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I wanted to like it. But, egh. It's worth the whopping nothing I pay to see it but, yegh.
The new Doctor Who is Star Trek: The Next Generation, in that it's the relatively faithful modern updating of a classic series that, while it had its genius, tended to lose people due to its having been filmed in someone's bathroom.
Which makes Torchwood the DS9 of the franchise. All the fun and wonder and joy--gone. No travelling; instead the characters stay put in one spot, bicker, and have grim sex with one another while waiting for weird aliens to wander through a nearby spatial rift so that they, the main characters, can bicker and/or have sex with it.
Some people liked Deep Space Nine. I'm sure some people like Torchwood too but I don't know many of them. Parts of it were all right, I guess. I quite liked the final minute and a half. Lisa, however, dislikes it even more than she dislikes Stargate SG-1, and her distaste for Stargate is a palpable warm weight.
Right now I'm watching the first episode of Sarah Jane Adventures, the new second spinoff, which is probably intentionally a lot like the popular modern update, except that now a handsomely middle-aged woman is captaining the ship. I mean show.
It will air on CBC in October. Last year, they aired Season 1 right after the BBC showed it; they had nothing better to show because of the hockey strike. However, its ratings were so high that CBC beat out the (mostly American) shows airing on the other networks--which means that they're putting Season 2 up against the new shows in the fall.
Bit of a miscalculation, I think, as the fans who really care will watch it through the intarwob, as I did.
Of course, last year Kyle and Justin, not willing to wait for the ten days between the BBC and CBC airings, watched it through the intertron anyway. So maybe it won't make that much of a difference.
Lisa asked why I love the show so much.
It's because North American sci-fi is generally about big ships and big guns blowing the holy hell out of each other. Big heroes and big villains have big battles, and the only way you can really tell the difference is that the villain is more interesting.
The Doctor's ship is a rickety blue wooden box, which, before it was the last one in existence, was obsolete. He has no guns. Last episode, a phalanx of automatic-weapon-bearing guards waited outside the TARDIS. "Well, there goes the element of surprise," muses the Doctor. "Still, stay in here."
"Doctor, they've got guns," Rose warns.
"And I haven't. Which makes me the better person, don't you think?" says the Doctor cheerfully. "They can shoot me dead, but the moral high ground is mine." And with that he steps out of the doors and surrenders. He relies on his wits and his intelligence and his higher moral authority to win him through.
It's a lot like Firefly in that regard. Except for the higher moral authority part.
The finale made me sad. Partially because of how it ended. Partially because there will be no new episodes until Christmas.
- Mood:
sad
Tough Love
I've been informed that the Season Two Volume One Gargoyles DVD has not sold as many units as the Season One Gargoyles DVD did. That's not particularly surprising, since it has a higher price point. But let's be honest, the lower sales are putting the release of Season Two Volume Two at risk.
To be clear, I'm not asking anyone to spend money they don't have and/or need for things like food, shelter, education, etc. But if you've just been lazy and have been putting off buying the darn thing... well, pal, help us all out by ponying up sooner than later.
And ALL OF YOU -- PLEASE DO WHATEVER YOU CAN TO SPREAD THE WORD!!!!
It is NOT a given that Season Two Volume Two will come out!
He's not wrong about the price point. I bought three copies of Season 1 and handed them out for Christmas, but S2V1 is a bit too expensive for that. Although it's a darn sight cheaper than Doctor Who!
Awesome.
I hope Shaw picks up the new WB/UPN merger channel, so I can watch this show on my television the way God intended. Instead of torrenting it like a hooligan.
BAD NEWS: The Region 1 DVD release has been pushed back to July. It appears that we will have to wait for our DVDs until the damn Yankees catch up.
We've been looking at the possibility of Canada receiving a set of the 2005 Doctor Who series for awhile now, and it's finally paid off. The BBC posted a press release talking about their sales successes in Canada, and there's a mention of a Canadian season one set scheduled for February 14, 2006.
There aren't any plans to release the set in the US at this time, since no US broadcaster has picked up the rights to air the series. The good news is that Canada and the US are both region 1, so you'll have no problem picking it up if you live South of the border.
We'll have more information when it becomes available. Canadians will be able to watch the second season of the series on CBC, as well as a Christmas special, hosted exclusive by Billie Piper (companion "Rose Tyler"), which will air on Boxing Day (12/26).
Read the BBC press release.
It's much more like the new Smallville, if you made Smallville all about Chloe and took out the Kryptonite mutants. These two changes would improve Smallville greatly, of course, but that's not the point.
The point is: why does a show have to be "the new" anything? During Veronica, in between the thirty-two replays of the Dairy Queen Moolatte commercial about Muffin the dead cat (and I can't think of much that would make a Moolatte less appetizing than watching a man orally grope, horselike, for a straw that's just out of reach) CTV showed commercials for Ghost Whisperer, a show featuring Jennifer Love Hewitt helping restless ghosts return the overdue library books they never returned in life. Simultaneously, then: the new Medium and the new low.
I never get tired of "medium" puns.
( Read more... )
- Music:Mike Teavee - Danny Elfman - Charlie & the Chocolate Factory
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