Okay, I shamelessly admit to skipping the entire S4 finale and I doubt I'll change my mind on that point, but this preview has me all pumped for S5, despite* the ( spoilers )



So do we have an actual date for the beginning of S5, or just this vague promise of "Spring"?

Note to self: Need Matt Smith icon.

--
* Oh, all right, maybe BECAUSE of that part. What can I say, I'm an Old Skool Whofan, I still haven't got over the novelty of it.

Oh, show. You give me John Lynch being... John Lynch, and Colin Morgan turning in one of his most brilliant and heartbreaking performances (the fact that he can hold his own with John Lynch, and that Bradley also does it to a less obvious extent with ASH in this episode, is really impressive) and more Arthur/Gwen goodness and CGI that isn't dodgy at all, and then you tell me I have to wait another year for S3. WHY. WHY MUST I WAIT.

( Spoilery comments )

...Do I really not have a MERLIN tag? Is this actually the first time I've posted about this show I've been watching (first skeptically, then indulgently, and finally with delight and deep affection) for the last two years? Wow. Okay then.

And why do I have no icons of Colin Morgan?

watchmebe a.k.a. Jackson Pearce (author of the forthcoming As You Wish, which I am dying to read) has posted a hilarious video from her recent trip to Savannah with the Gothic Girls, in which they all retell their stories using zombies.

But although this post was inspired by watching that video, it is not zombies I wish to speak of, dear readers. Rather, I was moved by the closing music of the video to talk about the Smurfs.

As a cynical child, I totally hated the Smurfs. All these smarmy little blue people being cute and singing their little la-la-la song, and the only hint of conflict or danger was that evil wizard Gargamel (whose motivations for persecuting the Smurfs were obscure to me, to say the least). When I sat down to watch Saturday morning cartoons, I resented the Smurfs for taking up time that could otherwise be spent watching shows that were really awesome, like Drak Pack and Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends.

But then one day I was browsing through my local bookstore, feeling frustrated that I already owned every Tintin comic in existence and that there weren't any new Asterix to be had, and I came upon -- what's this? -- an actual comic book of the Smurfs, as created by their original author, and translated into English by the same clever folk (Anthea Bell and Derek Hockridge) who did Tintin and Asterix?

Hmmm.

I picked it up. I flipped through it. I laughed in surprise.

And then I bought it.

You see, Peyo's Smurfs were not the nauseatingly perfect little darlings of the cartoon. They were not reduced to a convenient set of stereotypes endowed with different costumes so you could tell them apart (well, apart from the obvious differences of Papa Smurf and Smurfette, that is). They had actual attitude and personality, and what amused me most was that they used the word "smurf" in totally different ways than the cartoon did.

On TV, "smurf" was a cute little substitute for random nouns and verbs -- "Oh, that's absolutely smurfly! What a smurfy day for a picnic!" Whereas in the comic, "smurf" frequently ended up being a euphemism for things that could not be said in print. "I'll smurf you in the smurf, you smurfing smurf!" *cue tornado with flailing blue fists here*

And then of course Papa Smurf had to come break it up, but even he wasn't nearly so smug and condescending as in the TV series. He could be cranky and impatient and, well, more like a real person would be if they were saddled with being the father figure to a village full of little blue savages.

Okay, maybe I am exaggerating the Smurf aggression factor a little. But there was definitely enough wit (including sarcasm) and conflict that the Smurfs could actually have plots all their own, instead of having to rely on some outside baddie (i.e. Gargamel) to come and persecute them. In fact, Gargamel was hardly in the Smurf comics I read at all.

In short: TV Smurfs = meh. Comic Smurfs = kind of awesome.

You would think I would turn this into some deep authorial musing on the importance of writing three-dimensional characters with flaws as well as virtues, wouldn't you? Nah, you can probably figure that part out yourself.

However, I fear I have sad news. The Smurfs did not fade gently away when their TV show was cancelled, nor enjoy an eternally cozy existence between the pages of Peyo's comics.

No, I am afraid that with the full approval of their creator, they were bombed to death by UNICEF.

You think I'm kidding, don't you?



Which just goes to show, sometimes you can take that whole conflict thing a bit too far.

Wow, has it been that long since I did an episode review for this show? I have still been watching House, you know -- long after virtually everybody I knew had given up on it, or nearly so. Right now it is actually the only network show I still watch on a weekly basis (since Doctor Who has gone to specials for the year, and the UK TV season is so short that stuff like Merlin hardly counts).

I also seem to have forgotten to mention at any point in the last two years that I never had a problem with the whole fire-the-old-ducklings-and-replace-them motif. I thought it actually did a lot to keep the show from becoming stale, and although I'm not a big fan of Thirteen by any means I could never work myself up to actively hating her or blaming her and the other Mark II Ducklings for replacing Chase and Cameron.

I even liked the Chase/Cameron thing once it became a proper romance, and don't find myself sorry that House/Cameron didn't work out after all. (Actually I still think House/Cate from Antarctica would have been the best match ever, but you know these long distance relationships...)

But anyway, let's talk about ( the episode in question )

Amazing how a show so formulaic can keep me interested after five years. It really is the characters -- or I should say one particular character: House, in all his dysfunctional, infinitely strange glory.

Previously posted on Twitter, but reproduced and edited here because I'm lazy that way:

( Somewhat more than 140 characters, with some spoilers )

Final Rating for "Planet of the Dead": 3.5 out of 5 stars.

No, really, I didn't. I mean, once New Who started up it became substantially more likely, but back when I was writing DW fanfic in the early 90's the idea of Eleven seemed incredibly far away. I mean, we hadn't even seen Eight at that point yet.

Anyway, I was whining a bit on calapine's journal about the casting of Some Guy I Don't Know Who Looks Funny, but then I was reminded how the first pics of David Tennant I saw made him look weaselly and weird and not especially Doctorish at all, and that I remained skeptical right up until I saw "The Christmas Invasion" but then was completely won over. And soon after that I found this picture on Outpost Gallifrey, where the New Guy didn't have weird pointy hair or resemble Robert Smith from the Cure in any way whatsoever, and suddenly all was right with the world again.

So roll on, Matt Smith! Even if you are twelve years younger than me, which is just WRONG, but then it was a shock to find out that David Tennant was a whole year younger than me and I got over it.

(And no, I am not cut-tagging this because the news is all over the place, and if you're that afraid of being spoiled by finding out about Eleven ahead of time you'll need to stay off the internets until Spring 2010. Let me know how that works out.)

Well, what do you know. I actually liked that. I kept expecting the whole thing to go down the drain at any moment, but though it started to spiral once or twice, it never completely sank.

( Spoilers )

Bring on the Christmas special!

Seldom have I ever been so glad to have one of my predictions proven wrong.

On the other hand, the suspicion I had but didn't elaborate on here, as to the way this particular case would end? I was right about that part.

Just give RSL the Emmy already, people.

Okay, so I have learned my lesson about using fresh pineapple rings on my cooked ham, because if you leave the rings on overnight to let the juices soak in and then warm the whole thing up again, the ham tastes like it's been partially pre-digested.

EWWWWWW.

In other news, I cannot get this week's House out of my head. I mean, I could have DEFINITELY done without certain parts of it (those of you who've seen the episode will probably have no difficulty guessing what those parts are, and most of them, alas, belong to Lisa Edelstein), and there were the inevitable bits of plot that were far-fetched to the point of absurdity. But Hugh Laurie was brilliant as always, there were some Good Chase Bits, and the foreshadowing was a thing of beauty. ( Spoilers )

On the other hand, my edits on Knife are going well, the pain in my arms is much better today, and I found some great pictures and made a new Paul icon out of one of them. (And no, I didn't use the mouse. This is what my pen and tablet are for, even though the pen is going wonky and doesn't always behave as it should, thanks to my toddler DROOLING IN IT.)

I actually... kind of loved that?

( Some vaguely spoilerish comments )

I think this is yet another prime example of why I should never bother reading anyone else's reviews until after I've made up my own mind about the episode (and I don't mean just DW, I mean any show). So many many times the episodes I've been led to believe are junk turn out to be quite enjoyable, while the episodes that get touted as brilliant frequently leave me cold, or worse, enraged.

I have nothing in particular to say about this episode -- ( except these two things ). Everything else worth noting has already been said by other people like lizbee and calapine.

I do, however, desperately want a little Adipose of my very own. An icon will suffice. An animated one with the Adipose either skipping down the street or waving and smiling would be best of all: if anybody finds one in their travels, please let me know.

Oh, one more thing: did someone run over David Tennant with a bus between seasons? Seriously, he's looking kind of... worn out these days. Unless it is Plot, which it might be considering that Donna even remarked on it. In which case, well done BBC Makeup Dept., I guess.

Wait, two more things. ( minor spoiler )

I am three episodes into S2 of Blake's 7 and sadly, I have gone from quite liking Blake and being mystified as to why he is not more popular, to actively wanting to smack him around. I have also gone from thinking the scripts coherent and effective if a bit over-explanatory at times to finding them annoyingly cryptic and at times utterly baroque. Chris Boucher, what have you done with Terry Nation and how soon can we get him back?

( MOAR SPOILERS PLS )

And now to bed.

Since I still fail at the promised book reviews, why don't you have a very fine one of carbonelle's in the meantime? I just read D.M. Cornish's Foundling a couple of weeks ago myself, and enjoyed it thoroughly.

Meanwhile, my husband and I are still watching an episode of Blake's 7 every night, and slowly working our way through S1. Tonight's was a good old-fashioned murder mystery, marred only by the inexplicable stupidity of Blake in haring halfway across the galaxy without bothering to double-check his cargo first. Another sad case of Idiot Plot, but since Blake is not ordinarily an idiot (at least not in my estimation) I'll trust that this won't happen again... too often.

As for the rest of the crew:

Dear Avon: You smile like a shark. Please stop doing it, it creeps me out.

Dear Cally: I am relieved to find that you are capable of getting through an entire episode without endangering yourself or the other crew members. Keep it up.

Dear Vila: HEE.

Dear Jenna: Even when you don't do much, you are kind of awesome. How do you do that?

Dear Gan: Uh... I got nothing. But I like you OK, anyway.

No Servalan this episode, which is a bummer. I haven't seen such fabulous fashion sense since Romana I... oh, wait.

Off to bed now...

It has just occurred to me that I never reacted to the South Pole episode of House -- mostly because I somehow contrived to miss it when it first aired (so you can imagine my surprise at the beginning of the next episode when House confronted Wilson about dating you-know-who!). However, I've seen it now and WHOA.

Please tell me there is good House/Cate fic out there somewhere. Because it is totally my new OTP, and if there isn't any I fear I may have to write some myself.

***

Speaking of fandom, I have just discovered Blake's 7. We're only three episodes into S1 so far, but my husband and I are already hooked big-time.

Unsurprisingly for a fan of Sherlock Holmes, Snape, Jack Bristow and Beltanno MacRannoch, I love Avon best (though I'm sure my interest will wane if he doesn't demonstrate a bit more humanity soon). But I'm also surprised by how much I like Blake. I've heard so little about him, I thought he must be kind of a bland and uninteresting character compared to Vila, Cally, and so on. I even had a vague suspicion that he might be a shadowy or absent figure a la Charlie of Charlie's Angels. But in fact he's not only right in the middle of the action, he's pretty cool. I like Jenna, too, and I don't remember hearing anything about her from the B7 fans on my list at all.

The special effects are as bad as anything in Classic Who, but I'm really impressed by the dialogue, scripts and acting so far (well, except for Brian Blessed in ep. 3 gnawing off enormous chunks of scenery and spitting them all over the screen, but that's Brian Blessed). I especially admire the way that B7 captures the banality of evil -- in the first two episodes at least the villains don't sit around cackling and rubbing their hands or being villainous to each other for dramatic effect, they behave and speak like ordinary people who have sunk into evil so gradually they don't even seem to realize it. It's very well done. MOAR PLS.
--
I fail at the promised reviews, I know, I know. Coming soon.

Whovians on my f-list should run, not walk, over to avarill's LJ where she's bringing the Old Skool love, starting right from the beginning with "An Unearthly Child". She makes some great points in her review, about Ian and Barbara's general awesomeness and influence on the Doctor especially.

And best of all, this will be an ongoing series, as avarill takes up the challenge to watch all the available serials in order. I look forward to seeing what she has to say about the rest!

cesario shared this synesthesia-themed Dinosaur Comic with me a few days ago and I got a huge kick out of it.

Also, I just watched the two-hour due South pilot (yeah, I know, I'm a little behind) and I very much fear that I may be falling in love with this show. Which is kind of ludicrous seeing how snootily I disdained it when it was actually on my television, because, y'know, Canadian TV = teh suck in 99% of all cases, and the descriptions I'd read of the show just didn't grab me. But the sheer quirky insanity of the thing, plus a kind of warped Canadian patriotism, has won me over. Also, dead Gordon Pinsent = win.

My seven-year-old is an even more ardent fan, however, and having now seen a couple of S3 episodes he adamantly insists that Ray V. is superior to Ray K. In fact, any time I start a new episode, he demands to know whether it's "the proper Ray" or not.

I blame cesario entirely for the fact that last night I had a long, romantical (yet curiously plotty and action-packed) Fraser/Thatcher dream, in which neither of the Rays were present and I was the friend trying to get Fraser and Thatcher together -- in spite of the fact that I have only ever seen one complete episode of Due South in my life, and less than three seconds of Thatcher.

And now I have a craving to see a good Fraser/Thatcher vid. Are there any? Though given the omnipresent slashiness of the fandom, I'm sure it's too much to hope.

***

Since we're talking about random TV shows, here are the ones my seven-year-old son has been enjoying of late:

• Due South (he's crushed that we can't find any more episodes -- I may have to invest in a DVD)
  
• Star Trek: Enterprise (I have no idea why he likes Archer, but he does)
  
• MacGyver (my son's ideal action hero -- he builds stuff and then blows stuff up. What's not to love?)
  
• Top Gear (I myself am endlessly amused by this show, especially the one where they made amphibious vehicles and then tried to drive them across the English Channel).

Ah, the internets. What would we do without you?

***

And finally, for those impatiently waiting for the report, I will recap my visit to NYC soon, honest. Maybe even today.

This week's House = best episode of the last two seasons. Also, my love for Kutner is so great it may explode my brain. SF geeks unite!

And now before I head off to NYC for the weekend, because nothing says love like a poll --

Poll #1135153 Help an author out here...
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 115

How would you pronounce "Oakenwyld"?

I am so excited about meeting yahtzee63 tonight in person! Not to mention my editor. And my agent. And a bunch of other folks. I just hope I don't end up getting the same thing that kept my five-year-old up all last night, retching pathetically into a margarine tub. That would be... not good. (He's better now, though, so at least I can content myself that it's short-lived.)

Roundup time! I just keep finding links to amazing things so I have to share them with you all.

Firstly, lainitaylor has a gummi bear. She also has an entire chandelier made of them, if you go to the bottom of the post. But you should congratulate her on her personal gummi bear first, just to be nice. Oh, and she also finished a book.

Secondly, this may come as a surprise to certain people who think they know me (or at least think they know what Those Conservative Evangelical Christian Types are Like), but I am in complete and total agreement with the points that John Green makes in this awesome and funny (yet at the same time very not funny) vlog post about a group of people who are trying to prevent his book Looking For Alaska being taught in schools. A book which I have personally never read, but have decided I need to go out and buy RIGHT NOW, because it sounds awesome. Anyway, how about I just let him explain:



Thirdly, snickelish pointed to this brief essay by mrissa explaining something about introverts that many people just don't understand, and it is brilliant and so true that I think you should all read it. It's here.

Fourthly, uh... I've forgotten. Oh yeah! I just watched the new episode of House. Y HELO THAR PRODUCT PLACEMENT BY APPLE. Also, I kinda adore Kutner -- he's such a complete dork.

And now to bed! And now to bed!

I fail at holidays, so I have no timely New Year's post full of resolutions and thoughtful looks back at the year that was, or anything of that sort. I did, however, finish revising Chapter Eight of Knife (although it feels like a bit of a cheat, since I am splitting the original much-too-long chapter into two, so technically I'm only half finished). And that makes me happy, because it means I am still on schedule to get this puppy -- er, faery -- finished and back on my editor's desk by the end of February.

Meanwhile, I have been reading the last four Artemis Fowl books at a frightening pace, which is funny because I really didn't care at all for the premise or the execution when I read the first book, but I did develop a teeny tiny nagging litcrush on Artemis (shut up) and eventually I broke down and decided to find out what happened to him. And now I may kind of ship Artemis/Holly, in a deranged May-December way (yeah, yeah, I know, SHUT UP).

We also watched Amazing Grace on the weekend. Good film, that, and Ioan Gruffydd puts in a highly commendable performance. It even had extra bonus coolness in the form of Nicholas Farrell and Ciaran Hinds, although I was embarrassed to discover during the credits that I was incapable of telling Albert Finney and Michael Gambon apart. (At one point I actually wondered if Gambon were playing both Newton and Fox, but dismissed that as being too stupid.)

Apart from that... there isn't a whole lot else to say. Except that I do have one New Year's resolution after all: I have decided not to harsh anyone else's squee. If you think that you can therefore deduce my opinion of certain recent books, TV shows and/or movies by what I have not posted about them, you may be onto something. (Unless you were thinking about this season of House, which I have in fact been enjoying very much, so there.)

Man, I am boring these days. I apologize to all of you who were expecting actual content.

*skulks away*