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Thursday 20 November 2008
More Who. Much More
The Guardian is reporting that Jane Tranter, Head of Drama Commissioning at the BBC, has confirmed that she's commissioned a second series of Doctor Who, as well as a Christmas special.
The Guardian's gone for registration, so unless you've signed up you can't get the story, but if you want to, go to Media Guardian and it's linked from the homepage at the moment.
EDIT - BBC Story here.
Now That's What I Call....
David has been introducing me to all sorts of music recently that I otherwise wouldn't have touched wit a bargepole, and generally speaking, I'm liking it.
Recent additions to my listening range include:
Kaiser Chiefs - whose album Employment is very impressive. Favourite track is probably You can have it all, though I predict a riot runs it a close second.
Bodies Without Organs, a Swedish outfit from the school of Army Of Lovers. Their album, Prototype is very solid poppy stuff with some very cool tracks on it, including Sixteen tons of hardware and Open door which are my favourites.
Rilo Kiley ("the other Kylie in my life"). Female vocal-led, sort of poppy, sort of rocky, sort of folky, they have something for everyone. Standout track is Portions for foxes, but most of the rest could run it a close second.
All recommended.
The School Meals Thing
I've avoided commenting on the whole sorry saga of the pathetic state of the school meal system in England and Wales, but as the government has decided to make some new cash available for ingredients, it's reminded me to make a comment about a brief bit of the Jamie Oliver series that kicked it all off that I saw.
In one of the biggest "WTF?" moments in TV history, when the new, fresh and healthy, school meals had been introduced into a school in South East London, parents were coming to the school and passing bags of McDonalds' food in through the bars of the school gate!
I mean, really, seriously, what the hell kind of parent is it that doesn't want their kids to eat more healthily?
Doctor Oooooooh!
We liked it, I think it's safe to say - Graham Norton intruding from BBC3 notwithstanding.
Pacing was good, performances were good with the screaming exception of Rose's boyfriend, who was, bluntly, crap. Humour was at about the right level, and the much-commented-on 'intrusive' incidental music wasn't really anything of the kind.
And the preview of episode two..... whoar!
More Anglican Church Entertainment
Look - Scotland thinks gay ministers are okay.
The radio this morning was full of comments about how this is going to add to the potential for schism in the church.
All I can say is that the more energy they expend fighting among themselves, the less likely they are to be focusing their anger and hatred at people like me.
So I'm regarding this as a good news day.
I'm Off To Bosnia....
.... who wouldn't be?
"And now people watching this film abroad will say 'Ah you see, they're all homosexuals in Bosnia'."
Timekeeping
I just realised how well this coming weekend is falling. The clocks are going forward, resulting in an hour less to sleep in, but for once, it's happening over a long weekend, so it's not going to feel quite as grievously unfair.
I don't know why I always have that reaction to the start of BST, but somehow, I feel the loss of that hour very keenly....
Trailer Park
Oddly, given that I said I wasn't going to shut up about it, it's been more than a week since I posted about Doctor Who. But all that's over with now.
The full trailers, which started airing last Tuesday, are now all over the BBC, and make it all look very exciting - It's all getting increasingly real. And yet curiously, I'm feeling a bit at saturation point. I just want the thing to be on now.
Are You Thinking????
Am I the only one who's thoroughly engraged by that "Are you thinking what we're thinking?"campaign that the Tories are running on billboards at the moment?
The ones in particular that annoy me are:
"I mean; How hard can it be to keep a hospital clean?", which is not only insulting to all the people who work damn hard throughout hospitals, but tonally is offensive too. That "I mean" just strikes the kind of condescending snootiness that confirms everything you ever thought about the Tory party.
"How would you feel if a bloke on early release attacked your daughter?". Where to begin? First off, as every statistic in the world will happily confirm, violence (to the point of murder) is far more likely to happen inside a family than from outside - so where are the messages about "How would your daughter feel if you beat her up?" (Note that there's news today that girls are more likely to accept boyfriends assaulting them if they've experienced violence at home BBC). On top of which, who exactly do they think they're fooling with the tone again? I doubt Michael Howard has ever ebven thought the word 'bloke', let alone used it in everyday conversation. It's so obviously phoney I can't believe they thought they'd get away with it.
And worst of all: "It's not racist to impose controls on immigration." No, it absolutely isn't, in principle, but in practice the specific control imposed could be deeply racist. Also, that statement is a get out of jail free card for anyone whose reasons for wanting immigration controls actually are racist. They can hide behind it as much as they want, and the Tories have just handed it to them on a plate.
And While I'm On The Subject
What is it about Northern Irish politics that makes the worst possible examples of humanity rise to the top? On both sides of the political divide you find equally monstrous examples. If it's not Gerry Addams and Martin McGuinness and their mealy-mouthed defences of the indefensible, it's the vile Ian Paisley confirming with every utterance that 'Man of God' is, as I've always suspected, one of the most damning labels it's possible to adopt.
Maybe it's the entrance of some of the province's 'ordinary people' into the process that's exactly what's needed to offset these evil bastards.
The Politics Of Screwed
Exactly how screwed is Sinn Fein, suddenly? The stuff about the IRA and their increasing involvement with organised crime (another programme on which subject is on the BBC tonight) is increasingly discrediting any claim that they have to being about politics, and their 'political wing' is tarred alongside them.
Add to that the facts that they're not publicly condemning Robert McCartney's murderers; that two of the party's past candidates for office were in the pub where he was killed and didn't go to the police; and that no one is either condeming the IRA for the "we'll shoot the killers" proposal.
Add to *that* the fact that most of the past bastions of their support appear to be treating them like lepers at the moment; that McCartney's family (who are Sinn Fein supporters let's not forget) are apparently due to tell Bush that the party has no part to play in the peace process until the murderers are brought before a court; *and* that the always mealy-mouthed Martin McGuinness has felt the need to warn them off getting involved in party politics.
I'm thinking, pretty much screwed.
Yet More TV
It's odd that we're having time even to watch TV in our house when there's so much World of Warcraft to be played, but I suppose the occasional break is beneficial.
First things first - the bad: David has become a bit of a fan of a BBC3 series called High Spirits with Shirley Ghostman which I can't stand. I've never been a fan of 'cringe TV', and this thing makes me cringe constantly. The set-up is a fake medium who hosts a show which the audience and other people who take part think is authentic. It's done in such an over the top manner that no one could seriously think that it's real after more than a few minutes, but the nature of the set-ups is so crude and insensitive that I just cringe and have to go and do something else.
At the other end of the scale - something I expected to be bad and which was actually very enjoyable was also on BBC3 last night, and that was part one of Casanova. I mostly watched it because of interest in seeing Russell T Davies' other series starting this month, but got entirely caught up in it and found myself looking forward to the continuation in a way that I wasn't expecting. I know a bunch of people who think that David Tennant is incredibly sexy, and I'm most assuredly never likely to join their ranks, but I do think he did brilliantly well with it, as did pretty much all the cast.
Critique
You do know that for the next two weeks (and possibly beyond that) I'm just not going to shut up about the return of Doctor Who, don't you?
Just checking.
Some of the rather more sensible reviews that have emerged from the official screenings, rather than a downloaded rough cut, make for seriously heartening reading.
Among the many, my favourite (so far) is probably this one from The Times:
"It's a funny feeling. When the dum-de-dum, dum-de-dum starts, and the new-look title sequence begins, the hairs on your arms stand up, and a smile fixes itself, rictus-like, to your face. This warm feeling alone is enough to transport you blithely through the first five minutes of the new Doctor Who before any critical faculties kick in. And when they do, you realise that you're enjoying yourself."
I WANT THAT FEELING!!!!!!
I Am *Not* Sad!
But did you see the trailers for Doctor Who on TV last night?
Adding a new dimension to the word 'teaser', but I'm loving the sound of the new version of the theme tune.
And my word you can tell Bryan Hitch designed the Console Room.
But I'm not sad, no matter how much the fact that I knew exactly when to be watching to see them might suggest otherwise.
They're up on the Official BBC Doctor Who site by the way.
Post-Leak
Following on from the leaked episode of Doctor Who yesterday, I was directed to a couple of pointlessly mean-spirited reviews of the episode on Ain't It Cool News (no link - they don't deserve it).
This is stupid on a bunch of levels:
1) It's established that the promo version that went to Canada from which this pirated copy was sourced wasn't the final cut anyway.
2) Quality will have shifted along the way from original to download version, so comments about the quality of the audio mix are nonsensical.
3) Several people in the follow-on forum noted that they'd submitted glowing reviews of the thing, but that the established anti-Doctor Who sentiment on the TV section of that site is so clear that it's hardly surprising that only the negative ones were selected for publication.
Warren Ellis has published what I'm told is a more balanced review on his site. I haven't looked in case he's included spoilers.
Leaked!
According to the BBC News site, Rose, the first epsode of the new series of Doctor Who, is at large on the internet somewhere.
There's been some debate in our house about how we want to watch the first episode (and indeed the following ones), and one thing I'm entirely certain of is that 'via a pirate copy on a computer screen' wouldn't ever have been in the running.
Stunned And Amazed
Yesterday morning I had what I can really only describe as a Changing Rooms moment. Except that I used words that you're not supposed to use when Carol Smilie says "Open Your Eyes!".
Chris and Brian are staying at my place at the moment while they decide what they're going to do in the long term about where they live, and they offered to do some bits and pieces around the place while they're there.
These are the kind of things I've wanted to do myself for a while but not got round to because of time constraints more than anything.
I went round yesterday to catch up with them and found the place transformed. They've redecorated, put down a new floor, reorganised the kitchen and changed the worktops and sink, and generally made the place look like a new flat. I love every single thing they've done.
I knew everything they were thinking of, but had simply not expected them to get anything like as far in the time.
It puts my inertia on the matter to shame.
Thank you both *so* much.
WoW
I've mentioned previously that being with David has introduced me to a world of video gaming that I'd previously done no more than dabbled in...
Since last I mentioned this subject (when I completed both Haloes), I've had relationships of varying seriousness with X-Men: Legends, Fable and I've completed Ratchet and Clank 2 and made significant inroads into Ratchet and Clank 3.
While I was away David started playing World of Warcraft, and when I got back he introduced me to it.
There's a word which gets used a lot when games are being discussed, which is 'immersive'.
I now entirely understand how entirely immersed in a game one can get. This thing is amazing: properly challenging in an other than 'shoot-shoot-shoot' way, with the opportunity to have decisions about skills you pick up and life choices you make actually impact on the way the game goes, and all packaged up in some stunning graphics and the ability to play alongside other players in either short or long term parties that mean the model in which you play can change all the time.
Yes, I cannot deny it. This is me, openly raving about a computer game....
Un-Fucking-Believable
The Government of Sudan (that's the same government currently committing genocide-in-all-but-UN-recognition, by the way), wants the name of this carcinogenic food dye that's been in the news, Sudan-1, changing, because:
Because, obviously, perpetrating mass murder is such a reputation-enhancing activity.
First As Tragedy....
I'm having a weird flashback at the moment, courtesy of The Case Of Margaret's Shoulder, and I'm glad I'm not the only one. Several radio news programmes have reflected on the precedent of The Case Of Jennifer's Ear from the run-up to the 1992 election.
Given how badly that worked out for Labour, I'm amazed that Michael Howard wants to tread the same path.
Busy Week....
Obviously I'm back home; the cat is as lovely as ever; so is the man.
Since I got back I've been thrown right back into the everyday work cycle, except that the everyday work cycle now covers stuff happening on two continents in a bunch of offices.
I've also had Gramsci for his second trip to the vet, at which the concept of him losing his essentials was first raised. Poor baby - he has about three more months of being all man, and then they'll be coming off.
He's started being a bit crazy around water recently. Running a bath with the bathroom door open is now dangerous, because he's started going in and walking along the side then slipping in. He's also started looking like he wants to jump into the basin while water's running into it, and just sitting in the bath while it's empty.
We've got one crazy kitten on our hands.