This post's purpose is to collect my common tags in one place, so readers (and I!) can easily access entries on several subjects.

I wrote both at lunch and after work yesterday, and ended with a total of 1700 words, all part of a sex scene...which may be a tad too long, I won't know until I'm done writing it. It doesn't feel too long. But if this weren't an erotic novel, it would definitely be too long...and I'd be showing more of Sylvie's investigations and less of her fabulous clocked silk stockings. Sad but true.

I went home and watched the British tv adaptation of Terry Pratchett's Hogfather, which I got a while back with a gift certificate. For some reason, I thought it was two hours long, but actually it was just over three. Towards the end, I was wondering why I was so tired, but I didn't turn around to look at the clock, and was shocked when the story ended at it was 11:30 pm. It was a really good production, and I was absorbed by it, desperate to know what would happen next, even though I'd read the book and knew exactly how the story came out. The actors' performances made the difference, perhaps. I have a weakness for British actors (she understates profoundly). Ian Richardson was the voice of Death, and I really loved how he did it. How does one speak in all capitals? It sounded like he did it, however you do that. Marc Warren (he was in Hustle and The Revengers Tragedy and guested on Dr. Who) was also really riveting and scary as Mister Teatime with a weird high-pitched voice and a movie-mobster accent. Definitely worth seeing.

Has anyone watched this animated Who? Would you recommend it to me?

Doctor Who: The Infinite Quest

It was just marked down.

"The Mind Robber" is probably the wackiest Patrick Troughton episode of Dr. Who. It's amusing to watch the documentaries on the official DVD and learn not all the surrealism was intended--a different guy played Jamie (with manufactured plot reason) for an episode or so because Frazer Hines caught chicken pox, and the excellently creepy first episode, which takes place in a white-on-white stage supposedly Nowhere was because they needed an extra episode but had used up all their money and had to make do with what was at hand.

Anyway, this is the one where there's a world of fictional characters because there's some powerful aliens who want to take over Earth by making real people fictional so they can control them...I think. Don't ask me to explain it in too much detail. It will make your head hot.

Cool things: the unicorn looked pretty good; Medusa made use of stop motion animation; Lemuel Gulliver's lines all come from the written novel. They were smart enough to avoid showing the Minotaur, using its scary shadow instead.

I was mildly amused by the version of Rapunzel, who had fake eyelashes and hopefully asked everyone, "Are you a prince?" Alas, she is the only female fictional character we see, aside from some girls in a crowd of children.

My goodness, Zoe's sparkly catsuit. The bit in which she and Jamie are clinging to the TARDIS console while it revolves in space...there's an impressive back view of that costume. Hamish Wilson wasn't bad as Jamie, but I noticed he wasn't as physical--Frazer Hines as Jamie is always grabbing or hanging on to the others, either protectively or in search of protection.

The Karkus, a superstrong superhero of the future (Zoe used to read his adventures in a comic strip) is a trip. He has a strange and geographically untraceable accent, vaguely German, which somehow suits him.

More on this episode, and also more here. Here's The BBC episode guide.

"Eureka" is Greek for "this bath is too hot." --The Doctor

I have ten minutes in which to comment on this episode before it's back to the grind....

"The Talons of Weng-Chiang"

The main thing that puzzles me about this episode is why did they cast a white guy in makeup as the lead Chinese character? The various Limehouse thugs are all actual Asian people. Why not the famed magician? Were they going for a fake look because they thought it was more pulpish? Or was it simply that they didn't look very hard for a Chinese or at least Asian actor in the short time they had? This source says that the episode was put together in great haste; they hadn't even intended to have Leela stay on and be in it.

Otherwise, the episode is a lot of fun to watch. It's set in Victorian London, mostly at a vaudeville theater, and eventually that's crossed over with a villian from the 51st century, Magnus Greel.

More on the episode. And more.

Last week's Dr. Who watching was Jon Pertwee. I love his outfits, and I love his companions, and I love the actor, but I never warmed up to the Third Doctor as much as to some of the others. I think it has to do with his role in relation to the humans. From his inception until the end of "The Three Doctors," he's pretty much trapped on Earth and working for U.N.I.T., which means he always knows more than everybody else, and even though he's mostly prevented from traveling in space and time, he's still in a position of power. The reason I love the Doctor so much as a character is that he's perpetually a stranger in a strange land, even among his own people. The Third Doctor is still a stranger, but at the same time his position with U.N.I.T. also makes him part of a community, so his strangeness is lessened. Also, Pertwee's fondness for gadgets and physical stunts made him sometimes a more conventional hero than other Doctors. So I enjoy watching him--what a great voice Pertwee had!--he's just not my favorite Doctor.

( The episode. )

More on the episode.

I watched "Tomb of the Cybermen" a while ago but never got around to writing up comments. This is one for which I have an actual DVD; it's one of the Dr. Who episodes re-discovered in the last decade or so.

Plot: Some archaeologists (who have terrible research methods, but that's tv for you) have traveled to Telos (on a Rocket! They call it a rocket!) to open the Tomb and study the frozen Cybermen inside. Klieg, a Logician who's patron of the expedition, is also with the team, as is his partner (?) Kaftan and her ultra-strong factotum Toberman, who seems to be a Magical Negro in the literary sense. [ETA: natlyn rightly points out that he's really a Sacrificial Negro, also a literary trope.] Toberman's strength renders him a good subject to be made into a Cyberman; the process is partly completed towards the end, but once his mistress Kaftan is killed, Toberman helps the humans against the Cybermen. We don't hear his views on any of this. He has very few lines.

The TARDIS arrives just before this group opens the tomb, and the Doctor and his companions neatly insert themselves into the team. The Doctor knows it's unwise to wake the Cybermen, but he doesn't stop them from doing it, and even provides a solution to a mathematical code while telling Klieg not to use it.

"Yes, yes, I can see that, but how did you know in the first place?"
"Oh, I use my own special technique."
"Oh, really, Doctor? And may we know what that is?"
"Keeping my eyes open and my mouth shut."
--Klieg and The Doctor, in "Tomb of the Cybermen"

The Doctor does contain the damage. At the end of the story, the tomb is closed once more and the Cybermen again become foil-wrapped popsicles.

This episode also has the Cybermats. They're like giant, scuttling crawfish, only silver, and they are Evil Minions of the Cybermen. Except some of the characters initially find them cute.

The episode takes place shortly after Victoria Waterfield has joined the crew of the TARDIS. Jamie is very protective of her, and Victoria, perhaps because she comes from 1860s England, is accepting of this; but she can act on her own when necessary, as in this episode when she shoots a Cybermat (using Kaftan's gun) or when she runs to the Rocket to get help at a time when it's sorely needed.

"You look very nice in that dress, Victoria."
"Thank you. You don't think it's a bit, uh--"
"A bit short? Oh, I wouldn't worry about that. Look at Jamie's."
--The Doctor and Victoria, in "Tomb of the Cybermen"

The DVD has some commentary which I haven't yet listened to, and a few small featurettes.

More information on the episode.

And more, with some pictures.

I watched "Ghost Light" on Sunday with natlyn. There were a lot more extras on the DVD than I had expected. Not only was there a documentary comprised of interviews with various actors, the script editor, etc. (very much in the style of the interviews on the Lord of the Rings DVDs), there was some footage of the production itself, a slideshow of production photos, and quite a few deleted scenes arranged with cute Victorian-style cue cards. From the interviews we learned that the reason for all those deleted scenes was that they turned the original idea of four episodes into three episodes. No wonder this was a somewhat incoherent episode.

I love the atmosphere of it, though. It's just so wacky. There's something about aliens visiting 19th century England that amuses me greatly.

Also, there are some wonderful moments with the Doctor and Ace--their obvious affection is the thing I love most about them.

In which I go on at great length, in a way which might surprise those who never saw me in the full blush of my Dr. Who obsession.

"You can judge a man by the quality of his enemies."
--The Doctor, "Remembrance of the Daleks"

"Remembrance of the Daleks" is one of the best 7th Doctor episodes, I feel, and one of the ones I bought on DVD. The Doctor has hidden the Hand of Omega (a powerful Time Lord artifact) on 1963 Earth, which happens to be the setting of the very first episode of Dr. Who--we get to see the Coal Hill School again, and I.M. Foreman's junkyard--the idea is that the Doctor did this before the first episode happened. There are also, obviously, references to previous Dalek episodes and to the previous Omega episodes, "The Three Doctors" and "Arc of Infinity," memorable for the appearance of Colin Baker, future Doctor, as a supporting character, and Peter Davison's running around Amsterdam or wherever it was with green rice crispies stuck all over his face. (I saw on the web somewhere that there was an Omega radio show as well, but I never heard it.)

( Read more... )

I finished writing pretty promptly last night, so had time to watch two episodes of The Muppet Show.

I wasn't all that impressed with the Sandy Duncan episode. She was all right, but didn't light my fire for watching her over and over. The best part was the "At the Dance" skit, which this time was a tango version of the show's theme. And I don't think they could get away with Duncan's opening number today, on a kid's show--it takes place in a bar, and she's fake-drinking the whole time. The running gag about "the legendary banana sketch" was pretty cute; I love it when Kermit freaks out.

The Avery Schreiber episode was one of the better ones. My favorite number was Schreiber's last one, in which he demonstrated his wild vocal talent in a song with no words, accompanied by a host of muppets, including some adorable orange baby Koozebanians.

DR. BUNSEN HONEYDEW: "Think of the safety! Think of the sense of well being! At last your family can be protected from the heartbreak of gorilla invasion."

One thing that's sacrificed by having more episodes on each disk is that you can't skip from scene to scene within an episode. The chapters are all one episode long.

I watched a lot of episodes of The Muppet Show over my three-day weekend. Some quickie comments follow.

( Lots and lots. )

I had about an hour after I finished writing last night, so I watched two more episodes of The Muppet Show.

( Connie Stevens and Joel Grey. )

My DVDs of first season Muppet Show arrived yesterday.

YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I watched the extras first--the pitch reel, a gag reel, and the pilot, then went on to a few episodes on the same disc (4) that I remembered very little or not at all. I used to watch the series every week when it aired in the U.S., but am not sure when I began watching, or how many times I missed it, given that I was eight years old in 1976, when the show first aired. My memory blurs a bit from the passage of time. Also, I saw some of the episodes again (such as the one with Ethel Merman) when I was writing my Master's thesis and they were airing on A&E, adding to the confusion.

( Some comments, with spoilers. )

World War I, a CBS News production. Narration written by Arthur Kloch, narrated by Robert Ryan. Originally aired 1964-1965.

I bought this series from DeepDiscount DVD expecting a single disc of maybe two hours. Instead, I received a three-DVD set, each DVD approximately three hours long.

The historical narrative is much simplified compared to the books I've already read, and also the episodes are by topic rather than strictly chronological; so, watching this, it helps to already know what events were all happening at the same time. They don't give you a timeline. The show focuses on Big Names of History, or people who will become Even Bigger Names later on, like Herbert Hoover and Winston Churchill, as well as on major battles. So far, there's been little to nothing about the various home fronts, which is fine since I've researched that very heavily. The very best thing about this series is that both sides are shown and described in equally neutral language and with equal depth. This both surprised and pleased me.

However, I wanted this for the film footage, and that I got in spades. It's not as organized as I would like. I've only watched the first DVD so far, and I've already noticed there are some shots they reuse whenever called for, for example a shot of shells exploding. I'm pretty sure that generalized footage of soldiers on the march, etc., was used where it made sense in the episode, not where/when it might actually have been filmed. But I don't mind so much; I wanted the look of the thing. Somehow, photographs give you something words, even primary source words, can't, and film footage even more so. You can see faces, and you can see their expressions change. You can see their body language. Sometimes, in watching the people, I barely heard the narration.

The footage is in black and white, and sometimes shaky. Watching on my small television, my eyes grew tired after a while. Sometimes it was difficult to watch, when I would think of nameless soldiers seen in closeup, "I wonder how he died? Or if he survived the war?" That, too, is why I think watching this is very useful as research. Not for the facts it gives me, but for the speculations it engenders.

I visited the WOMDA archive again today, this time to check out some of their digital video of WWI film footage.

The clips are all very, very short, I think to aid downloading speed, but they're also captioned very well, including interesting annotations like telling you to note the hairstyle of one of the soldiers shown because it was in vogue at the Front in 1916. It's worth a look if you have a fast connection. I viewed the clips in QuickTime.

A long while back, I bought World War I Films of the Silent Era on DVD, which is pretty good. ( Summary. )

I checked out a video copy of the 1915 Theda Bara movie, A Fool There Was. Here's a summary and review of the DVD. It's a silent, intended both to titillate and to warn against dangerous women. Interestingly, Bara's character has no name--she's simply called "The Vampire."

Well. I did not find Theodosia Goodman (Bara's real name) to be quite as much a vampire, i.e., vamp, as the audience was obviously meant to. C. and I kept making up little reasonable stories to explain her seemingly awful behavior towards men, because at least she had some spine.

The video quality wasn't great, and she only had one or two closeups. This is a film I wouldn't necessarily recommend to anyone for fun, but it's good research material.

My favorite intertitle: "Kiss me, my fool!"

Vampiric seduction technique: Theda Bara enthralls Schuyler first by having his deck chair placed next to her own, then later by dropping one of her trademark flowers. When he bends to pick it up, she lifts her skirt. Above her ankles. Twice, later on, she deflects him from returning to his wife and Adorable Daughter of the Long Curls simply by entering the room and clasping him in her arms. Did she smear her body with opium?

Favorite cultural anthropology moment: The wife of one of Schuyler's old friends finds out about him and Bara, and refuses to stay in the same hotel.

Best Evil Laugh: Bara yukking it up after a former lover shoots himself in front of her. Really, it was hysteria, because he'd done Bad Things to her...she wasn't bad, she was just acted that way.

I need to watch my D.W. Griffith WWI propaganda flick before it's due on Saturday.

This is the oddest of the Ian Carmichael adaptations, because it strays farthest from the text. As I've become used to, there's a lot of movement in the novel's dialogue, mostly breaking up long speeches among several characters in a scene, in ways that I don't think I'd notice were I less familiar with the books, or in some cases holding the book in my hand as I watch. The Nine Tailors has some of that, and various small omissions and shifts to accomodate the medium and the budget. One event I really missed is Peter having to climb onto the roof of the church, but I could see how that would have been a challenge for the cameras.

There's one big difference between this adaptation and the others. The Nine Tailors adaptation has some completely original material. An important element of the novel is the theft of the Wilbraham emeralds during World War One, which here is dramatized, taking about 25% of the total length. Carmichael, though a bit too old to be convincing as a callow young Peter, nevertheless carries it off with changes in his manner and speech, and the judicious addition of a moustache. The viewer is then dragged to the trenches with Peter and Bunter; Peter's traumatic experience is dramatized, and Bunter's subsequent arrival to be Peter's valet. At the same time, we see what happened to Deacon, and how.

It's scripted; none of this business is shown in the novels at all; yet I confess I liked it. Better than I liked the rest of this adaptation, which I found rather dry. (Yes, I know there's a flood. Ahem.) The acting was all excellent, but for some reason, this particular adpatation didn't grab me like some of the others. Maybe I was just in a mood when I watched it. Maybe it's because I find large sections of the novel itself to be rather dull; by that point in the sequence, I want more Harriet, and here I feel her lack acutely.

Fans of Blake's 7 will easily recognize David Jackson (Olag Gan) playing Jim Thody, the sailor brother of Will Thody. They may or may not spot Peter Tuddenham (voice of the computers Zen, Orac, and Slave) in Mr. Godfrey, who rings Batty Thomas; he's using one of his innumberable accents, but traces of his future characters can be heard by the keen of ear.

The Five Red Herrings should arrive in the mail shortly, and that will be the last of the Wimseys that were made for television. Hmm, I wonder if I can somehow get hold of those British audiobooks?

A different Bunter from Clouds of Witness--Derek Newark, whom I rather liked. He and Peter have a wonderful scene as they prepare to begin questioning the denizens of the Bellona Club about the General's death; Newark manages to look quite offended when Ian Carmichael tells him he's too tidy to be a journalist, a comment that's borne out later on when we meet Salcombe Hardy.

Though Marjorie Phelps was left out of the Clouds of Witness adaptation, she's present here to great effect, played by Phyllida Law! Anna Cropper gave a nuanced performance as Ann Dorland.

I haven't much to say about this one. As usual with the Carmichael adaptations, it sticks fairly close to the actual novel. The main difference was that the tv version is more direct in pointing up the World War I experiences of George Fentiman and of Peter, and actually shows George wandering around in a "shell-shocked" fit. Also, a poppy in the lapel becomes an important plot point, a poppy which does not exist in the novel. I suspect this was to make things clearer to a modern television audience. [Edit: the poppy IS in the book. I just blanked on it.]

Another of the Edward Petherbridge adaptations, Have His Carcase is notable, for me, for the excellence of the sexual tension portrayed by Petherbridge and Harriet Walter, who plays Harriet Vane. Some of it arises from the book, most importantly their big fight, which can be summed up as "saving a woman from the gallows can put a big damper of your hopes of getting matrimonially laid." That scene in this adaptation is splendidly acted, especially by Petherbridge, who ranges from hurt to rage to a dreadful, sad weariness in less than five minutes. For that scene alone, this DVD is worth it.

There is demonstration of how Peter feels about Harriet which is mostly skimmed over or ignored in the novel; in the television adaptation, you see him touch her, more than once, but always in circumscribed ways. They dance in the novel, but the actors show desperation in the way Harriet pulls away from Peter before the dance is concluded. A lighthearted discussion of marriage proposals becomes less lighthearted, and Peter's joking hand on Harriet's knee attains new significance. In the final scene, Peter takes Harriet's hand and kisses her wrist, between glove and sleeve, a deeply sensual gesture that shows us all we need to know.

There are the usual minor changes to the novel. The only one that really disappointed me was riding the horse down the beach--Bunter replaces Peter, which may have been a matter of the actors' riding ability, or simply that the available stuntman had dark hair. The casting is good. Jeremy Sinden as Henry Weldon is wonderfully odious!