

polytropic-liar:

I was thinking today about Leverage–as one does–and about the various grifting styles we see the team employ, and how most of them have a very particular grift strategy that they rarely stray from when they have to be the main one in the spotlight. And what I think is really interesting is how their strategies are often exact opposites.

Eliot’s syle of grifting is to flatten himself, to make himself seem simple. He plays nerds, ‘manipulate-able’ fighters, awkward librarians and accountants and basically people it’s easy to dismiss or to pigeonhole as one thing (whereas in reality he’s anything but that). In direct contrast, Sophie’s entire grift style plays up her mysteriousness. She draws people in because they want to know more about her, because she’s intriguing and fascinating and there’s the suggestion that if only the mark were worthy of her time and attention, she knows things they could only dream of.

Nate’s style is to be incredibly obnoxious. Which, let’s all congratulate him on playing to his strengths, first of all. But second of all, it’s a really interesting grift style, because basically it manipulates people by annoying them. While Sophie draws people in and directs their attention and clouds their judgement by making them want her around, Nate directs people’s attention and clouds their judgement by making them want him to leave. They’re both very effective at getting a person to do exactly what they want!

And while Eliot’s grift style almost always involves him pretending to be bad at something (physically harmless alien nerd, unsophisticated boxer who can’t people good, etc), Hardison’s grifts almost always involve him being an expert at something (Iceman, FBI agent, even conspiracy theorist) and using his expertise to gain access, authority, etc.

And then I was thinking about Parker and trying to pin down her style, and I realized that another reason why she was an excellent choice of leader is that she can kind of do them all. Every grift she does has that tinge of ‘weird’ to it, because that’s who she is, but she’s able to switch between strategies in a way that the others never really employ. She can be unassuming and underestimated (Alice, baby reporter), off-putting and upsetting (that pop star with the duck), an expert who comes in and takes over (FBI agent), or intriguing and enticing (that scene with the diamond necklace, you know the one, we all know the one, you whispered “oh no she’s hot” at the screen don’t lie). I wouldn’t say she’s the best grifter, that’s definitely Sophie, but she might be the most versatile one.

Basically Parker is the best, Leverage is the best, we all knew that, thank you for your time.