Episode 1 (Fan Creations)

by Kermit , Raleigh, NC, Monday, January 16, 2023, 18:56 (676 days ago) @ Cody Miller
edited by Kermit, Monday, January 16, 2023, 19:19

As both an adopted kid and a parent of an adopted kid, I'm really uncomfortable with your distinction between adopted and bio kids. (I have both... I can tell you that for me, there isn't a difference in how responsible for them I feel, or how much I love them... or how I'd feel if I got the chance to take care of another kid if they were all dead in horrible circumstances. And while I don't know my bio parents, I don't have any feelings for them - I don't hate them for giving me up, I don't love them for the blood ties. I don't know them at all, and that doesn't bother me.)

I'm not arguing about whether he'd love her any less or anything like that. It is merely about perception to an audience. Neither the game nor the TV show explore those dynamics, so given that both are using shorthand, you can't expect such nuance in the presentation. There will be confusion.

I asked someone who saw the show but not played the game, and he just assumed she was adopted. If you don't go into that relationship explicitly, people will jump to conclusions based upon THEIR experience and prejudice. I have family members who were adopted, and while the relationship is wonderful and loving, they do not believe there is no difference. Your experience isn't even universal among adopting / adopted. But right or wrong, they're already looking at it differently than if they hadn't race swapped. It is wrinkle introduced with no benefit, since no effort is made to explain or explore the relationship from that point of view.

It's fine if you take the time to illustrate the point you made above. But they did not.

I don't relate to your reading of Joel as some kind of neglectful, guilty father in the game--I'm pretty sure the creators mainly tried to show how much Joel loved Sarah, and I think they succeeded brilliantly in the show and the game. I don't know why people, based on the evidence, would assume she was adopted, and if they did, how that would make any difference. Those of us who are adopted might understandably take offense at the suggestion that biology is so determative when it comes to parental love. I would go so far to say that if there is a difference, adoptive parents are more loving because they sought to do so.

It's mostly moot, though, because I believe the vast majority of people accept what you quickly dismiss, that Sarah resembled her mother more than Joel. I gave as much thought to it as I did when I assumed the Sarah's mom in the game was probably blonde. If people are giving it more thought than that, I don't care what they think.