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the highly subjective Colditz primer and picspam, part 4
The final installment! I'm going to talk about one more pairing, then show you some other characters, all of them series regulars, who probaby won't be central to anything I might write but may get a mention. Then there's more picspam, and finally, I recommend the episodes to watch for an abbreviated Colditz experience.
All the pairings I've talked about so far have had some canonical backing. The last has none, unless you count "they're in the same episode." But I like them, and although I'm not sure if they'll turn up in my Kink Bingo fics, I'm writing a longer fic about them. (I haven't abandoned it,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
halotolerant, I swear, I've just been busy! Mostly doing, um, this.)
Palmer (played by Michael Elwyn)
Palmer isn't give a first name or a rank in canon; he appears only in the second-series episode "Odd Man In." He's an army intelligence officer who helps Simon send a coded letter and decode the reply. He's not, he says, a cryptography expert, but he enjoys it very much. Here he is, eager to show Simon some results.
It's not a great cap, but he's a fidgety sort of man and there are very few shots in which he's holding still.
Obviously his character doesn't get much development, but good writing in this episode and a good performance by Elwyn make Palmer more interesting to me than, frankly, some of the regulars. Palmer is soft-spoken, intelligent, slightly feminine, and a bit melancholy, for good reasons. During the episode he learns that his mother has had to go into "a charity home for the widows of indigent gentlefolk" because she's too frail to manage the house without his help. When Simon offers a sympathetic "I know how you feel," Palmer shows a surprising, bleak, hard-headed strength: Simon doesn't know, Palmer insists. Simon has bright prospects after the war, while all Palmer can look forward to is being a struggling schoolmaster who will be lucky to afford a car to take his mother out of the home on weekends. The contrast between Palmer's superficial mild softness and how hard he resists being condescended to or pushed around (there are a couple of nice moments of him shooing away an impatient, hovering Simon) intrigues me.
Lawrence Page (played by Ian McCulloch)
This is RAF Pilot Officer Larry Page. Except that it isn't. He's actually a British agent who took on that identity when captured in order to avoid Gestapo interrogation.
Page has experienced all the ugliness of covert work--fear, betrayal, knowing that comrades will be tortured and murdered, the brutalizing effects of being trained to violence--and is shattered and desperately weary. He's estranged from other people and so traumatized that he can barely feel anything except the instinct for self-preservation. And he's dangerous. We see him react with brutal violence when a small act of physical aggression from someone else triggers his trained responses. Page is a walking bit of war damage, so naturally I want to save him.
Once again,halotolerant and I have worked out a lot of ideas for Palmer/Page, most of which are in the story I'm working on, so I don't want to spoil them. I'll just say that Palmer's hidden strength, and hidden frustrations at his circumscribed life, are the sort of thing that might appeal to and slowly earn the respect of someone who is used to thinking of people as tools to be manipulated for particular ends.
Now I want to turn back to Colditz's regular characters, with brief looks at a few I might mention.
the Kommandant (played by Bernard Hepton)
A German army colonel and First World War veteran who never gets a surname in canon (although we learn his first name, Karl), the Kommandant is a decent man who treats his prisoners as honorably as possible. He and the Senior British Officer respect each other and develop something like a friendship.
Franz Ulmann (played by Hans Meyer)
Hauptmann Ulmann arrives at Colditz in the fifth episode as the camp's chief of security. He's the definition of "strict but fair," and despite his stern appearance, he has a sly sense of humor. Ulmann is based on the real-life Colditz security officer Reinhold Eggers.
Colditz was criticized in some quarters for its "sympathetic" portrait of the German staff, although Eggers and most of the real-life commandants behaved with decency, avoiding the abuses the happened in some other POW camps, and were respected by the POWs. In the second series, when the show introduced Major Mohn, it was then criticized for being "propagandistic." Sometimes there's just no winning.
John Preston (played by Jack Hedley)
Lt. Colonel Preston, the Senior British Officer, arrives at Colditz in the fourth episode, and after a rocky start becomes a respected and indeed loved figure. He maintains good relations with the staff (Preston and the Kommandant, at their first meeting, bond over having both served on the Somme) while keeping the POWs' interests foremost. Preston, who married late, has two young sons and suffers (much more quietly than Simon Carter!) at being separated from his wife and children.
Tim Downing (played by Richard Heffer)
Tim is in most ways exactly what you'd expect of a man with a moustache like that: a career officer, captain in the Guards, brisk, hearty, patriotic, not very subtle or thoughtful, inclined to judge first and think later if at all. And yet he's got a kind streak, can make the occasional joke, and somehow becomes the person who does all the sewing necessary for escape attempts, such as making civilian suits. Here he's testing a half-sewn jacket on Dick for fit (a job many would envy!).
Phil Carrington (played by Robert Wagner)
Carrington, to my deep regret, is a fairly prominent character. His role as an American officer in the RAF was shoehorned into the show in an attempt to market it in the United States; even more egregious Americanization happens in the last few episodes of series two, despite the fact that Colditz never held more than a handful of American officers and they don't seem to have done much.
Carrington might, nevertheless, be an appealing character. He's not bad on paper: a liberal journalist before the war, he's brave, intelligent, and in some ways the show's most astute political voice. When some British officers are moralizing about the German occupation of Europe, it's Carrington who mentions India.
The trouble is that Robert Wagner can't act. His performance as Carrington is flat and charisma-free, making an initially well-written character tedious; it's the opposite of what Edward Hardwicke does with Pat Grant.
Anyway, on to cheerier things. Have some more screencaps!
Pat and Dick share a cigarette.
Still sharing the cigarette, Pat and Dick walk to the washroom.
Dick looks pretty. That's George beside him.
Dick flirts with a guard to try and get some information.
Pat and Dick sneak into the Kommandantur.
Dick returns after calling off a planned escape attempt. Pat does not look altogether sorry to see him back.
Dick and a friend demonstrate how not to dance the can-can.
Dick knows an excellent way to stop a fellow-escapee from panicking.
Dick with Paul von Eissinger. The collar-type thing at Paul's neck is a back brace; he broke his back in the equestrian trials for the 1936 Olympics.
Paul and Dick have adate discussion of important political issues.
Dick and George fetch breakfast--and some bonus metal skewers for tunnelling.
Depressed George is depressed.
Happy George is happy. He's smiling at Dick, who's just come out of solitary and is pleased with the meal George and the others have made for him.
Slightly later in the same scene, Dick hasan orgasm his first cigarette in a month.
With that, I will end the picspam and turn to the last item on the agenda: the episodes I recommend if you want to watch some but not all of Colditz.
The first three episodes are character introductions for Pat, Simon, and Dick (in that order) and the main cast only assembles in Colditz at the very end of 1x03. The first two are skippable if you must, but Dick's introduction is written by the brilliant Arden Winch and has both interesting politics and slashiness. So:
1x03, "Name, Rank, and Number" (Dick's intro)
1x04, "Welcome to Colditz" (the first Colditz-set episode, introduces the staff and other prisoners)
1x05, "Maximum Security" (lots of Pat and Dick interactions, Ulmann's introduction, and a great one-off character)
1x07, "Lord, Didn't It Rain" (another Dick-centric episode by Arden Winch, focusing on a disastrous escape attempt)
1x11, "Court Martial" (good character development for George and some great moments for everyone)
1x14, "Gone Away, Part One" (the first part of the two-part series 1 finale, which was initially intended as the conclusion of the whole series)
1x15, "Gone Away Part Two - With the Wild Geese" (series 1 conclusion)
2x01, "Arrival of a Hero" (introduces Mohn)
2x02, "Ghosts" (George and Dick stuck together in a cold dark cramped space)
2x03, "Odd Man In" (the last episode written by Arden Winch, full of great stuff including Page, Palmer, and Harry's first appearance)
2x06, "Ace in the Hole" (Harry, the beginning of the famous Colditz glider scheme, and a great, great scene with Mohn)
2x11, "Chameleon" (Mohn-centric; it doesn't do justice to the character, in my opinion, but it's still interesting)
2x12, "Death Sentence" (a mixed bag, but recommended for the changing atmosphere as the end of the war nears, and for the Kommandant's scenes)
2x13, "Liberation" (again very mixed, but you want to know how it ends, don't you?)
I hope these posts have been helpful and interesting, and that they might lure some of you into giving the show a try.
All the pairings I've talked about so far have had some canonical backing. The last has none, unless you count "they're in the same episode." But I like them, and although I'm not sure if they'll turn up in my Kink Bingo fics, I'm writing a longer fic about them. (I haven't abandoned it,
halotolerant, I swear, I've just been busy! Mostly doing, um, this.)Palmer (played by Michael Elwyn)
Palmer isn't give a first name or a rank in canon; he appears only in the second-series episode "Odd Man In." He's an army intelligence officer who helps Simon send a coded letter and decode the reply. He's not, he says, a cryptography expert, but he enjoys it very much. Here he is, eager to show Simon some results.
It's not a great cap, but he's a fidgety sort of man and there are very few shots in which he's holding still.
Obviously his character doesn't get much development, but good writing in this episode and a good performance by Elwyn make Palmer more interesting to me than, frankly, some of the regulars. Palmer is soft-spoken, intelligent, slightly feminine, and a bit melancholy, for good reasons. During the episode he learns that his mother has had to go into "a charity home for the widows of indigent gentlefolk" because she's too frail to manage the house without his help. When Simon offers a sympathetic "I know how you feel," Palmer shows a surprising, bleak, hard-headed strength: Simon doesn't know, Palmer insists. Simon has bright prospects after the war, while all Palmer can look forward to is being a struggling schoolmaster who will be lucky to afford a car to take his mother out of the home on weekends. The contrast between Palmer's superficial mild softness and how hard he resists being condescended to or pushed around (there are a couple of nice moments of him shooing away an impatient, hovering Simon) intrigues me.
Lawrence Page (played by Ian McCulloch)
This is RAF Pilot Officer Larry Page. Except that it isn't. He's actually a British agent who took on that identity when captured in order to avoid Gestapo interrogation.
Page has experienced all the ugliness of covert work--fear, betrayal, knowing that comrades will be tortured and murdered, the brutalizing effects of being trained to violence--and is shattered and desperately weary. He's estranged from other people and so traumatized that he can barely feel anything except the instinct for self-preservation. And he's dangerous. We see him react with brutal violence when a small act of physical aggression from someone else triggers his trained responses. Page is a walking bit of war damage, so naturally I want to save him.
Once again,
halotolerant and I have worked out a lot of ideas for Palmer/Page, most of which are in the story I'm working on, so I don't want to spoil them. I'll just say that Palmer's hidden strength, and hidden frustrations at his circumscribed life, are the sort of thing that might appeal to and slowly earn the respect of someone who is used to thinking of people as tools to be manipulated for particular ends.Now I want to turn back to Colditz's regular characters, with brief looks at a few I might mention.
the Kommandant (played by Bernard Hepton)
A German army colonel and First World War veteran who never gets a surname in canon (although we learn his first name, Karl), the Kommandant is a decent man who treats his prisoners as honorably as possible. He and the Senior British Officer respect each other and develop something like a friendship.
Franz Ulmann (played by Hans Meyer)
Hauptmann Ulmann arrives at Colditz in the fifth episode as the camp's chief of security. He's the definition of "strict but fair," and despite his stern appearance, he has a sly sense of humor. Ulmann is based on the real-life Colditz security officer Reinhold Eggers.
Colditz was criticized in some quarters for its "sympathetic" portrait of the German staff, although Eggers and most of the real-life commandants behaved with decency, avoiding the abuses the happened in some other POW camps, and were respected by the POWs. In the second series, when the show introduced Major Mohn, it was then criticized for being "propagandistic." Sometimes there's just no winning.
John Preston (played by Jack Hedley)
Lt. Colonel Preston, the Senior British Officer, arrives at Colditz in the fourth episode, and after a rocky start becomes a respected and indeed loved figure. He maintains good relations with the staff (Preston and the Kommandant, at their first meeting, bond over having both served on the Somme) while keeping the POWs' interests foremost. Preston, who married late, has two young sons and suffers (much more quietly than Simon Carter!) at being separated from his wife and children.
Tim Downing (played by Richard Heffer)
Tim is in most ways exactly what you'd expect of a man with a moustache like that: a career officer, captain in the Guards, brisk, hearty, patriotic, not very subtle or thoughtful, inclined to judge first and think later if at all. And yet he's got a kind streak, can make the occasional joke, and somehow becomes the person who does all the sewing necessary for escape attempts, such as making civilian suits. Here he's testing a half-sewn jacket on Dick for fit (a job many would envy!).
Phil Carrington (played by Robert Wagner)
Carrington, to my deep regret, is a fairly prominent character. His role as an American officer in the RAF was shoehorned into the show in an attempt to market it in the United States; even more egregious Americanization happens in the last few episodes of series two, despite the fact that Colditz never held more than a handful of American officers and they don't seem to have done much.
Carrington might, nevertheless, be an appealing character. He's not bad on paper: a liberal journalist before the war, he's brave, intelligent, and in some ways the show's most astute political voice. When some British officers are moralizing about the German occupation of Europe, it's Carrington who mentions India.
The trouble is that Robert Wagner can't act. His performance as Carrington is flat and charisma-free, making an initially well-written character tedious; it's the opposite of what Edward Hardwicke does with Pat Grant.
Anyway, on to cheerier things. Have some more screencaps!
Pat and Dick share a cigarette.
Still sharing the cigarette, Pat and Dick walk to the washroom.
Dick looks pretty. That's George beside him.
Dick flirts with a guard to try and get some information.
Pat and Dick sneak into the Kommandantur.
Dick returns after calling off a planned escape attempt. Pat does not look altogether sorry to see him back.
Dick and a friend demonstrate how not to dance the can-can.
Dick knows an excellent way to stop a fellow-escapee from panicking.
Dick with Paul von Eissinger. The collar-type thing at Paul's neck is a back brace; he broke his back in the equestrian trials for the 1936 Olympics.
Paul and Dick have a
Dick and George fetch breakfast--and some bonus metal skewers for tunnelling.
Depressed George is depressed.
Happy George is happy. He's smiling at Dick, who's just come out of solitary and is pleased with the meal George and the others have made for him.
Slightly later in the same scene, Dick has
With that, I will end the picspam and turn to the last item on the agenda: the episodes I recommend if you want to watch some but not all of Colditz.
The first three episodes are character introductions for Pat, Simon, and Dick (in that order) and the main cast only assembles in Colditz at the very end of 1x03. The first two are skippable if you must, but Dick's introduction is written by the brilliant Arden Winch and has both interesting politics and slashiness. So:
1x03, "Name, Rank, and Number" (Dick's intro)
1x04, "Welcome to Colditz" (the first Colditz-set episode, introduces the staff and other prisoners)
1x05, "Maximum Security" (lots of Pat and Dick interactions, Ulmann's introduction, and a great one-off character)
1x07, "Lord, Didn't It Rain" (another Dick-centric episode by Arden Winch, focusing on a disastrous escape attempt)
1x11, "Court Martial" (good character development for George and some great moments for everyone)
1x14, "Gone Away, Part One" (the first part of the two-part series 1 finale, which was initially intended as the conclusion of the whole series)
1x15, "Gone Away Part Two - With the Wild Geese" (series 1 conclusion)
2x01, "Arrival of a Hero" (introduces Mohn)
2x02, "Ghosts" (George and Dick stuck together in a cold dark cramped space)
2x03, "Odd Man In" (the last episode written by Arden Winch, full of great stuff including Page, Palmer, and Harry's first appearance)
2x06, "Ace in the Hole" (Harry, the beginning of the famous Colditz glider scheme, and a great, great scene with Mohn)
2x11, "Chameleon" (Mohn-centric; it doesn't do justice to the character, in my opinion, but it's still interesting)
2x12, "Death Sentence" (a mixed bag, but recommended for the changing atmosphere as the end of the war nears, and for the Kommandant's scenes)
2x13, "Liberation" (again very mixed, but you want to know how it ends, don't you?)
I hope these posts have been helpful and interesting, and that they might lure some of you into giving the show a try.
no subject
This primer is really lovely and interesting and I am intrigued, thank you! ♥