skywaterblue: (the last unicorn)
I never root for the Christian British in any adaptation of Merlin. Like all good fantasists, my heart is firmly with the Druids and the magic leaking out of the world. Also, Cooper and I were making jokes about yet another magic system that is based solely on Fancy Latin, and then in one episode we learn the terrible secret about Arthur's parentage: Nimue didn't remember to balance for the 'Law of Equivalent Exchange'.

Proving that everything is a bit better with Fullmetal Alchemist.

Some spoilers. )
skywaterblue: (Revolution Will Not Be Televised)
I started watching 'Merlin' the other night with Cooper. We watched about seven straight episodes. Unfortunately I failed at DVD making and we watched some of them out of order, including the second episode as the first episode. Doubly unfortunate as that second episode is literally one of the worst hours of television I've ever seen.

Anyway, it's okay, I'll probably watch the rest of the season tonight. Cooper and I almost invented a drinking game which was 'every time Anthony Stewart Head gets to have range, take a drink', because most of the show involves his character being a complete douche to create third act drama. Strangely, they just gave interesting backstory to Gaius, which makes it two Gaiuses in a row who are interesting characters.

Mainly the whole thing makes me wonder why the BBC never made a good version of "The Once and Future King". And also why I can't find my copy for a reread.



Here's a video of a historian who made a working reconstruction of the Antikythera mechanism.

There's a movie coming out called Nothing But The Truth which is a thinly veiled version of the Valarie Plame scandal. It's written by Rob Lurie, who did 'Commander-in-Chief', that shit West Wing knockoff, and the much better film "The Contender". Interestingly, it not only has Alan Alda, but some guy named President Lyman who gets shot.
skywaterblue: (ambrose bierce hates you)
I'm still awake and unfortunately, Cartoon Network is on and of all things, BLEACH is playing. I have to admit, while this might just be the shittiest anime ever made, The Soul Society is a totally cool phrase.

Too bad they're using it ever other sentence in this episode.

Stuff

Dec. 5th, 2008 03:51 pm
skywaterblue: (Revolution Will Not Be Televised)
In Defense of Amy Gardner.

I kind of agree with the tone of this blog, except I think I always also disliked the way Amy pursues her politics. We don't share exactly the same feminism. I tend to think her brand of feminism is why most women in America tell pollsters they don't identify as a feminist.

I think she might have been a more interesting character had she ever stuck around in and racked up more non-Josh scenes. I would have liked to have seen a season five with Sorkin at the helm and Parker promoted to the credits so we could have seen him do the alcoholism plotline. (And man, I just know someone's going to call on me to source that information, so: it's in the s3-s4 scriptbook, and in the Sorkin commentary track on one of her s4 episodes. [livejournal.com profile] michellek knows the score.)

None the less, will never get over the guilt I feel for not liking Amy as much because of being a shipper. SO SORRY TO BE THAT PERSON.

The Flashforward Pilot is gonna have Joseph Fiennes?

Fuck yes. I really enjoyed that book, and it's SAD that Pretty/Handsome didn't get picked up for a full series. That pilot is amazing.
skywaterblue: (Default)
Survivors, Episode Three. )

Next, the first NGE Rebuild film, which I downloaded several months ago, around the time I convinced [livejournal.com profile] rosmar that this was the anime what would convince her anime was a bit alright. (Gendo Ikari, you magnificent bastard!)

Neon Genesis Evangelion Rebuild: Film One: You Are Not Alone )

Lastly, a comment about Screenwipe 4.3 )
skywaterblue: (Default)
Survivors -- Episode Two

A mixed review for this. )

The Devil's Whore -- Episode Two

Actually, I thought this much improved from last week. )

Sarah Jane Adventures: The Temptation of Sarah Jane Smith

A really great episode. )

Charlie Brooker's "Dead Set" + Season Five of Screenwipe



Episode One was better than Episode Two, primarily because good reviews are less fun than bad reviews. The poetry bits are a mistake and Cooper and I fast forward through them.

As for Dead Set, it was really good! I called it successfully in the middle of the first episode that this was going to be an EVERYONE DIES zombie flick. The zombies are just too deadly in this. The scene where the producer butchers the dead? Squicked even us hardened zombie film watchers.

However, I'm generally really pleased about how everyone who survives the initial round of killings (save for the people in the house, obviously) are good survivors who tend not to make too many stupid mistakes. Which immediately made this show better written than 'Survivors'. (Of course, in 'Survivors' they don't have to fight the undead.)

Even the decision by the boyfriend to go back for his girlfriend makes brilliant sense in the context of the show -- something that almost never works in zombie dramas!

Finally, one of the things that I thought elevated the series was the sense of time. The main characters who are survivors are survivors because they wait and think decisions though before making them, and not always through sheer luck.

skywaterblue: (serious doctor tiem!)
First I saw 'The Devil's Whore', which was surprisingly crap. [livejournal.com profile] selenak did a good round up on why it was crappy. Let me just say that the English Civil War is far too early to be making Goya references. I'll probably watch the rest of it though, given there's only three more parts and there is quite literally, nothing on American television that remotely interests me at the moment.

Second, I saw 'Einstein and Eddington'.

Potential spoilers for physics )

Here is my problem with math and disaster films: So there are about thirteen million people who live in the London metro area. If the flu has a kill rate of 90% of all people infected, with 100% infection rate, that still leaves about 1.3 million people in the London metro area.

Obviously, a lot more people than that died in 'Survivors'. So what if it was 99% of people? That leaves 13,000 people. Which is not a lot, but it's a lot more fucking people than you see in Survivors.

I say this only because there are so fucking many of us by this point that it would be really difficult to kill off all humans in one fell swoop and it always really bothers me to see plagues reduce the population to television portions. Especially since there's basically never been any disease (knock on wood) that was so virulent as to have that high a fatality. Battlestar Galactica did a good job by saying there were several thousands of survivors but never showing us them.

So here's Survivors. )

Anyway, I'll keep watching this. It's only six episodes. I hope the next episodes are shorter than an hour and a half, though, because that was far, far too long for the material covered.

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