silverusagi

Let’s talk about Lost in Austen. Guys, it’s like someone wrote some crack and filmed it just for me. And I recognize that this is crack, and maybe even crap, but I love it anyway. Lost in Austen is about a girl named Amanda who falls into Pride and Prejudice. It sounds totally Mary Sue, and it kind of is. But I don’t care. So. Amanda is a modern day girl who loves Austen. And then one day she discovers Elizabeth Bennet in her bathroom. Elizabeth has come through a door in the wall. There’s a door on the top floor Longbourn, and when Elizabeth opened it, it led her here. Amanda just has to check the out, of course, and then the door closes, leaving her in Elizabeth’s world and Elizabeth in hers. And it’s not just a trip to the past. Amanda is actually in “fictional Georgian England”, right at the beginning of Pride and Prejudice.

Naturally, things do not go as they should. While there is a certain sort of magical handwaving (the other characters just accept that Amanda has come to stay with them while Elizabeth has gone to her house), Amanda’s presence screws things up from day one. Bingley sees her and decides she is all that, and thus doesn’t become interested in Jane. Amanda keeps trying to fix this, rather unsuccessfully. Then of course there’s Darcy, who she finds completely awful (even though she knows he’s completely awful). But Amanda seems to be confusing what she knows of Darcy from reading the whole book, and expecting this guy she just met to act like that toward her, a complete stranger. And of course, Darcy ends up intrigued by her because she’s clearly not like anyone he’s met. Mary Sue-ish, I know. Shut up, it’s fun.

Anyway, Amanda, despite having obsessively read Austen, and despite being able to rattle of phrases like “alas, that unrewarding task has been claimed by another” and “I shall trespass on the hospitality of this house for…”, has no actual clue how to act in day to day Georgian England. Everything she does is wrong. Even the simple things, like gentleman standing up for a lady when she enters, but ladies not standing up, elude her. So in that way, it’s not just a big Mary Sue fest. She can’t do anything right, she can’t fix the story she’s ruined, and pretty soon, things start spiraling out of control. She ends up engaged to Mr. Collins at once point, for instance. She screws things up with Charlotte. Also, she has no money or way to live, and when Mrs. Bennet kicks her out, she has to go to Wickham for help. Wickham is wonderful in this story. Well, not actually wonderful, but it’s one of those cases of twisting canon and turning things on their head. (Also, see: Caroline Bingley. Canon twisted.) Wickham is a bastard, but the right sort of bastard to have around. Also, Amanda, being a modern girl, has no problem bantering with him when he starts with the double entendres.

I saw Lost in Austen before I ever saw Doctor Who, but it’s worth noting that Alex Kingston plays Mrs. Bennet. Now I kind of can’t unsee it as Doctor Song in the past, even though Alex plays it completely differently. Also, Mr. Bennet is played by the guy who plays Lord Crawley on Downton Abbey. I really like the girl who plays Jane, and the girl who plays Lydia. Lydia, IMO, is a very hard part to play, because an actress can easily come off as trying to be mean girl/stuck up/bratty, when Lydia’s character is just completely flippant and basically thinks only of herself. I also like the guy that plays Darcy. I like his Darcy much better than that 2005 movie Darcy, at any rate. One thing I dislike is how everything moves at a breakneck pace and makes it seem like everything is right next door to each other. They’re at Longbourn, now they’re at Rosings, now they’re at Pemberly! Boom boom boom. Also, Mrs. Bennet is kind of in it too much. I know why they had to get her and Lydia to places, story wise, but it doesn’t make a lot of sense, plot wise. But that’s a minor complaint.

But I love how every time Amanda tries to fix something, it causes some new problem. The world of Pride and Prejudice changes around her, and nothing she does can get it back to the original story. And she might just be falling in love with Darcy. Shut up, we all would be. Which leads to another complication, of course, on Darcy’s side. I do like what happens with Bingley, when he realizes that he loves Jane but thinks he’s lost her. And even Mary and Kitty get a few things to do. There’s no Mr. and Mrs. Hurst, but there really wasn’t room for them here. Oh, and even though we don’t see Elizabeth again until the very end, she’s slipping notes under the magical door. Elizabeth has been getting on amazingly well in the modern world, lol. Oh, and one thing I did love was something that highlighted all the little things we take for granted. Amanda is perfectly fine with no electricity, but she balks at seeing what people had to clean their teeth with in the 1800s. Wearing pretty dresses is fun; personal hygiene is not.

Basically, this miniseries is my go to thing for relaxing, fluffy viewing. I don’t know how many times I’ve seen it, but it’s something I put on in the background a lot when I just want something fun and light that I don’t have to pay attention to. And I love Pride and Prejudice and I love AUs, so there was a very good chance I’d like this. It’s like the best sort of cracky fanfic, where you can just turn your brain off and embrace your id, and end up with Mr. Darcy.