Early morning, so I'm still in my dream - which featured me and the Fifth Doctor, a room full of baddies and a physical fist fight between the two sides. 'Twas a pretty cool dream, because even though "Warriors of the Deep" stands as testiment that 5 is perfectly capable of beating people up (if he absolutely has to), this Pertwee-style diving in hi-yah!
Probably because I was working on my comic last night. Plot so far: the Master works out there is only one person he can rely on - himself. So he skips back through time and liberates his former selves, and the four of them unite to take over the universe. Four = Delgado, Ainley, Roberts and Simm. I decided the "corpse masters" were in no fit state to do other than rasp, and Derek Jacobi is only the Master for about three minutes. And not even in my mangled canon could I fish him out. Pity, as he's my favourite. It's brilliant, and I'm very proud of my grasp of the dialogue. The plot isn't bad either. The problem is, some scenes I can only make work in my head, and look strange written down. I'm also conscious that I hate Doctor Who novels for being angsty and violent, so am working very very hard to keep it tame and angst free. Yet remove the angst, you lose the drama and danger. Plus, at least one of the four Masters comes from a very bad place, and all he wants to do is hurt things. The chief problem is I'm not up to it, and even if he wants to remove the Doctor's fingers one at a time before toasting them on kebab skewers while singing an aria, I'm not going to sit there and let him do it.
And indeed, that's probably where the dream came from - because one of the scenes I've envisaged but can't draw is the Doc and one Master actually descending to physical violence. It'd never happen on TV, but it's meant to be strange. Putting it on paper is too strange, though, and might I add, way way too slashy. I freely admit that the slash exists there, so like the show, it's innuendo-y without actually directly confirming or denying anything. Script also includes the line: "The Master sent you flowers?". But it makes sense in context.
Russell T. Davies has this to say on the subject:
I watched and enjoyed the Doctor Who special. Some 12 hours after the rest of the country, which is a shame. More than perhaps any other show - except maybe the 9'oclock news - people sit down to watch it live. It is a television event, and one shared by so many different groups. I like the idea that there are families around the country experiencing at the same time as I am.
The internet is being over-critical, but I don't think that's fair. Yes, everyone prefers the smart-and-upsetting episodes - yet the power of, say, and "Earthshock" is that is comes as a shock. See Galactica, Hellblazer or Torchwood for an example of people getting this wrong: a gruelling experience every single week. For me, it quickly becomes wearying. Perhaps it's just because I engage too deeply with the fiction, and can't physically go through that many high-tension, high-emotion events?
It's a fantasy novel cliche, and whether it's true of real life is debatable. Yet in terms of fiction, light needs dark, dark needs light - they are what define each other. The "everybody lives!" end of Empty Child is only powerful because the Doctor usually gets extras killed off with alarming regularity. But the same goes for Warriors of the Deep, which features the Doctor getting some 200 humans-and-Silurians killed through a bad mix of compassion, doubt, good faith and bad conscience. It packs a punch through being suprisingly dark, just as Empty Child is suprisingly happy. Those two episodes which culminate in dead companions are only moving, intense because there are 31 other companions who left safe and in one piece.
The point is, Doctor Who needs these stopgap episodes, the Shakespeare Codes and Unicorn and the Wasps, to give the significant episodes their power, and with three hours of Tennant left on telly, it's going to be full-throttle emotional onslaught from here onwards. In addition, it's one of the brilliant things about this show that it can be something different every week, from real-life drama, gothic horror, icky horror, epic fantasy - right the way to daft comedic runabouts on the other end of the spectrum. It's occured to me before that the problems I have appreciating other TV shows might just be one of tone, because I'm spoilt by a show which can be different every single week. Particularly Galactica, now I've got to the end of my fourth season of them sitting around on the same six sets. Yawn, another Viper battle? Another emotional challenge for contemporary America? But it can't jump like we do.
My point is, Planet of the Dead wasn't trying to be intelligent or thought provoking - it was about a bunch of commuters crashing on Tattooine and featured the Doctor attempting to make alien technology compatable with a London bus, while eating an easter egg and flirting with Lara Croft. Yet if you accept its dramatic ambitions were small, you can't deny it did exactly what it was trying to do brilliantly. Full review on my blog: http://malcassairo.blogspot.com/
Other news? Still ploughing through that darn essay, and fanmixing. One of the things I truly adore about Spotify is that companies have uploaded their entire catalogues, which means some really odd stuff has slipped through. How else could I listen to "Moog Rock - Classic Hits"? Or "Balm of Gilead", a really limp rendition of Gospel songs by a gal with a guitar interspersed with maudlin facts about slavery. Other sources, and yes I admit ones of potentially shaky legality such as Youtube, always had the problem of relying on what the web could find - which meant hugely popular. Bad for me, who likes my music bizzare or obscure. Spotify might have weird absences like Peter Gabriel, Pink Floyd and the Beatles. But it makes up for it by having the full back catalogues of other Genesis alumni - Tony Banks and Steve Hackett. Several albums worth of the wonderful Victor Borge. Lots of Rick Wakeman. And of the more mainstream crowd, all their demos and extra tracks which I never got due to sticking to albums. Banks'n'Hackett are my real treat, though, because as a family we have all their LPs and have yet to upgrade to CD.
As a student, I haven't been able to take any CDs with me to uni, certainly no LPs; and my mp3 memory is pitifully small. So it's great to look up whole albums which we have at home, and I had to leave behind. Furthermore, the oppertunity for finding single, rare tracks is wonderful. For years, I've wanted to hear Jeff Buckley's cover of "Back in NYC", but never known where to start. It's great, as good as the original. Or I've a strong dislike of Coldplay, but have a true fondness for "Violet Hill". After that, things like a nice interface and playlisting capabilities are just added bonuses.
Some people have raised the artists as an issue. My thoughts are they're likely getting more this way than through sheer piracy. Furthermore, Friend 2 introduced me to the program, and she knows her music and has a policy of buying albums of small bands to support them, so I find it hard to believe she'd do it if it was that bad.
Finally, my first Lord M watch has broken. It's slightly, but not much like the real thing - too small, opens in the wrong direction - I got it from "Pocket Watches of the World" magazine. Later, my friends teamed up to get me a proper one, and while that's not perfect either, the heaviness is better and it's engraved with his father's initials. But the broken-ness of the first one unnerves me a little, because if we're going to talk about the fictional watch in detail, it's broken and can't be wound. It was probably a metaphor for something at the time...
Probably because I was working on my comic last night. Plot so far: the Master works out there is only one person he can rely on - himself. So he skips back through time and liberates his former selves, and the four of them unite to take over the universe. Four = Delgado, Ainley, Roberts and Simm. I decided the "corpse masters" were in no fit state to do other than rasp, and Derek Jacobi is only the Master for about three minutes. And not even in my mangled canon could I fish him out. Pity, as he's my favourite. It's brilliant, and I'm very proud of my grasp of the dialogue. The plot isn't bad either. The problem is, some scenes I can only make work in my head, and look strange written down. I'm also conscious that I hate Doctor Who novels for being angsty and violent, so am working very very hard to keep it tame and angst free. Yet remove the angst, you lose the drama and danger. Plus, at least one of the four Masters comes from a very bad place, and all he wants to do is hurt things. The chief problem is I'm not up to it, and even if he wants to remove the Doctor's fingers one at a time before toasting them on kebab skewers while singing an aria, I'm not going to sit there and let him do it.
And indeed, that's probably where the dream came from - because one of the scenes I've envisaged but can't draw is the Doc and one Master actually descending to physical violence. It'd never happen on TV, but it's meant to be strange. Putting it on paper is too strange, though, and might I add, way way too slashy. I freely admit that the slash exists there, so like the show, it's innuendo-y without actually directly confirming or denying anything. Script also includes the line: "The Master sent you flowers?". But it makes sense in context.
Russell T. Davies has this to say on the subject:
"You've got to be merciless. People will say 'You love your characters'. But nobody loves their characters that much. If you really write, and you love them, you are the God of them and you can kill them with the click of a finger. It's joyous to do so."Good for you, Russ. I wish I had your nerves.
I watched and enjoyed the Doctor Who special. Some 12 hours after the rest of the country, which is a shame. More than perhaps any other show - except maybe the 9'oclock news - people sit down to watch it live. It is a television event, and one shared by so many different groups. I like the idea that there are families around the country experiencing at the same time as I am.
The internet is being over-critical, but I don't think that's fair. Yes, everyone prefers the smart-and-upsetting episodes - yet the power of, say, and "Earthshock" is that is comes as a shock. See Galactica, Hellblazer or Torchwood for an example of people getting this wrong: a gruelling experience every single week. For me, it quickly becomes wearying. Perhaps it's just because I engage too deeply with the fiction, and can't physically go through that many high-tension, high-emotion events?
It's a fantasy novel cliche, and whether it's true of real life is debatable. Yet in terms of fiction, light needs dark, dark needs light - they are what define each other. The "everybody lives!" end of Empty Child is only powerful because the Doctor usually gets extras killed off with alarming regularity. But the same goes for Warriors of the Deep, which features the Doctor getting some 200 humans-and-Silurians killed through a bad mix of compassion, doubt, good faith and bad conscience. It packs a punch through being suprisingly dark, just as Empty Child is suprisingly happy. Those two episodes which culminate in dead companions are only moving, intense because there are 31 other companions who left safe and in one piece.
The point is, Doctor Who needs these stopgap episodes, the Shakespeare Codes and Unicorn and the Wasps, to give the significant episodes their power, and with three hours of Tennant left on telly, it's going to be full-throttle emotional onslaught from here onwards. In addition, it's one of the brilliant things about this show that it can be something different every week, from real-life drama, gothic horror, icky horror, epic fantasy - right the way to daft comedic runabouts on the other end of the spectrum. It's occured to me before that the problems I have appreciating other TV shows might just be one of tone, because I'm spoilt by a show which can be different every single week. Particularly Galactica, now I've got to the end of my fourth season of them sitting around on the same six sets. Yawn, another Viper battle? Another emotional challenge for contemporary America? But it can't jump like we do.
My point is, Planet of the Dead wasn't trying to be intelligent or thought provoking - it was about a bunch of commuters crashing on Tattooine and featured the Doctor attempting to make alien technology compatable with a London bus, while eating an easter egg and flirting with Lara Croft. Yet if you accept its dramatic ambitions were small, you can't deny it did exactly what it was trying to do brilliantly. Full review on my blog: http://malcassairo.blogspot.com/
Other news? Still ploughing through that darn essay, and fanmixing. One of the things I truly adore about Spotify is that companies have uploaded their entire catalogues, which means some really odd stuff has slipped through. How else could I listen to "Moog Rock - Classic Hits"? Or "Balm of Gilead", a really limp rendition of Gospel songs by a gal with a guitar interspersed with maudlin facts about slavery. Other sources, and yes I admit ones of potentially shaky legality such as Youtube, always had the problem of relying on what the web could find - which meant hugely popular. Bad for me, who likes my music bizzare or obscure. Spotify might have weird absences like Peter Gabriel, Pink Floyd and the Beatles. But it makes up for it by having the full back catalogues of other Genesis alumni - Tony Banks and Steve Hackett. Several albums worth of the wonderful Victor Borge. Lots of Rick Wakeman. And of the more mainstream crowd, all their demos and extra tracks which I never got due to sticking to albums. Banks'n'Hackett are my real treat, though, because as a family we have all their LPs and have yet to upgrade to CD.
As a student, I haven't been able to take any CDs with me to uni, certainly no LPs; and my mp3 memory is pitifully small. So it's great to look up whole albums which we have at home, and I had to leave behind. Furthermore, the oppertunity for finding single, rare tracks is wonderful. For years, I've wanted to hear Jeff Buckley's cover of "Back in NYC", but never known where to start. It's great, as good as the original. Or I've a strong dislike of Coldplay, but have a true fondness for "Violet Hill". After that, things like a nice interface and playlisting capabilities are just added bonuses.
Some people have raised the artists as an issue. My thoughts are they're likely getting more this way than through sheer piracy. Furthermore, Friend 2 introduced me to the program, and she knows her music and has a policy of buying albums of small bands to support them, so I find it hard to believe she'd do it if it was that bad.
Finally, my first Lord M watch has broken. It's slightly, but not much like the real thing - too small, opens in the wrong direction - I got it from "Pocket Watches of the World" magazine. Later, my friends teamed up to get me a proper one, and while that's not perfect either, the heaviness is better and it's engraved with his father's initials. But the broken-ness of the first one unnerves me a little, because if we're going to talk about the fictional watch in detail, it's broken and can't be wound. It was probably a metaphor for something at the time...
Comments (1)
(Episode whinge.) I thought the ep was rubbish, tbh. Can't believe they had Daniel Kaluuya as one of the (pointless) extras and didn't use him. Michelle Ryan was very, very annoying, as was the applause at the end- wanted her smug face to hit the wheel or something. The music was really intrusive too. Am amused on two points: the fact that Ten did all of the alien's lines (could they not afford another actor?) and the absolutely bizarre "that's why the aristocracy continues- cos we're always ready" line. I mean, what???
On the 'not too bad for small artists' line that's perfectly true. It's basically 'bands get small amount of revenue' versus 'download it and they get absolutely NO payback' so who's it hurting.
Re earlier point- the Manics gig is really, really not a reunion gig. XD if it was a reunion gig THERE WOULD BE NO DEBATE!!
Final note: cannot stop laughing at the fact you mention the 9 o'clock news. You're so brilliantly out of touch you weirdo XD (it's been nearly TEN YEARS since it stopped, and moved to 10pm!!)
-Loz