#ds flashback

One, thank you very much for even mildly encouraging my thoughts about Flashback. Two, you may probably regret giving me this soapbox (but thank you regardless) (Also this kind of got away from me and is about Flashback but also about Fraser the Hero Archetype.) (sorry)

SO. I will admit I was mildly confused 'Flashback' at first. Fraser lost his memory, but why would he also lose his entire personality ffs? BOO! OOC!! BAD WRITINGGGG, I yell as I fling my metaphorical popcorn at the screen.

Because which is it, writers - which Fraser is real??

The one we see most of the time: the unfailingly kind, brave, truthful and Maintain the Right guy? Or the mildly crappy, everyday guy we see when Fraser loses his memory and forgets to Perform the Nice Guy act?

And sure, people do go there and assume that's what 'the real Fraser' is like, I am not a fan of that read because it implies that the Fraser we see in-show the entire time is a lie. Why would I root for that guy? I want the storybook prince guy back, complete with his talking animal!

Then I realized both characterizations actually make perfect sense if viewed through the lens of how due South was written:

due South is a fable, and by extension Fraser is one too. He's the Prince in exile from the storybook, the White Knight in the fairy-tale, the David to the Big City Bureaucracy's Goliath. And Flashback showed us that so perfectly.

And this is explicitly in the show: Fraser never gets dirty, and can survive falling out of a plane into a snowbank without getting a speck of snow on him, not understanding money, or romantic love beyond what a book might tell him. Crucially, he's not stupid or naive. He understands greed, corruption, and all the trappings that come with life.

But he approaches them with the simplicity & inner strength of a storybook hero. He will always strive to do the Right Thing or die trying. This is simultaneously the thing that endears him to Ray over time, and also irritates Ray immensely. Because Fraser isn't a person the way we are, Fraser is an Ideal made human. And Ray has the wonderful, terrible job of being friends with that ideal.

Flashback shows us what Fraser might be like if he lost that storybookish-ness- and was replaced by the guy Fraser might be if he was a Regular Guy. Regular Guy Fraser isn't a fable, he's your average Joe who's just like the rest of us with our wants and our flaws and reluctance to do more than necessary. This Fraser is a real boy, and... Ray doesn't like him! He wants the old, weird stepped-out-of-a-storybook one back immediately! he will not be taking no for an answer!

Now, instead of Ray bitching, Not!Fraser is the one bitching about how weird Benny is and Ray! Doesn't! Like it!!

"You always jump onto vans!" "What am I stupid?" "No, you're a hero."

What the hell kinda name is Benton anyway!

You always hold the door open for women!

"That's Diefenbaker, your wolf!" "I own a wolf?"

"I live like this?"

Ray is the one defending each of Benny's seemingly bizarre life choices to Fraser himself! Ray! Who! has bitched at Fraser for literally! All of these things!!

Finally FRASER himself asks: Why are we friends? I'm annoying!

And Ray says, didn't I already tell you we're friends? Bonded friends! Better together than apart friends! So STOP ASKING ME TO REPEAT MYSELF AND BE EMO ON MAIN. WE'RE FRIENDS AND I THINK THE OLD YOU IS ANNOYING AND I LOVE HIM REGARDLESS.

It is this response that gets Fraser back - almost instantly. The fact that Ray wants the intensely irritating storybook idealist version of himself back. And this (to me anyway) invokes the Tinkerbell effect, now applied to Storybook Prince Fraser.

Everyone else is worried about Fraser, yes, want him back even - yes! But the only person who pushes the most to get him back, affirms it repeatedly and finally names the weird storybook 'lost' Fraser his friend, his best friend, and says it in the [brb crying] way possible???

What's Benny gonna do - NOT COME BACK???? pls.

F: And then we, um… V: Bonded. F: Bonded? We bonded?

V: Yeah, you could say that.

I love the delivery of this line. Ray looks/sounds like he's about to laugh, but also like he's on the verge of tears

about to laugh because there is so much history between the two of them that 'bonded' really can't come anywhere close to capturing it... the shenanigans they experienced (and caused), the bickering and bantering, all the driving each other crazy in the best of ways

and on the verge of tears because this version of Fraser doesn't remember any of that... all of the times they laughed together, grieved together, the times they had each other's backs and saved each other's lives, the good times (and the bad) that they lived through together... Fraser's forgotten it all

Ray's grappling with having potentially lost Fraser, even though Fraser is still alive, and Ray fixates on helping Fraser get his memories back, I believe both because he genuinely wants to help Fraser navigate the unfamiliar waters he's found himself in (flashes back to the pilot, when Constable Benton Fraser was new to the city and Ray decided then too that he was going risk his life and career over and over and over again to help him), but also because he doesn't want to have to accept a reality in which he's lost his best friend

it feels like Ray is using a softer version of his typical joking/sarcastic tone, it seems very in-character for him to try to use humor to mask the true depths and sincerity of his statement, trying to hide the vulnerability he's feeling in this moment, but I think the underlying sentiment shines through nonetheless

✨ Due South Pixel Art ✨

"You see a bond is more than just a bankable note. It's an instrument of trust between two people, indicating a promise that must be honored." - Fraser (S1E1 Free Willie)