If he ever accepted it
Jun. 8th, 2008 12:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alexsarllThe best thing about a Moffat two parter is that after a first part which was brilliant, you get a second part that's even better. Yes, he's still shamelessly recycling himself - but as has been pointed out to me, "I'm always alright" and "everyone lives" are the sort of thing that works as a catchphrase, the Doctor's own "I am the Law". And Moffat also does grand speeches about who the Doctor is and what he means better than anyone else except Lance Parkin, of whom more in a moment. Those moments of godhead, the suggestions of a Doctor beyond even what we know - I love that stuff. TBH I am still getting a bit choked up thinking about the episode, so this is perhaps not the most rigorous of critical analyses, but I still have some questions. Like, I knew what she whispered would be his name, but what's this about there only being one time he'd say it? Like, is the Doctor going to be using the upgraded screwdriver from now on? Because that would be a lovely loop. Oh, and I'm rescinding the idea that she must necessarily have travelled with the Tenth and thus some kind of timeline shenanigans must be coming if Tennant's off. Obviously they could still go that way - but that bit about him coming with a different haircut and a suit? I think maybe that was another Doctor, dressing as Ten so she knew what to look for, possibly even doing the internal-possession-by-past-incarnation bit we saw in Timewyrm.
Does it show how much I love that the highest-rating episode of the series is so damn geeky? Like that line about having thousands of people inside your head - "like being me" - well if that wasn't intended as a reference to him storing the Time Lords in his brain after Gallifrey's first fall, it sure sounded like one to me. And if he never mentioned how similar the whole library colonialism situation was to that he encountered in The Genocide Machine - well, The Genocide Machine was deeply mediocre, so I'm not complaining.
I'm sure by now we all know about Lawrence Miles' interesting if infuriating blog, and Paul Cornell's has been about for a while (as if getting mainstream coverage for Gordon Brown vs the Skrull Empire weren't enough, turns out he's adapted Iain M Banks' The State of the Art for radio. With Anthony Sher as the Ship and Nina Sosanya as Sma, no less). But I was happy to discover this week that the other big beast of the Who books* finally has one too - Lance Parkin. In part because he's writing a Tenth Doctor book. As in, just the Doctor. There's not a lot up yet, but he does link to an interview in which I made the sad discovery that one of my favourite Who writers wanted to kill off one of my favourite companions.
Shaun Tan's The Arrival is not a comic per se; it's a wordless picture book. The wordlessness perfectly suited to the story of an immigrant's experience in a New World whose language he does not know, a city of wonders as strangely familiar as the lurking horrors from which he fled in the old country. It has some of the most haunting artwork I have seen in a long time, and some of the most heart-rending. I imagine it would be a particularly good purchase for any child which parents fear may have been exposed to Mail headlines about immigrants eating house prices, but it deserves an audience far beyond that.
I love White Mischief, so I'm glad it's popular, but dear heavens it gets hot in there with those crowds, especially if one is making an effort to dress up (which the vast majority did, splendidly so - at one point I thought "What the Hell is that girl wearing?" before processing that she was in jeans and a teen top, ie what would outside be considered normal). Some fine acts, though - I particularly liked the Brel-singing acrobat and the sword-swallowing, and if Tough Love and Ebony Bones had just played shorter sets, they would have absolutely killed.
And for all my irritation at last night's multi-clash, I at least got to say hello and cheerio to some of the Poptimism lot on my way home.
*Kate Orman I would have counted for her Virgin work, but once she went to BBC books and started co-writing with that guy, they no longer grabbed me in the same way. And Daniel O'Mahony was excellent, but he only wrote two.
Does it show how much I love that the highest-rating episode of the series is so damn geeky? Like that line about having thousands of people inside your head - "like being me" - well if that wasn't intended as a reference to him storing the Time Lords in his brain after Gallifrey's first fall, it sure sounded like one to me. And if he never mentioned how similar the whole library colonialism situation was to that he encountered in The Genocide Machine - well, The Genocide Machine was deeply mediocre, so I'm not complaining.
I'm sure by now we all know about Lawrence Miles' interesting if infuriating blog, and Paul Cornell's has been about for a while (as if getting mainstream coverage for Gordon Brown vs the Skrull Empire weren't enough, turns out he's adapted Iain M Banks' The State of the Art for radio. With Anthony Sher as the Ship and Nina Sosanya as Sma, no less). But I was happy to discover this week that the other big beast of the Who books* finally has one too - Lance Parkin. In part because he's writing a Tenth Doctor book. As in, just the Doctor. There's not a lot up yet, but he does link to an interview in which I made the sad discovery that one of my favourite Who writers wanted to kill off one of my favourite companions.
Shaun Tan's The Arrival is not a comic per se; it's a wordless picture book. The wordlessness perfectly suited to the story of an immigrant's experience in a New World whose language he does not know, a city of wonders as strangely familiar as the lurking horrors from which he fled in the old country. It has some of the most haunting artwork I have seen in a long time, and some of the most heart-rending. I imagine it would be a particularly good purchase for any child which parents fear may have been exposed to Mail headlines about immigrants eating house prices, but it deserves an audience far beyond that.
I love White Mischief, so I'm glad it's popular, but dear heavens it gets hot in there with those crowds, especially if one is making an effort to dress up (which the vast majority did, splendidly so - at one point I thought "What the Hell is that girl wearing?" before processing that she was in jeans and a teen top, ie what would outside be considered normal). Some fine acts, though - I particularly liked the Brel-singing acrobat and the sword-swallowing, and if Tough Love and Ebony Bones had just played shorter sets, they would have absolutely killed.
And for all my irritation at last night's multi-clash, I at least got to say hello and cheerio to some of the Poptimism lot on my way home.
*Kate Orman I would have counted for her Virgin work, but once she went to BBC books and started co-writing with that guy, they no longer grabbed me in the same way. And Daniel O'Mahony was excellent, but he only wrote two.
