I am a nerd. This is not news.

So I have been embracing my nerdiness recently. I’m in a Doctor Who phase, for one thing. This is mostly sparked by Christmas and the Christmas special being so well-done. Also, when my boyfriend and I went Christmas shopping, we saw a figurine collection of all eleven doctors, with their signature accessories (usually the sonic screwdriver), and it was actually well-done. Not all eleven doctors looked like their portrayer, but let’s say 8 out of 11 did. Which is pretty good for plastic. I’ve also been listening to the audio plays from Big Finish. I also blame Christmas for this: they’re kind of perfect for long flights when there’s nothing good being shown on the actual airline TVs. I read a lot of the time as well, of course, but would turn on the Big Finish when I just wanted to phase out. Also, Tor.com did “The Twelve Days of the Doctor” over the Christmas season, which just fed the obsession.

The other day, while I was home alone (since my actual Full-Time Job didn’t start until today), I extended the obsession. I watched all of the regeneration scenes, for each of the Doctors. And after each regeneration scene, I watched the first scene or two (or three) with the new Doctor – enough to see him reintroduce himself to the companion(s) and the situation and establish himself as a personality. The only one I didn’t watch this time was Four into Five, because I’ve seen Castrovalva a few times, and the last time was just a couple of months ago. Oh, and I limited myself to the “classic” Doctors, because obviously I’ve seen the new regenerations and establishing scenes more than a few times. They’ve kind of imprinted on me.

It was really interesting to see how the actors, writers, and directors established the departure of each Doctor and the arrival of each new Doctor. There were a few similarities, but mostly they were individual. One into Two is, sadly, lost as a video. There are reconstructions (which I watched) but the quality was so bad, and my understanding of the plot was so bad, that I didn’t really get a lot of it. I would wish, if it were any use, that there were more Troughton bits available – I think I would like him as a Doctor. I’ll watch what I can, when I can, though.

Two into Three was the forced regeneration. It was interesting that the Time Lords gave the Doctor a choice of face for this one – even though Pertwee wasn’t one of the choices. I wonder, had Pertwee been cast at this point? Or did they just want to surprise people at the start of the next episode? Pertwee started off as you would expect a disgraced, exiled, regenerated Time Lord to act: secretive, angry, upset and disappointed. It didn’t help that the Brigadier didn’t recognize him, and then he almost got kidnapped and had to escape in a wheelchair with masking tape over his mouth. There was a touch of “crazy man” about him, but not as much as the next one.

Three into Four was tricky. Sarah Jane had no idea what to expect, the Brigadier was surprised but quickly resigned himself to it, and a helper from, I assume, previous episodes had to come and speed things along a bit. And then Tom Baker appeared and “crazy man” absolutely took over. He is so….I’m not sure what the right word is. It’s not manic, because he’s more laid back than that. It’s not “crazy” with the negative connotations. But he’s kind of amnesiac at first, and then he absolutely refuses anyone’s assistance, advice, or presence. He disappears into the Tardis, apparently about to abandon Sarah Jane and the Brigadier, when it’s like something clicks back into place. That smile appears, his eyes go happily wide instead of the alert and wary wide they’ve been so far, and he snaps into place. In one episode – not even one episode – you know exactly what his Doctor is going to be like, and the key word is going to be “unpredictable”. He won’t hesitate to tie someone up in a closet by his bootlaces; he also won’t hear of anyone putting themselves in danger for him. You’ll think he’s placid until he explodes into a fury of activity.

Four into Five is different again. As he regenerates, Four sees visions of all of his previous enemies and companions. He’s also been warned by the Watcher (a white-wrapped figure, theoretically the Doctor’s potential next self, I think?) that a regeneration is coming, so it’s not as violent a “death” as some of the others (Three was attacked by mutant spiders, if I recall…). And then Five comes along and takes over the role. There’s a touch of amnesia, as is becoming usual, but it’s more that Five doesn’t know who Five is rather than he doesn’t know who the Doctor is. He progresses through each of his previous personalities – and is spot-on in doing so – before establishing himself. It’s a nice touch of continuity in a show that is notoriously – and necessarily – bad with continuity.

And it couldn’t be more different than Five into Six. The regeneration itself is fairly standard – it helped that both Peter Davison and Colin Baker had blond hair – but the establishing scenes make a very definite statement: this is not the same Doctor. After watching that bit, I can absolutely see why Colin Baker had trouble in the role. I can absolutely see why many fans didn’t like him, and why the ratings dropped so precipitously. He comes in to this established and loved series and says, paraphrasing only slightly, “I am not the Doctor that you have known and loved. I reject everything that has come before me, and if you don’t like it, too bad.” He dismisses Peri’s affection for the Doctor, he literally rejects every costume that his predecessors wore and chooses something (a garish coat-of-many-colours) that they themselves would have rejected.

I don’t see this as even mostly Colin Baker’s fault. He’s been wonderful in the audio dramas. His Doctor, when given a chance, is not really that different from the other Doctors – he’s just less gentle on first acquaintance. But first acquaintance is all that some people will give you – and when you reject and abandon the aspects that drew them to you in the first place, they won’t stick around to find out what you’re really like. And, like I say, this isn’t Colin Baker’s fault. He didn’t write the lines – he just delivered them. And I would imagine that he was given some input on how to deliver them. It can’t have been entirely his idea to make the first appearance of the Doctor so inherently unlikable.

With all that, and the behind-the-scenes BBC drama, it’s no wonder that Colin Baker, the public face of the Doctor, was fired – or that he refused to film a regeneration scene. So Six to Seven is a bit different again. The regeneration happens fairly quickly – I don’t even know how much lead-up to it there was in the previous episode – and then Seven is thrown straight into the new situation. No amnesia, no character-establishing scenes where he’s picking out a costume or looking at his new face. He wakes up, he’s face to face with the Rani, and he’s just there, dealing with it, the end.

I’ll stop there for now. There’s still the movie and New Who to get through, plus reactions to the Christmas special and excitement about the new season, and the audio plays, and I’ve read a couple of the novelizations (and got one for Christmas, yay)… plus there’s the additional geekery of getting into World of Warcraft for the first time (hey, it gives me contact time with the boy) and Eternal Sonata and a couple of anime shows….

Media Roundup, Part 1

I have been in a "long-form" video mood lately. Actually, I've been in a long-form everything mood: instead of single tracks, I've been listening to whole albums (Ocean Eyes, by Owl City, mostly, although I also finished the Ring last night) and instead of random TV episodes, I've been watching movies or whole series. (There is one tiny exception to this, which is Doctor Who, which is possibly self-explanatory.)

It started with Casualty 1900s, which I wrote about before and have watched all of about five more times since my birthday. But even I can't watch a series incessantly. I needed a break, something new and stimulating. But I was still in a "historical" mood, so bring on Foyle's War, which my best friend had been recommending for ages.

Foyle's War, if you don't know, is a British TV series set in WW2 Hastings. Each episode is about an hour and a half long (so two hours when it aired on ITV, a commercial network). Detective Chief Superintendent Foyle is a WW1 veteran who (eventually) sees his role in the war effort to be keeping down crime on the homefront - murder doesn't stop being murder just because there's a war on.

Each episode is a discrete story; the story arcs come from the war itself and the main characters. Foyle's sergeant lost a leg in the Norway campaign; Foyle's son is in the RAF; they're in Hastings, on the coastline, so fear of invasion is a running theme for a while. Each episode is incredibly grounded in the real events: Dunkirk, the American presence, the Blitz, the Normandy invasion, etc. It's so well-researched; in addition to being a compelling procedural, it gives such a vivid picture of life on the coast and the homefront during the war. I learned about things that I'd never known existed (like Exercise Tiger) and got a sense for things that I couldn't possibly experience. And I can't say enough good things about the actors. I fell in love with them all. (However, as a warning: the murder in the first episode is the most vivid and quite horrific.)

Next on the list was Life on Mars, which keeps on with the historical police drama theme. It's so different from Foyle's War, though: in Life on Mars, the main character is in a car accident in 2006 and wakes up in 1973. Is he mad? in a coma-induced hallucination? or actually a time-traveller? It's never made 100% clear, although the last episode leans greatly toward the coma-induced hallucination with a touch of near-death time-travelling.

This is another series where the actors and the characters totally make the series. The stories themselves aren't anything too special and unique; it's the characters, especially John Simm as Sam Tyler, that make them shine. The final episode in particular was stunning. I had tears in my eyes at the end. It was heartbreakingly sad and inevitably right at the same time.

Next on the list was the BBC miniseries of Casanova. David Tennant and Peter O'Toole. *sigh* It was incredibly funny. I don't know why I didn't expect it to be funny, given that it was written by Russell T. Davies... There were some absolute laugh-out-loud moments. David Tennant overcomes many different levels of bad hair and just leaps off the screen. I may be biased here, but he was just fantastic. And Peter O'Toole as the aged Casanova exuded faded sexuality - he's always been wonderful and I'm so glad he's still acting. I completely believed the love between Casanova and Henriette (even though it's probably not historically accurate....and why isn't Laura Fraser better known?) and now I want to read Casanova's memoirs. Just skimming the Wikipedia article made me realize that his romantic reputation is only a small part of who he was. (Well, not small. That enduring legend couldn't be founded on anything .... small.)

The last series I want to mention is Lost in Austen. It was quite cute, and I enjoyed some of the liberties they took with Pride and Prejudice (especially Wickham. I unashamedly loved Wickham in this version. They made him believably redeemable). It did fall into the Darcy trap but not for long, and it was quite amusing to watch Amanda panic and try to "fix" everything. Causes and consequences were kind of hand-waved away, but it's a charming enough series.

Next time: films.

Look! I have friends! And other miscellany

Three days in a row, including tomorrow, I will spend at least a few hours a day with friends. As in, leave my house and deliberately go somewhere to spend time with people I don’t live with. I’m always a little bit amazed when this happens. I forget, sometimes, that I have friends who want to and can spend time with me.

Yesterday I had lunch with a flatmate from last year, who just got a PhD place here. So yay! She’s coming back to town! It’s very exciting! Especially since she’s the one flatmate from last year that I’ve kept in consistent touch with. And it’s inspired me to at least think about getting back to my own research stuff. I started reading Pearl last night. It’s slow going, but Middle English always is.

Today I was sitting on my bed, slowly getting ready for the day (not unusual), in my bathrobe and towel-turban, when there was a knock on my door and a friend called “BREAKFAST!” So I got dressed and he treated me to breakfast. Then he accompanied me to my initial counseling session, and after that was over, we went to Nottingham Contemporary for the Star City (art and propaganda surrounding the Soviet space program) exhibit.

And while we were doing that, I got a text from another friend, inviting me for coffee before she leaves next week. But I was, of course, unavailable, so I suggested tomorrow instead (we’re meeting for lunch). I’m going to miss her sooooo much when she goes.

I really like Nottingham Contemporary as a gallery. As a building, it’s growing on me although I still think it looks out of place. But as a gallery, it’s lovely. The current exhibit (their second), as I said, focuses on the Soviet space program. It’s named Star City, after the cosmonaut quarters outside of Moscow. It’s primarily modern art, although there are some prints of propaganda posters. It’s also a multimedia exhibit, with a few video and audio things complementing the visual art. The first two galleries also had a sort of electrical theme to them. There was really only one piece that stood out to both me and my friend as “good”* - a sort-of abstract representation of a womb with a red fetus and a black fetus (twins). The red one had a small picture of Castro and the black one had a small picture of Kennedy. I can’t remember the full title, but “We are twins” was a part of it. There was also a giant spacesuit – able to be walked through – representing Tereshkova. One of the things that the Soviet space program did so much better than the US space program was diversity, especially inclusion of women.

*We both agreed that we don’t really “get” modern art in many cases. I was reminded of that Murphy Brown episode, as I almost always am while at contemporary art galleries.

For my birthday, my awesome housemates got me the DVD set of Casualty 1900s, which I had been wanting for a while. And I am obsessed, and can’t stop watching it. There are only 10 episodes at this point, and no word yet on whether there will be another series (season), but I love every single one. It’s so well-produced, well-written, well-acted, and above all, historically accurate. Historical fiction of the highest quality, with a touch of the soaps thrown in. It’s made me ever so interested in medical history, as well as the personal histories of the characters. (Like the lead romantic couple, Dr Culpin and Nurse Bennett, who did get married in real life, eventually.) It’s also helped me clarify my “modern” history/literature interest, which is absolutely Edwardian. Give me 1901-1919 and I’m happy. Much past that, and you get into officially modernist territory, which I really don’t like as much. Even my true literary love, Forster, is more appealing to me in the early works (Room with a View was 1906, Howards End 1910). I knew this before, of course, but this has helped me actually formulate it.

Soap Operas

Guiding Light, the longest running entertainment program in the US, ended last week after 72 years on radio and TV. I find this kind of sad. I understand that the TV industry is just that, an industry, and it’s driven by costs and ratings, but soap operas and Guiding Light in particular seemed like stalwarts, like they’d never end. Even if other soaps failed (Sunset Beach, Loving/The City, etc.), soaps in general would go on, and Guiding Light would always be there.

I used to be a huge soap opera fan. My mom watched Days of Our Lives and Another World when I was very young – to the point where, when SoapNet started showing old episodes of Another World, things were familiar. My own personal fandom started one vacation, probably summer vacation, when I was in middle school with The Young and the Restless. After a year or so of that, I moved on to Days of Our Lives (I am slightly embarrassed to admit that the possession storyline drew me in, although it’s not what kept me) and Another World for the last year or so of its existence. Then I found out that an elementary school classmate of mine was occasionally an extra on Guiding Light, so I watched that in the hopes of glimpsing her. My roommate sophomore year of college taped Passions and would watch it every evening, and it was a small room so I watched too. Then, the year after I graduated from college, when I had nothing to do in the afternoons, I turned on the TV. I don’t remember what got me hooked on them, but somehow I ended up hooked on All My Children and One Life to Live, with General Hospital thrown in by the end of the year, partially because I was too lazy/distracted to change the channel. Thanks to SoapNet, I rewatched early-to-mid-80s Another World and kept up on all of the above. When I got my computer for Slovakia, my second year, and was investigating the wonderful world of free podcasts, I rediscovered Guiding Light and newly discovered As the World Turns, both of which had audio podcasts of their episodes. If I’m in a TV-watching mood in the US, I still will happily turn on SoapNet. Soaps are the television equivalent of Harlequin romance novels (which I also enjoy, probably more than I ‘should’). They’re formulaic, they’re repetitive, they require attention but not a lot of thought to consume, and every once in a while there’s something that stands out as beautiful or genius or true.

The thing about soaps – and fiction in general – is the story. That’s why I watched, anyway. (That and the hot guys.) Humans are a story-telling animal. That’s why even non-fiction books have to have some kind of narrative structure to them and some kind of character to identify with and care about. If they don’t, it’s like reading the dictionary: informative, but not something that (most) people do cover-to-cover or for fun. I watched (or, that year in Slovakia, listened) because of the story, because of the characters. I wanted to know what happened to these people, and I wanted to know how and why it happened. (And if the story didn’t turn out the way I wanted, John and Natalie on OLTL, then I often drifted away if there wasn’t any other story keeping me hooked.)

The other thing that soaps can provide is history. Guiding Light was on the air for 72 years, and one of the reasons that it survived so long is because of its slow transitions through its history. That’s how most of the soaps that are still on survive. They started with a core group of people – usually a family – and introduced new characters in connection with that family, not in isolation. As the new characters became established, then perhaps the original group would fade out, but not until then. This is one of the problems with soaps today. In a desperate attempt to attract new viewers – especially in the summer when teenagers are out of school – producers throw new, usually teenaged characters at the show in a usually-futile attempt to make something stick. If these newcomers have a connection with established characters, it’s tenuous or very limited – in a new group of five ’16-year-old’ characters, one may be the child of a supercouple, usually a child that we haven’t seen for a while who has now undergone SORAS [Soap Opera Rapid Aging Syndrome] and should really only be about 8 years old if we’re going by real time. (This is also one of the reasons that soap opera mothers can steal their daughters’ boyfriends – at a certain point every character over the age of 21 is portrayed as within about fifteen years in age of each other, unless they are in ‘grandparent’ character in which case they’re allowed to have grey hair but not usually a social life except in certain circumstances.) The year that I lived at home and was watching four or five soaps a day, minimum, I stopped watching consistently during the summer because I was so annoyed by the new teenaged characters that I didn’t know and didn’t care about. (I learned how to use the DVR so that I could fast-forward through storylines like that that I didn’t like.) Most viewers want the consistency of the history of the soap - an acknowledgment of characters and storylines past - and shows ignore that history at their peril.

Another thing that I find wonderful about soaps is the sheer volume. Almost every daytime soap in the US right now is an hour-long daily. There are no repeats. There are times during the year when they don’t air – major sporting tournaments, especially tennis in the summer, for example – but there is no ‘hiatus’ like primetime shows get. A primetime season of 22 episodes is just over a month in daytime soaps. The sheer volume of work that goes on with soaps is absolutely incredible.

There’s a good mental_floss article about soaps and the ending of GL (I figured since I commented about a bad mental_floss article a while ago I should link to one that I enjoyed). I particularly like the slightly snarky comments that undercut the actual good work that soaps do to highlight social and global issues.

Goodbye, Guiding Light. I'll miss you.

How I Met Your Mother

I have become addicted to the show "How I Met Your Mother." I blame iTunes. They had the "Sandcastles in the Sand" video for free. I also blame MySpace for having the first Robin Sparkles episode for free. Oh, who am I kidding. I'm a TV junkie.

But just because I live my life through popular entertainment doesn't mean that it's not a good show. It's a great show. In case you haven't heard of it, it's theoretically one character telling his kids how he met their mother - the very long version. It's just finishing the third season on CBS and, thanks to the magic of online viewing, I have now seen every episode.

There are two writing things that really make this show impressive for me. First is the realism. Characters tell jokes, but they're the types of jokes that normal people tell and they acknowledge that they're making jokes, or at least trying to. And there are conversations that aren't particularly jokey or witty, but are very real: either television real where they explicitly lay out their emotions, or real-real like when they get excited about going to Red Lobster or whatever. When I watch the show, I can see my own friends in these characters.

The other thing that impresses me is the continuity. It's an ongoing story in a way that shows like Friends were not. And it's the little moments, the little character things, that make it special. For example, there's a third season episode where everyone's complaining about everyone else's annoying habits. And someone mentions Marshall's habit of singing whatever he's doing. And in the first season, there's a scene where Marshall is doing just that - sing-narrating what he's doing. It's the little things like that which make the show wonderful. [Side-note: should it be which there? I was reading something about the difference between that and which the other day and now I'm all paranoid and doubting.]

The actors are good, too. Neil Patrick Harris has this deliciously twisted morality; Alyson Hannigan is quirky (although she's been getting on my nerves a bit in the third season). But I totally adore Josh Radnor as Ted. He looks like John Cusack, acts a little bit like early Zach Braff, and I just want to be his friend.

There are some actors who are so gorgeous and/or talented that you know if you ever met them you would be so completely starstruck that you wouldn't even be able to breathe. Stars that don't seem real. George Clooney, Brad Pitt, etc., fall into this category. But Josh Radnor's Ted and my other TV crush, John Krasinski as Jim Halpert, seem like guys who would actually talk to you. Guys you could be friends with. Guys you would WANT to be friends with. Guys that you wouldn't be intimidated to fall in love with. Not that you necessarily WOULD fall in love with them (although if either one of them wants to give me a call, I'm on the next plane to LA) but guys that you could hang out with without feeling inferior.

I'm really hoping that "How I Met Your Mother" comes back for another season. It's not even that I want Ted to meet "the mother" (even though that's the purpose of the show) but because it's so much fun to hang out with these characters.

The Office: The Chairmodel/Parking

I have other things to post here, too, but before it gets too late (and another episode airs) I just wanted to talk about last week’s episode of The Office. Now I am not going to talk about Michael being an absolute, complete, and total ass who is still living in a dream world – I mean, come on, I’m only in my late 20s and I’ve accepted that the movie/romance novel scenario is not going to play out in real life. Although the bit where he accidentally calls Jan is hilarious and I do think that it was subconsciously deliberate (if that’s not a contradiction in terms) and that they’ll be on again by the end of the season. I am also not going to talk about Dwight being sweet for Michael in a rather creepy, Dwight-like way. Or how awesomely pathetic Kevin is. Aw. I love Kevin.

No, the reason I watch the show – the reason I kept watching the show, rather, after the shuddering cringing horribleness of the first couple of episodes (I hate Diversity Day, I don’t care what people say) – is Jim and Pam. I adore Jim and Pam. I want to be Pam and have a Jim (although, see above about the movie/romance novel scenario).

I read a bit about The Office. Not living in the US, it’s the only way I can legitimately keep up with the show. This week, I read ew.com’s analysis, and the weecap and forums at televisionwithoutpity. Most of the commentators and posters seemed to think that the fact that Jim had bought an engagement ring for Pam a week after they started dating was creepy and spelled DOOM for them. I could not disagree more. (And luckily for me, one of my favourite internet television commentators agrees with me, calling it “legitimately romantic….more romantic than a proposal.” I definitely agree, and swoon.)

Jim has been in love with Pam for ages - not even in love with an idealized Pam although that was certainly a risk, but in love with Pam, herself, even when she was engaged to Roy, even when he tried not to be by dating Karen, even in episodes like "The Fight" or the end of "The Client" when she wasn't speaking to him for a little while. Once they actually went on a couple dates, and he realized that this was not just a case of wanting what he can't have, of COURSE he's going to start planning how to propose. I have absolutely no fear that they will break up, at all, whatsoever. It's just a matter of waiting for Pam herself to be ready - which is the other thing.

Some people commented that her face when Jim "ties his shoe" is terrified, not anticipatory, but I just don't see it. I think it was more of an "I'm not ready for this yet and the cameras are here" not "I don't want him to propose at all." I mean, she was with Roy for so long - and engaged to him for what, almost five years? Just because she wants to take this a little bit slower doesn't mean that she doesn't think that she and Jim are going to get married eventually. I think, if anything, she's not letting herself think that far in advance, BECAUSE of what happened with Roy. She doesn't want to start taking Jim and her relationship with Jim for granted; she wants to enjoy what it is right now before they move on to the next level (which makes relationships sound like a Nintendo game or something, but you know what I mean). It's not that she doubts that they're going to move on to the next level; she just wants to enjoy this one first. And Jim KNOWS that and accepts that, which is why he has the ring already - being prepared for the next level - but hasn't proposed yet - because she's not ready for that yet. But it is important to him and to them as a couple that they both are consciously aware that yes, this is serious, and yes, they will be getting to that point. And that’s what this episode was about, in their relationship – him letting her know that he is in it the whole way, and that when the timing is right – meaning when they are BOTH ready – it will happen.

Or maybe I’m just reading too much into fictional characters.