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paxpinnaeRight. First things first: Doctor Who. Because I was travelling for the last two weeks but one, and then sick with the Death Lurgy of the NYC Subway for the next, I watched both of the last two episodes back to back. My reactions to them, respectively, were "meh and ugh and meh and ugh and meh and ugh and mugh" and "WHAAAAAAA?"
Closing Time:
There was so much about this episode that I disliked. Every trope that made it run seemed to have been stolen from last century's comedy playbook: the vaguely misogynistic "wife leaves for a weekend, hopeless husband fails to cope" premise; the vaguely homophobic "Ha Ha someone's mistaken the Doctor and Craig for gay" subplot; and, of course, the goddamn "You blew the Cybermen up - WITH LOVE" resolution. A world of UGHHHHHH, I tell you what. The bits with Stormageddon, Destroyer of Worlds, Talking Baby Extraordinaire, charmed me, just because Matt Smith knows how to work a baby as an accessory and I am a sucker for babies, but they were pretty tired too. Perhaps it didn't cross the pond, Doctor Who writers, but Hollywood made that movie a few times in the 1990s, and it wasn't funny then either. All this was just lazy, lax writing, and I could probably forgive it, except.
AMY POND IS A MODEL/FRAGRANCE MANUFACTURER. WHAT. THE. SHIT. When the little girl came up for an autograph, I was rooting for my own personal fanon, Children's Book Author, but nope. To all indications, she's a model. Or one of those professionally useless persons with a fragrance. I am in no way disparaging models or modelling, but little girls get enough encouragement to go into fame for fame's sake these days. I'd much rather have seen Amy get famous for her lively imagination, rather than her (admittedly good) looks.
The Wedding of River Song:
Wow. Not - not really sure how to go about this. I just watched this with my best friend, C. (ETA: who, I just realized, is not the same C. I mentioned in an earlier Doctor Who discussion, so let's make him an H. instead), who's also a rabid Who fan, and - well.
I didn't like it.
Don't get me wrong - I LOVED lots of little pieces of it. I loved the pterodactyls and Winston Caesar and the dirigible rush hour. I loved Live Chess and the chattering skulls and the Doctor's brief crossover with Indiana Jones. I really, really, really fucking loved Pond, Amelia Pond, and Rory, ever the good soldier, and Amy becoming a stone-cold killer because some things you can never forgive. I loved their little family reunion, that quiet moment where Mama and daughter had a chance to talk honestly. I wish that had lasted longer, I really really do. All the atmospherics were in place for me to love this.
I just couldn't love the plot.
I'm used to Doctor Who having plot holes big enough for a smallish continent to drift through, but this was just too much. First of all, the reinterpretation of the "Silence will Fall" prophecy to refer to the Doctor's death felt like a cop-out, even though I know it must have been planned. More importantly, given the posited condition of "The universe can't reboot unless the Doctor is removed from it," having the Doctor in the universe after the reboot is definitely cheating. Wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey has always been Moffat's philosophy, I know, but here is was just offensively abused, and I couldn't get past it to the cleansing catharsis that a good season finale should be.
The temptation on the Intarwebs seems to be to make your approval or disapproval of this episode a litmus test for How Much You Love River Song, so let me be clear: I'm pretty darn okay with River Song as a character. I like her best when she's vaguely psychopathic and getting into shenanigans and being smarter and more fabulous than anyone on screen, because I approve of adventuring archaeologists. I like her least when she's getting maudlin and being pitched as The Doctor's Destined Soulmate, because Destined Romance makes my teeth itch at the best of times, and this plotline, with the Doctor's heavy involvement in River's childhood, is definitely not the best of times. In this episode, River Song was high on the maudlin destiny and low on the fabulous shenanigans, and thus I found it very difficult to care about her destruction of the universe to save the Doctor. I don't think it was wrong, or noble, or stupid, exactly; I just didn't care.
It's interesting, because when Rose/Ten was going on my little shipper heart was on a fucking roller coaster, but I've never really had Feelings about River/Eleven. I think a big part of it is the Destined Romance aspect. When River Song first appeared, I was optimistic, because it seemed like Ten, for the first time, had a shot at a romance of equals. River was intelligent, badass, and knew how to fly the TARDIS. Then Eleven and River started flirting, and, well, they had some decent chemistry, but it wasn't really magnetic. I could live with it, but it didn't really gun my engine one way or another. Then the plot rolled on, and - oh, apparently River's entire life was built around the Doctor. Literally. And I find that disturbing. For the first part of her childhood, she was focused on killing him; for a good part of her adulthood, she was focused on finding him; and now, she's married him. That is, I suppose, in keeping with the long Doctor Who tradition of an exotic traveller who drops in to sweep impressionable young girls off their feet, but there's a reason why Donna's a favorite companion - it's nice when the Doctor has someone to stand up to him.
It boils down to this: I wanted River and the Doctor in a massive fiery tango with knives and badinage, spanning centuries and consuming civilizations. I got a wedding. I still have hopes that once next season rolls around, I'll be able to get over it, but for now - eggghhhh.
On a happier fannish note, I just mainlined two books and a novella in the space of 24 hours. That hasn't happened in a while.
The Newsflesh trilogy, which currently consists of Feed and Deadline, follows two adoptive siblings, Georgia and Shaun Mason, as they cover a presidential election for their blog about 20 years after the zombie apocalypse, known in this canon as The Rising. And y'all, it hit me where I live. Political scandal! Internet culture! Surprisingly accurate epidemiology and viral evolution! The response of a society to apocalyptic events! Pervasive yet not cloying references to Edgar Allen Poe! AND ZOMBIES!
OH MY SAINTED AUNT'S PANTS. GEORGE IS ALIVE!!! THEY CLONED HER!! SHE AND SHAUN CAN MEET UP AND TAKE DOWN THE CDC TOGETHER!!! THIS IS THE BEST THING EVER. I am making grabby hands at the future, willing it to be May 2012 so I can read the next book in what I hope will be an increasingly inaccurately named trilogy. I'm honestly not certain what I want more from this fandom, political and medical worldbuilding or canon incest porn, and wow, that's a sentence I'd never thought I'd type. I shipped George/Shaun like burning basically from the word go, but it was still kind of a shock when it was revealed in Deadline.
Anyone have any recs for Newsflesh/want to babble about what you want to see from the fandom? Because I want to babble about what I want from this fandom. Quite badly.
So right now, I think my Yuletide nominations list has been refined to Newsflesh, The Night Circus, and a third as-yet-undecided fandom, possibly Raging Phoenix, possibly Clueless. I'll trust that someone else will pick up Young Wizards.
Closing Time:
There was so much about this episode that I disliked. Every trope that made it run seemed to have been stolen from last century's comedy playbook: the vaguely misogynistic "wife leaves for a weekend, hopeless husband fails to cope" premise; the vaguely homophobic "Ha Ha someone's mistaken the Doctor and Craig for gay" subplot; and, of course, the goddamn "You blew the Cybermen up - WITH LOVE" resolution. A world of UGHHHHHH, I tell you what. The bits with Stormageddon, Destroyer of Worlds, Talking Baby Extraordinaire, charmed me, just because Matt Smith knows how to work a baby as an accessory and I am a sucker for babies, but they were pretty tired too. Perhaps it didn't cross the pond, Doctor Who writers, but Hollywood made that movie a few times in the 1990s, and it wasn't funny then either. All this was just lazy, lax writing, and I could probably forgive it, except.
AMY POND IS A MODEL/FRAGRANCE MANUFACTURER. WHAT. THE. SHIT. When the little girl came up for an autograph, I was rooting for my own personal fanon, Children's Book Author, but nope. To all indications, she's a model. Or one of those professionally useless persons with a fragrance. I am in no way disparaging models or modelling, but little girls get enough encouragement to go into fame for fame's sake these days. I'd much rather have seen Amy get famous for her lively imagination, rather than her (admittedly good) looks.
The Wedding of River Song:
Wow. Not - not really sure how to go about this. I just watched this with my best friend, C. (ETA: who, I just realized, is not the same C. I mentioned in an earlier Doctor Who discussion, so let's make him an H. instead), who's also a rabid Who fan, and - well.
I didn't like it.
Don't get me wrong - I LOVED lots of little pieces of it. I loved the pterodactyls and Winston Caesar and the dirigible rush hour. I loved Live Chess and the chattering skulls and the Doctor's brief crossover with Indiana Jones. I really, really, really fucking loved Pond, Amelia Pond, and Rory, ever the good soldier, and Amy becoming a stone-cold killer because some things you can never forgive. I loved their little family reunion, that quiet moment where Mama and daughter had a chance to talk honestly. I wish that had lasted longer, I really really do. All the atmospherics were in place for me to love this.
I just couldn't love the plot.
I'm used to Doctor Who having plot holes big enough for a smallish continent to drift through, but this was just too much. First of all, the reinterpretation of the "Silence will Fall" prophecy to refer to the Doctor's death felt like a cop-out, even though I know it must have been planned. More importantly, given the posited condition of "The universe can't reboot unless the Doctor is removed from it," having the Doctor in the universe after the reboot is definitely cheating. Wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey has always been Moffat's philosophy, I know, but here is was just offensively abused, and I couldn't get past it to the cleansing catharsis that a good season finale should be.
The temptation on the Intarwebs seems to be to make your approval or disapproval of this episode a litmus test for How Much You Love River Song, so let me be clear: I'm pretty darn okay with River Song as a character. I like her best when she's vaguely psychopathic and getting into shenanigans and being smarter and more fabulous than anyone on screen, because I approve of adventuring archaeologists. I like her least when she's getting maudlin and being pitched as The Doctor's Destined Soulmate, because Destined Romance makes my teeth itch at the best of times, and this plotline, with the Doctor's heavy involvement in River's childhood, is definitely not the best of times. In this episode, River Song was high on the maudlin destiny and low on the fabulous shenanigans, and thus I found it very difficult to care about her destruction of the universe to save the Doctor. I don't think it was wrong, or noble, or stupid, exactly; I just didn't care.
It's interesting, because when Rose/Ten was going on my little shipper heart was on a fucking roller coaster, but I've never really had Feelings about River/Eleven. I think a big part of it is the Destined Romance aspect. When River Song first appeared, I was optimistic, because it seemed like Ten, for the first time, had a shot at a romance of equals. River was intelligent, badass, and knew how to fly the TARDIS. Then Eleven and River started flirting, and, well, they had some decent chemistry, but it wasn't really magnetic. I could live with it, but it didn't really gun my engine one way or another. Then the plot rolled on, and - oh, apparently River's entire life was built around the Doctor. Literally. And I find that disturbing. For the first part of her childhood, she was focused on killing him; for a good part of her adulthood, she was focused on finding him; and now, she's married him. That is, I suppose, in keeping with the long Doctor Who tradition of an exotic traveller who drops in to sweep impressionable young girls off their feet, but there's a reason why Donna's a favorite companion - it's nice when the Doctor has someone to stand up to him.
It boils down to this: I wanted River and the Doctor in a massive fiery tango with knives and badinage, spanning centuries and consuming civilizations. I got a wedding. I still have hopes that once next season rolls around, I'll be able to get over it, but for now - eggghhhh.
On a happier fannish note, I just mainlined two books and a novella in the space of 24 hours. That hasn't happened in a while.
The Newsflesh trilogy, which currently consists of Feed and Deadline, follows two adoptive siblings, Georgia and Shaun Mason, as they cover a presidential election for their blog about 20 years after the zombie apocalypse, known in this canon as The Rising. And y'all, it hit me where I live. Political scandal! Internet culture! Surprisingly accurate epidemiology and viral evolution! The response of a society to apocalyptic events! Pervasive yet not cloying references to Edgar Allen Poe! AND ZOMBIES!
OH MY SAINTED AUNT'S PANTS. GEORGE IS ALIVE!!! THEY CLONED HER!! SHE AND SHAUN CAN MEET UP AND TAKE DOWN THE CDC TOGETHER!!! THIS IS THE BEST THING EVER. I am making grabby hands at the future, willing it to be May 2012 so I can read the next book in what I hope will be an increasingly inaccurately named trilogy. I'm honestly not certain what I want more from this fandom, political and medical worldbuilding or canon incest porn, and wow, that's a sentence I'd never thought I'd type. I shipped George/Shaun like burning basically from the word go, but it was still kind of a shock when it was revealed in Deadline.
Anyone have any recs for Newsflesh/want to babble about what you want to see from the fandom? Because I want to babble about what I want from this fandom. Quite badly.
So right now, I think my Yuletide nominations list has been refined to Newsflesh, The Night Circus, and a third as-yet-undecided fandom, possibly Raging Phoenix, possibly Clueless. I'll trust that someone else will pick up Young Wizards.
no subject
Date: 2011-10-04 01:53 pm (UTC)Also, I think
*cough* http://seanan.next-crisis.org ;)
no subject
Date: 2011-10-04 03:02 pm (UTC)This may be a bit insensitive, because I know you run a lot of fanlistings, but - I came into fandom directly from Livejournal without passing "Go," and I've always been a bit vague on what they actually do. Is it a mailing list? An online rolecall?
no subject
Date: 2011-10-04 06:17 pm (UTC)That's not a problem! Not everyone does know about fanlistings. I've been doing them for about eight years now. Basically, it's sort of both an online roll-call and a way for fannish people who like the same things to find each other online; if you have a website or journal, you can have it listed at the fanlisting and put a pretty button on your site to show that you're a fan of [x] thing/person/place/lots of other stuff. If you don't have a website, you can join all the same, just to put your name on the list and show that you love this thing. You can hide your email if you prefer, or not. Some fanlisting owners use them as mailing lists and combined fansites, but I generally don't - though I do have a couple of fanlistings that are also integrated shrines, like Prophecy of Light. The original ('official') network is at http://thefanlistings.org and lists over 25,000 fanlistings. I have about 110 now. :) Does that help?
(wandering over via capslock_dreamwidth, I think...)
Date: 2011-10-31 02:59 pm (UTC)(Other than that it's supposed to be a pretty closed canon though.)
Re: (wandering over via capslock_dreamwidth, I think...)
Date: 2011-11-01 12:00 am (UTC)Also, tapeworms? Huh. I can't wait to see where she goes with that.
Re: (wandering over via capslock_dreamwidth, I think...)
Date: 2011-11-01 05:31 am (UTC)I can't wait to see where she goes with the concept, although zombies are already into my squick territory, tapeworms more so, but it is her and basically if she writes it, I will try reading it once.