Sad Things Happen

This isn't how I saw things going,
Definitely not how I thought it would be.
But every cloud has a silver lining
every person a sight to see.

I cannot help but relive memories,
though I know theres a new path to tread.
All it means is I walk in circles
Crossing over from warmth to dread.

I have no clue how hard the journey
That awaits me around the bend,
All I know is I have to step forward
And just trust that it leads to the end.

Has anyone else noticed...?

A certain amount of wicked irony in the US threatening Russia over illegal incursions into another territory?

Surely that ranks alongside Lily Allen mouthing off about the crapness of other "celebrities" and the English football fans' insistance on pointing out Spain's frequent under-performing at major competitions as one of the most hypocritical statements of all time...

Anyone think of any more?

Like A Rowling Stone

There was a really interesting article on Guardian.co.uk back in May, which looks into whether JK Rowling is accepted as a fantasy writer, or whether the world of critics and academics are sexist towards her (and other female sci-fi/fantasy writers). I meant to blog about it at the time, but a lot has been happening... So here are my thoughts.

Firstly, the article is here.

There are a few things that I picked up on particularly. Firstly, the quote from Michael Rosen, which was jumped on by the media the week before that for being anti-Potter... He was quoted in the Scottish Sunday times as saying that the Potter books are rather hard-going for children under six. Well, that's right, surely? Why is that controversial or anti-Potter? That's no more a criticism than saying Shakespeare is difficult for toddlers. The books are full of heavy themes and events - things that a lot of adults struggle to comprehend. Michael Rosen is not the Children's Laureate by good fortune. He knows what he's talking about - I'm not sure there are many who understand and promote storytelling better. And yet, his comments were interpreted as meaning that the books were unreadable.

Secondly, and I hadn't paid attention to the criticisms of JKR before now - I was content just to read and enjoy the books, enjoying the storytelling and the escapism - but the comments of AS Byatt are snobbish and ignorant. If you don't know what this is about, she has said that the popularity of the Potter books is because they are "written for people whose imaginative lives are confined to TV cartoons, and the exaggerated (more exciting, not threatening) mirror-worlds of soaps, reality TV and celebrity gossip." Sounds disturbingly like jealousy to me... Very unseemly for an extremely well-respected novelist, poet and Dame of the British Empire...

I, for one, don't fall into the target audience Byatt suggests, and I find it offensive to be pigeon-holed like that. If you don't like it, fine, but I don't see what right you have to condemn others. It's easy to read - maybe not all that deep and meaningful (to me), but its a nice escape from a world that is increasingly becoming dark and corrupt. You write what moves you - and you know what you're talking about there. But Rowling wrote what she felt she had to - and there's no doubt that she knows what she's on about in that realm.

Another point in the article was about Rowling being invited to give Harvard's graduation day commencement address this June. The reaction from students was not altogether positive. This is from the Guardian article:

Writing in the university paper, the Harvard Crimson, student Adam Goldenberg rips into Rowling as "a flash in the pan", "a petty pop culture personality" who "tricked parents into letting their kids read books filled with sex, murder, and homosexual role models". Furthermore, "writing bedtime stories is lame".

What utter, utter crap. I'm going to sound like I'm JKR's press officer now, but I have to disagree. A flash in the pan - seven books worth. Does that make seven flashes in seven pans? A highly successful movie series isn't exactly half an hour’s work either...

Petty pop culture personality - the way she's handled her fame, and riches - the philanthropic and compassionate way she's dealt with it all makes that comment every bit as ignorant as AS Byatt's jealous rant. Writing articles about subjects you clearly know nothing about isn't the way to cultivate respect...

I'll skip the tricking parents thing, as I think its nuts - OK there's murder in there, but sex? No more than kids would have experienced growing up, and homosexual role models - that maybe true, but when you're not told a character is homosexual until well after the books are published, it kind of diminishes the effect. And what's wrong with a homosexual role model anyway? That would make two ‘isms’ from Mr Goldenberg in one comment. Good going there...

"Writing bedtime stories is lame." That comment is just so wrong that I actually feel violently-inclined to this whingeing, envious wheeze bag. As a parent, I love reading stories with Luke. I have always loved stories and storytelling, and I am a huge fan of children’s or “young adult” books - because they tend to be more creative and imaginative. I read plenty of bona fide adult fiction and non-fiction too, mind you. But that only sharpens my appreciation to it all. I don't think I would enjoy either one half as much without the other. Writing a bedtime story is every little bit as legitimate, literary and commendable as writing a historical novel, or a thesis on the US constitution.

In general, I agree with the point of the article - novels of this genre are generally only talked up if they are written by men - Philip Pullman, Garth Nix, Darren Shan, Philip Reeve et al. But there are female writers who produce books of a quality matching, if not surpassing them - Diana Wynne Jones and Marjorie Blackman are two that spring to mind immediately. Both of those I discovered through recommendations, having seen nothing of their work advertised or hyped up in the press to the same extent as the male authors quoted.

People like different things. Lord of the Rings is pretty good, I think - but I don't consider it to be that good to deserve obsession and repeated readings. Or a musical. When you strip that down to its bare bones, it’s essentially a fairly tedious road trip story. Albeit a road trip with tiny men in possession of huge hairy feet. And a fiery thing at the end. And orks. I did enjoy it, but I also got very bored at various points.

JK Rowling has achieved what she has through hard work - and in the process she's stimulated millions of minds (not just those of children), and made reading popular with many, many children once more - in an age where the internet and TV rule without competition. How on earth, with clear conscience, can you criticise that?

Unless she’s selling more books than you, of course…

blOODy hell, we're famous!

Well, nearly.

The wonderful eccentricities of my computer meant that for some reason I missed a couple of recent episodes of the DWO Who Cast... Which I downloaded last night and listened to this lunchtime.

I listened to Episode 76 and nearly choked on my sushi when they started the "Random Fandom" section by mentioning the name "The Ood Cast"...

Tony and Trevor are both very nice about us and I've probably mentioned this before, but I'll do it all over again - the Who Cast is well worth a listen, definitely one of the best DW-themed podcasts out there, and always an entertaining half an hour or so of listening.

Oh, and they mention my rant about people's, frankly wrong, opinions on The Unicorn and The Wasp. Oops...!

But the word is out...

Look it up on iTunes if you don't believe me...

Or download it from here...

[See the original post here]

Red Letter Days

Saturday was supposed to be a momentous day for Doctor Who – it was RTD’s big finale, in effect. An episode where he pulled together as many loose strings from the last four years as he could fit into an hour and tried to tie them all together once and for all.

We finally saw the door slammed on the ridiculous Doctor-and-Rose-sitting-in-a-tree… "tension". Mickey finally moved on (to Torchwood?). Martha finally seems to have joined Torchwood permanently. Donna is back with her family – having got better and better as the series rolled on. And we got that answer to the regeneration question.

But did it all come off?

[Read the rest here...]

This is wonderful! Go and enjoy!

I've been reading about Interesting2008, which took place last Saturday in London. I'd have loved to have gone. Its a conference where various creative-types get up and talk about interesting things.

Annie Mole, of the Going Underground blog fame, described it like this: "A collection of funny, fascinating, funky & often frankly foolish people who Russell Davies collected together to talk about interesting things"

Anyway, this is amazing - a self-confessed geek and LEGO obsessive expounds the delights of the little building blocks we all love. All in 3 minutes ten seconds.

http://www.slideshare.net/rooreynolds/lego-is-full-of-win

Go and have a look, share the geeky joy and do something geeky yourself. Its good for you.

Trust me, I'm a doctor.








All right, I'm not.

But you should do it anyway.

When the night is long...

I find straight-up horror films pretty boring these days. I almost think its fair to say that if a film states that it is a horror film, and is not made in Japan – its probably not very scary unless you’re a horror virgin or too young to see one. They generally end up in three categories, in my experience – the unheard-of, non-english-language original version, the plastic-bimbo-populated Hollywood remake, and the half-baked predictable teen-horror.

What’s impressive with Doctor Who at the moment, is how far they seem willing to push the boundaries for the timeslot they’ve been shoved in (I say shoved in: series 1-3 were all shown in a slot an hour later – and all pulled in roughly a million more viewers per week).

But this hasn’t quietened down the ambition of the production team. This series has had a feel of the inevitable about it – a kind of running dread that has wound its way around the storylines. But – no stories that have tried to freak viewers out with “scary” CGI monsters… Not that spring to mind, anyway.

And RTD’s episode, Midnight, seems to be the pinnacle – so far, anyway.

[Read the rest here...]

And the nation's libraries were empty...

Oh so often in television, cliffhangers are abused. Cruelly used to drag viewers back against their better instincts to watch the next installment of whatever it is they're watching. And often, this is a complete let-down. Imagine sitting back to watch the new episode of Eastenders because the end of last night's has intrigued you - only to find out that its still a soap opera of negligable merit about depressing people and their petty little existences. Nothing is ever discussed - always dismissed as either "it's family" or in fisticuffs. Or a bottling. It is London, after all.

Where are the Krays when you need them, eh?

Well, I'm always worried that a cliffhanger in Doctor Who was just such a hook to drag you into a mediocre fishing net, filled with slippery little bores that rumble on endlessly about continuity, mythology and characters. Incidentally, I'd like to set up a forum for people to discuss and enjoy the good doctor's universe - but it would have a strict policy - the rules of Just A Minute would apply. Say continuity twice and you're out of here!

But why was I worried at the end of the Silence In The Library? Why did I even entertain the idea that the next part would be anything other than magnificent? I'm not sure. But I'm glad I was worried, if only that it meant I enjoyed The Forest of the Dead even more.

[Read the rest here...]

When The Going Gets Tough, The Moff Gets Going

Well. How to describe The Silence In The Library... I sat still afterwards for a few minutes, looking at the now empty screen I'd been watching it all on, and became very aware that I had a dark room behind me...

I've loved this series so far - so many things to like about the writing, the elusive "story-arc" (yawn). But the one thing I think we've been missing is suspense. Last year was not short of suspense - I think most, if not all the stories had elements of suspense - with 42 being extremely tense all the way through, and then the ultimate trio of episodes from Paul Cornell and Steven Moffat topping it all off. But this year, I think we've seen things coming.

The Sontaran story, as enjoyable as it was (and I mean that sincerely - it was incredibly watchable, even if I did have reservations about the plot), was not tense at any point, to me. The Doctor's Daughter gave away the suspense within a minute of the start and from then on was light on plot and pretty predictable (but great all the same). The Fires of Pompeii had some suspense in, and was a cracking early episode, but that's about it.

But as usual, The Moff defies us all. From start to finish, this episode pulsed like one of the classic Dalek tales or the relentless tension in the Web of Fear. There were some fantastic touches in structure - they're sealed in a library, but there's a little girl on earth (? Is it earth?) who can see all and communicate with them - even if she doesn't understand. Shadows that eat you alive - "not every shadow, but any shadow" is how the Doctor described it. Weapons useless against such an enemy is something that also screams classic Who to me - and makes all this even better.

[Read the rest here...]

Trailer nonsense

I am writing at the end of the week where the good Dok-tor was replaced by a bunch of over-made-up European tunebreakers. Eurovision took preference, and Who fans have had to make do with a teaser trailer again.

I also write this just after the first ever get-together of the Ood Cast writers - fine gentlemen, all - and the night before the Moff unleashes what looks to be an even more frightening story than last year's Blink. Only this time, we have to get through two episodes behind our white knuckles!

I actually quite like the break to accomodate Eurovision. And that's not just because I like the Eurovision (although, embarrassingly, perhaps, I do - even if it is mainly for Sir Terry) but it affords us a bit of a breather before we set off on the usually terrifying road to the season finale. And it gives us a chance to ruminate on what's been and get pant-wettingly excited about what's coming up.

But some take this more seriously than others. Some can't stand the week's break (really - think about how long we had to wait for the series to come back, guys - what's a week?), and others take what they're given and over analyse to a ridiculous extent.

[Read the rest here...]