(Brian) Sweet and Innocent??

General discussion about the nineteen episodes of "My So-Called Life". Note: Our episode guide can be found here.
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TomSpeed
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Post by TomSpeed » Aug 23rd 2004, 8:34 pm

I agree with almost everyone's comments. Brian is naive, but he isn't stupid. He is honest, but he isn't always truthful. He's on the lookout for his own pleasure, but he denies his pursuit of pleasure. He loves Angela, but he hates her. He loves himself, but he hates himself. He hates Jordan, but he is envious of him. Rayanne repels him, but he would sleep with her if given a chance. He's a bundle of contradictions and counter-motivations. He's also probably the most complex character on the show, and his character is written dead-on, IMHO.
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zakka
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Post by zakka » Aug 23rd 2004, 10:18 pm

Agreed. Brian's stalkerish tendencies bother me too, as does his selfishness. Although I see a little of myself in Brian, as I'm sure a lot of people do, I generally don't really like him. It made me furious when he asked Delia to the dance then dropped her and took Angela.

But as for Brian being "sweet and innocent" or "nice," I think it's absurd to describe any character on My So-Called Life as that because the show depicts the characters as real people put in real life situations. No one is entirely "sweet and innocent." A closer look at anyone would reveal something negative about their personality.

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Post by EWU MSCL fan » Oct 4th 2004, 2:19 pm

Brian Krakow was the most misunderstood character on MSCL. Yes, he hurt Angela when he spread the gossip about her and Jordan going all the way in his car and he kept showing up at the most unusual and annoying times but he didn't know how to deal with Angela after Angela tried to get away from her past by changing her hair color and best friend, etc.

The context of the relationship between Brian and Angela changed from childhood friends that lived across the street from one another to having Brian basically becoming an outsider to her life without Brian even being given a chance to stay friends with Angela.

Angela didn't want to see that Brian had changed throughout the whole season, trying to be completely unaware of Brian's feelings for her while at the same time trying to get away from her parents and her childhood.

Sharon tried numerous times to explain to Angela that Brian "Is like so in love with you" and Angela didn't want to believe it.

We have all been teenagers and got through the pains and enjoyments of adolescents (however you spell it) and saw all the people we were friends with and our peers change and trying to deal with new kinds of relationships with these same people.

Brian was hurt when he started the gossip about Angela and Jordan just to make her feel as bad as he did about Angela using Brian and his house to get her a fake ID from Jordan.

I believe he always asked her about Jordan Catalano to tell her that he cares about what happens to her and doesn't want to see her heart get broken by any guy, like Jordan did in Betrayal with Rayanne.

Angela finally figures out how Brian changed in the last episode "In Dreams Meet Responsibilities" when he admits and then tries to deny he wrote the letter but to make sure whatever was in the letter made her happy. That was Brian was about, trying to see that Angela was happy in whatever she was doing.

So is Brian sweet and innocent? No, but if both your parents were shrinks you would overanalyze every situation to death too, trying to do the right thing.

Is Brian misunderstood? Only by Angela who didn't want to believe how he had changed from a childhood friend to an almost stranger who wanted some kind of romantic relationship with the Angela Chase he grew up with and the Angela Chase she had become up to this point.

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Post by BriansAngst » Oct 27th 2004, 7:12 pm

Brian was a pretty classic character on MSCL. I wasn't ever overly irritated by his stalker-like characteristics because I felt for the most part, they were just benign. In general I could empathize perhaps just because I felt he was so used by Angela on numerous accounts... but again, my need to empathize with Brian was mostly in the context between himself and Brian.

Brian was genuinely honest and was always level-headed about most issues during the show, but of course this offsets his lack of spontaneity and adventure which most of the other characters contained. On a different note, for some reason I always felt it was wierd seeing him tutor Jordan... I think because I always knew what there real life ages were.

Anyhow, Brian's Brian... his character was more than 2-dimensional, but he was always limited in his expression, but perhaps that was how things were meant to be. I just wish he had the opportunity to either get to develop things with Angela or alternatively move on with his life and stop obsessing about her... of course if this had happened then most of us wouldn't feel so bad for him which was likely the purpose.

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BriansAngst
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Post by BriansAngst » Oct 28th 2004, 1:55 pm

Sorry, my bad, at the end of my 1st paragraph I meant between him and Angela... LoL

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Re: (Brian) Sweet and Innocent??

Post by BuffaloLawnmower » Jul 26th 2011, 5:01 pm

I would say that Brian can definitely be sweet, and I see him as a mostly good (though flawed) person, but, of course, good people do bad things sometimes. I wouldn't consider him 'innocent' in the sense of being uninformed about the world, but I might consider him a bit lacking in social skills (though not completely hopeless) and a bit naive at times. I might consider him 'innocent' in the sense that he's a guy version of the "good girl" and he is a bit straight-laced; he doesn't ever seem to do anything too crazy in comparsion to others, like Rayanne. He has moments when he is a jerk, but I think that deep down he really is a good person. He does hurt Delia, for example, but he also feels remorseful; not only does he apologize to her, but you can also see the pain he's feeling (guilt) in his facial expressions and demeanor/body language. He's beating himself up inside. Another example is when he lets Angela have it in "Pressure" when she leaves his bike at Jordan's, but he also is sensitive enough to know that something happened and they have a really nice albeit short conversation; after that, he tells Jordan to leave the bike with Angela in case she needs it. So, he can be sweet at times. I think that maybe if he didn't feel as used and taken advantage of as he does, and also if he were more of an open person, perhaps that side of him would come out more often.

Also, as for him riding his bike around in circles: on one level, I do see it as him hoping that Angela will come out and that he'll get to see her or talk to her. On another level, though, I wonder if it's symbolic of a cycle that he goes through with her: she uses him, he lets her do it a lot of the time, other times he stands up to her, sometimes he vows not to let her use him, she uses him again, and it just goes on and on like that. Maybe it's symbolic of his inability to break free (emotionally) from her and "move forward"?

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Re: (Brian) Sweet and Innocent??

Post by Superjesus » Jul 31st 2011, 6:23 am

Krakow, sweet and innocent? Nope.

If he were that sweet and innocent, he wouldn't have started the rumour in Guns and Gossip (obvious example).

Brian's pretty interesting in that he has moments where he appears so clueless (the whole Delia Fisher thing in Life of Brian) but he also has moments where he can be surprisingly perceptive (like The Substitute, where he's the only one to realise Vic is basically a dickhead).

But I wouldn't call him sweet or innocent. I would say that there is a depth to Brian that isn't always obvious, but his naivete is more because he tends to live in his own world. When he steps out of it, though, he can be very sharp (and I don't mean re schoolwork, where we all know he's a superstar).

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