Saturday, November 21, 2009

Unexpected Import




OK, cutting to the chase -

I might not be at Burwood tomorrow.

This morning my mum was doing the washing up when a Father-Ted-style string of bad luck lead to my cat Frodo (the one who thinks he's a dog) biting my mum on the hand. Between the tendons. Nasty. So my dad has rushed my mum to the doctor for emergency stitches and stuff, while I am left looking for the traumatized cat. Because Frodo has never bitten a human in his life, let alone the most important one in the house. Quite frankly, I may never see a cat look ASHAMED ever again.

I'm praying to a god I'm not on speaking terms that my mum will be all right (this is less than 24 hours after I discovered a Metabelis-sized spider on her back), but most likely with her hand out of action and basically she's more important than going to Club Burwood for a look at some merchandise before fleeing from that T-shirt vendor with the anti-immigration workshop.

So... if I'm not there, do not be surprised.

I'm posting stuff on Monday, so, I dunno, comment a request or something.

In other news, I've seen the preview for The End of Time.

Basically, the Doctor returns to the Ood-Sphere where Ood Sigma is waiting for the Time Lord. The Doctor isn't much better from when we last saw him - he's decked out in sombrero and sunglasses, and babbles about the multitude of off-screen adventures he's had since he went off the deep end. Even though the Ood were summoning him for help, he deliberately kept them waiting so he could deal with fiddly stuff like River Song and Queen Elizabeth I and mastering how to snap his fingers and get the TARDIS to make stupid "car security alarm" noises.

In fact, you might mistake the Tenth Doctor for his normal self, but not quite. He's not longer "Time Lord Victorious - just call me Valeyard", but he's not exactly pleasant either. He's rude and contemptuous of Ood Sigma, basically going, "You should be damn grateful I turned up at all, squid face, how dare you remind me of my own mortality, you humorless bastard!"

Even if you hadn't seen Waters of Mars, it's clear the Doctor's trying too hard to be cheerful and carefree. There's that faint grit of the teeth, the ending sentences in a sigh, the palpable sense he SO wants to run and keep running. His bluffing of "Yeah, on Earth, you didn't really think I was crying or anything gay like that, did you?" says pretty much everything you need to know.

Ood Sigma - doing a king of cross between Hannibal Lector and Q from James Bond - patiently leads the Time Lord to the ice city of the Ood. It turns out our cute Cthulu pals have reconquered their planet and over 100 years evolved yet more brains, and are powerful enough to telepathically cross time and space. The Doctor's deeply troubled by them managing this so soon, but as Ood Sigma icily notes, they didn't call the stubborn would-be god here so he could critique their development. The Ood, as a gestalt and as individuals are all suffering nightmares.

Nightmares of John Simm laughing his head off.

"But... he's dead!" the Doctor gasps fearfully, totally losing his oh-so-convincing composure.

The Ood stare at him. It's rare prosthetics can do the "for fuck's sake!"/"no shit Sherlock!" expression, but full marks to BBC Wales for managing this prosthetic triumph. The Ood Elder playing catch with his own brain was pretty cool too...

6 comments:

Jared "No Nickname" Hansen said...

Though the site said the meeting was at Burwood on Sunday the 29th, as I would have reminded you had I any access to the internet over the last three days. (Our phoneline is dead with no explanation forthcoming) I'd respond on more detail but I'm on a TAFE comp right now in a limited window of time.

Youth of Australia said...

OH. I assumed it would be the 22nd since that was the closest to the 23rd, a date not without significance.

So. Yay us.

Jared "No Nickname" Hansen said...

..damn, took me a moment to realise just then what the date of siginificance was. Now I feel DUNCE'd.

(And by that I mean opening up the page just now. I haven't been puzzling that one out for nearly a week)

Anyway, started watching The Incredible Robert Baldick and was enjoying it quite a bit - though you were definitely right about the agonizing awfulness and padding of the five minute cold opening, featuring the worst acting I've seen on the Beeb.

ONE of those terrible actors I recognised quickly, however, as The Outboard Motor Salesman from Fawlty Towers : The Hotel Inspectors. Now online I find out that the fellow you dubbed 'Spudgun' was a young John Rhys-Davies (Sallah, Gimli and DaVinci in Voyager) whereas Thomas is Sgt Patterson from Survival. Well.. I found it cool..

Interesting disc. Quite retro. I also watched the first of the Beeb Christmas tapes. Apparently few things were funnier than tits back then..

Youth of Australia said...

..damn, took me a moment to realise just then what the date of siginificance was. Now I feel DUNCE'd.
Hey, I've done it often enough...

(And by that I mean opening up the page just now. I haven't been puzzling that one out for nearly a week)
Oh. OK, you were stupid.

Anyway, started watching The Incredible Robert Baldick and was enjoying it quite a bit - though you were definitely right about the agonizing awfulness and padding of the five minute cold opening, featuring the worst acting I've seen on the Beeb.
Yeah, my dad had very similar thoughts.

ONE of those terrible actors I recognised quickly, however, as The Outboard Motor Salesman from Fawlty Towers : The Hotel Inspectors. Now online I find out that the fellow you dubbed 'Spudgun' was a young John Rhys-Davies (Sallah, Gimli and DaVinci in Voyager)
GIMLI? As in Bill Oddie the Troll with the Axe in LOTR?!

He looked a lot like Spudgun though.

whereas Thomas is Sgt Patterson from Survival. Well.. I found it cool..
...no way. I did not even find either of them FAMILIAR!

Interesting disc. Quite retro. I also watched the first of the Beeb Christmas tapes. Apparently few things were funnier than tits back then..
Yeah. As far as I can tell they were the first 'outtake-youtube-montage' things in history and for some reason this allowed them to show all the tits they weren't allowed to show to the British public.

It's ironic that only the DW/Fawlty Towers/Goodies stuff is the only thing meriting it getting uploaded to websites... considering they were of the least import in the programs at the time.

Jared "No Nickname" Hansen said...

Oh. OK, you were stupid.

...possibly you've misinterpreted me.

GIMLI? As in Bill Oddie the Troll with the Axe in LOTR?!

The very same!

He looked a lot like Spudgun though.

I could definitely see the resemblence. Spudgun is a very recognisable bloke, isn't he? I found it hilarious when he showed up in Foyle's War.

...no way. I did not even find either of them FAMILIAR!

I know, it's MADNESS!

It's ironic that only the DW/Fawlty Towers/Goodies stuff is the only thing meriting it getting uploaded to websites... considering they were of the least import in the programs at the time.

Because of the fact they survived on the Christmas tapes, though, you can see the out-takes on the respective DVDs - I saw all the DW bits on the Key to Time extras, for example - so I was slightly more interested in the bits from shows I knw nothing about. If nothing else they gave me a fuller picture of telly in the 70s.

Youth of Australia said...

I could definitely see the resemblence. Spudgun is a very recognisable bloke, isn't he? I found it hilarious when he showed up in Foyle's War.
Yes. I wonder if he's typecast...

I know, it's MADNESS!
It's not the artefact scrambling our minds telepathically?

Because of the fact they survived on the Christmas tapes, though, you can see the out-takes on the respective DVDs - I saw all the DW bits on the Key to Time extras, for example - so I was slightly more interested in the bits from shows I knw nothing about. If nothing else they gave me a fuller picture of telly in the 70s.
Seems to be most of them wanted to show swearing and nudity but never could. And that a lot of the actors had trouble remembering their lines.