Update on this morning's post: my sister has gleefully got in on the reality-bending. She thinks the Tommy Westphall theory is nuts, but she must have been kinda inspired for the idea she contributed this afternoon.
Torchwood was on, so I joined her to laugh at it, but was foiled because it happened to be one of my genuine favourite episodes: "Adam", in which the team is infiltrated by a man who can manipulate memories. Hilarity, and mucho angst ensuses, but my sister's stroke of genius is that potentially anything in that episode is dodgy. She identified the low-light of the episode, Jack's maudlin flashback - "it was the worst day of my life!" the Man of Plywood describes the massacre of his entire village, as if he'd missed the bus. Once he realises what Adam is, Jack is sorely tempted to ask him to unlock those memories he's supressed. Oceanic's idea is that, actually, it's part of a larger trap by Adam, and those very memories are also fake.
Pretty smart, fairly likely - and this is an especially alluring theory, because it calls into question the existance of Jack's brother Gray, and potentially removes from canon that awful season finale where Gray turns up, pretending to be a fascinating arch-nemesis, when in actual fact he's a wooden whine with a 30 year grudge against his brother on very shaky ground.
Hell, it potentially invalidates the second half of the season, and everything that comes after. Do characters who die in Adam's fake-memory season 2 actually die in real life? We can only wonder. Aw, we love Torchwood really. I'm looking forward to the week-long five-part miniseries. I'm looking forward to pointing, and laughing, for 45 minutes every day for a week. Then saying nasty things about it on my blog. It's a love-hate thing: we watch it cos we're desperate and the Mother Show isn't on air, then punish it for not being Doctor Who. Also, it's crap.
We're off to see relatives tomorrow: the worst of both worlds. It's my time off, so I want to either be totally self-denying and workworkworkworkwork till my hands bleed - or totally selfish, say by locking myself in a garret and finishing any one of my numerous projects. Any other time spent is time spent in limbo. My relatives must think I'm a real sulky sod, but it's because when I spend time with them they have me at my worst possible period. I'm not free to devote three hours to restructuring a single paragraph of prose (or rather, I am free, but I'd feel bad doing that - self-loathing!). I'm sans friends, and boy do I get disproportionately unhappy without them. And finally, no piano. It's only a small thing, but boy does it grate on me. In other words, I'm in a constant state of moping, I don't enjoy it and they surely can't. It's not that I don't want to spend time with them, goodness knows I do. I suppose, on my terms. My terms include friends, literature breaks and a piano. In other words, three methods to ignore them entirely.
Boy, is that bitter! I don't mean it nastily. I do want to spend time with my relatives. It'd just be nice if their presence didn't bar me from those few comforts that make me a sane and sociable individual. In any case, I'm back in Hampstead on Tuesday and will be spending the week chained to a desk, but it'd be nice to see people. It'll be like prison, with visiting hours, and profundis will be Realism in Cinema and Gladiatorial Games.
This evening has been brightened by me watching - enduring - the first two episodes of Blake's 7. Wikipedia describes the show as memorable for it's "dark tone, moral ambiguity and strong characterisation." So I should have been prepared, but something about the fact it was made in the 70s, combined with the fact my dad has been describing it as "tackier than Doctor Who".
Oh my. I know that too much of the aforementioned show has softened my resolve, made me really sensitive to violence because it's so tame, made me genuinely shocked by unpleasantness because it's so friendly. But it struck me at once how nihilistic the whole thing is. It starts with our hero being party to mass murder, and it's unpleasantly shot for retro television, yet via one of the most terrifyingly corrupt and efficient eeeevil dictatorships I have ever seen, it's only the beginning of 100 minutes of good, clean fun: multiple betrayal, manipulation, multiple paedophilia, downright cruelty, attempted (or in any case, threatened) rape, a 98% death count for named characters, even ones you think are going to make it onto the regular cast, and a total lack of joy.
And I love it. There's something very...well, non-rubbish about it. Ignoring some shoddy modelwork, and you do have to, the world is brilliantly drawn. It feels very real. And it works: when two NPCs discuss loudly and in public about how they're going to bring down the government, he actually takes notice. And because seemingly everyone in this world except Blake is a sour bastard, he then notifies the authorities, and everyone gets killed. I've just sat through 100 minutes of the hero, failing, failing, failing, failing. In fact, I know the ultimate spoiler about this show - and that alone is reason to keep watching. In other words, it understands irony and isn't afraid of being downright cruel. It's also shot very intensely. Yet the fact it's an old series make these things more shocking, because you know a new series has virtually no limit when it comes to sex, violence, swearing, even special effects. I've always been more intrigued and impressed in older works, because you do expect them to be tamer.
So why are we watching it? Well I do love my retro telly, and even though I'd just as enthusiastically watch Space: 1999 or Star Trek, this is fondly remembered by my dad. But Blake's 7 is special - it was created by Terry Nation, our own personal Davros and creator of the Dalek race, albeit in fiction. And there are literally hundreds of crossovers, be it in cast, crew, props or plots. Even in the first episode I spotted a futuristic sofa which the Sixth Doctor had sat on in Timelash. That episode stars Paul Darrow (a.k.a. Avon) in an appallingly hammy cameo, but I've heard it rumoured the entire thing was vengeance for an even hammier cameo by Colin Baker in Blake's 7. That'll be one to watch. There's a healthy fan theory they exist in the same universe, and one I support so far. Obviously, there are strong stylistic similarities, especially the cross-pollination of props and costumes, and in the way it is shot. I've found where to put it too - Frontier in Space has a human Federation with a president, like the one namechecked here. And Caves of Androzani, god those gun runners, are also straight out of this universe. To be honest, I didn't think retro telly got any nastier than that episode. It does: it's here, and roll on boxed set!
Torchwood was on, so I joined her to laugh at it, but was foiled because it happened to be one of my genuine favourite episodes: "Adam", in which the team is infiltrated by a man who can manipulate memories. Hilarity, and mucho angst ensuses, but my sister's stroke of genius is that potentially anything in that episode is dodgy. She identified the low-light of the episode, Jack's maudlin flashback - "it was the worst day of my life!" the Man of Plywood describes the massacre of his entire village, as if he'd missed the bus. Once he realises what Adam is, Jack is sorely tempted to ask him to unlock those memories he's supressed. Oceanic's idea is that, actually, it's part of a larger trap by Adam, and those very memories are also fake.
Pretty smart, fairly likely - and this is an especially alluring theory, because it calls into question the existance of Jack's brother Gray, and potentially removes from canon that awful season finale where Gray turns up, pretending to be a fascinating arch-nemesis, when in actual fact he's a wooden whine with a 30 year grudge against his brother on very shaky ground.
Hell, it potentially invalidates the second half of the season, and everything that comes after. Do characters who die in Adam's fake-memory season 2 actually die in real life? We can only wonder. Aw, we love Torchwood really. I'm looking forward to the week-long five-part miniseries. I'm looking forward to pointing, and laughing, for 45 minutes every day for a week. Then saying nasty things about it on my blog. It's a love-hate thing: we watch it cos we're desperate and the Mother Show isn't on air, then punish it for not being Doctor Who. Also, it's crap.
We're off to see relatives tomorrow: the worst of both worlds. It's my time off, so I want to either be totally self-denying and workworkworkworkwork till my hands bleed - or totally selfish, say by locking myself in a garret and finishing any one of my numerous projects. Any other time spent is time spent in limbo. My relatives must think I'm a real sulky sod, but it's because when I spend time with them they have me at my worst possible period. I'm not free to devote three hours to restructuring a single paragraph of prose (or rather, I am free, but I'd feel bad doing that - self-loathing!). I'm sans friends, and boy do I get disproportionately unhappy without them. And finally, no piano. It's only a small thing, but boy does it grate on me. In other words, I'm in a constant state of moping, I don't enjoy it and they surely can't. It's not that I don't want to spend time with them, goodness knows I do. I suppose, on my terms. My terms include friends, literature breaks and a piano. In other words, three methods to ignore them entirely.
Boy, is that bitter! I don't mean it nastily. I do want to spend time with my relatives. It'd just be nice if their presence didn't bar me from those few comforts that make me a sane and sociable individual. In any case, I'm back in Hampstead on Tuesday and will be spending the week chained to a desk, but it'd be nice to see people. It'll be like prison, with visiting hours, and profundis will be Realism in Cinema and Gladiatorial Games.
This evening has been brightened by me watching - enduring - the first two episodes of Blake's 7. Wikipedia describes the show as memorable for it's "dark tone, moral ambiguity and strong characterisation." So I should have been prepared, but something about the fact it was made in the 70s, combined with the fact my dad has been describing it as "tackier than Doctor Who".
Oh my. I know that too much of the aforementioned show has softened my resolve, made me really sensitive to violence because it's so tame, made me genuinely shocked by unpleasantness because it's so friendly. But it struck me at once how nihilistic the whole thing is. It starts with our hero being party to mass murder, and it's unpleasantly shot for retro television, yet via one of the most terrifyingly corrupt and efficient eeeevil dictatorships I have ever seen, it's only the beginning of 100 minutes of good, clean fun: multiple betrayal, manipulation, multiple paedophilia, downright cruelty, attempted (or in any case, threatened) rape, a 98% death count for named characters, even ones you think are going to make it onto the regular cast, and a total lack of joy.
And I love it. There's something very...well, non-rubbish about it. Ignoring some shoddy modelwork, and you do have to, the world is brilliantly drawn. It feels very real. And it works: when two NPCs discuss loudly and in public about how they're going to bring down the government, he actually takes notice. And because seemingly everyone in this world except Blake is a sour bastard, he then notifies the authorities, and everyone gets killed. I've just sat through 100 minutes of the hero, failing, failing, failing, failing. In fact, I know the ultimate spoiler about this show - and that alone is reason to keep watching. In other words, it understands irony and isn't afraid of being downright cruel. It's also shot very intensely. Yet the fact it's an old series make these things more shocking, because you know a new series has virtually no limit when it comes to sex, violence, swearing, even special effects. I've always been more intrigued and impressed in older works, because you do expect them to be tamer.
So why are we watching it? Well I do love my retro telly, and even though I'd just as enthusiastically watch Space: 1999 or Star Trek, this is fondly remembered by my dad. But Blake's 7 is special - it was created by Terry Nation, our own personal Davros and creator of the Dalek race, albeit in fiction. And there are literally hundreds of crossovers, be it in cast, crew, props or plots. Even in the first episode I spotted a futuristic sofa which the Sixth Doctor had sat on in Timelash. That episode stars Paul Darrow (a.k.a. Avon) in an appallingly hammy cameo, but I've heard it rumoured the entire thing was vengeance for an even hammier cameo by Colin Baker in Blake's 7. That'll be one to watch. There's a healthy fan theory they exist in the same universe, and one I support so far. Obviously, there are strong stylistic similarities, especially the cross-pollination of props and costumes, and in the way it is shot. I've found where to put it too - Frontier in Space has a human Federation with a president, like the one namechecked here. And Caves of Androzani, god those gun runners, are also straight out of this universe. To be honest, I didn't think retro telly got any nastier than that episode. It does: it's here, and roll on boxed set!
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