Very Boys Such Bromance Wow So Unlikely Alliances Much Cheekbone Part 2: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

2013: Year of the Colon.

So basically I'm linking together Thor and The Hobbit and Sherlock (forthcoming in Part 3) because they are all such utter sausage-fests about the manly bonds between manly men and why would you think we're gay we're not gay and maybe we should get a new joke for this show, Stephen Moffat.  It's particularly noticeable to me right now because I've been watching Battlestar Galactica again and I have to say, actual realistic representation of women as fifty percent of the population never felt so good. I watched a scene today where three politicians discussed the impact that a particular issue would have on an upcoming election and they were all women and nobody commented on it. I nearly wept.  Anyway, I really enjoyed The Hobbit but Middle Earth sure has been struck by some tragic ovary-targeting wasting disease.

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug: Review: I Knew Aidan Turner Was In It For A Reason

So on the whole, it was a ton of fun.  It has the same flaws as the first film, only bigger, and the same strengths as the first film, only bigger.  It's bigger.  Is what I'm saying.  It also has that Middle-of-a-Trilogy-itis thing where the director gets excited by not really having introduce anything or tie anything up so it's all action, bitches, because it's 2013 (well, it was) and that's what we like, amIright? This is a good thing or a bad thing depending on your tastes - some of the action sequences are epic and beautiful and brilliant and so much wow (the dwarves going all Home Alone on Smaug and DON'T FUCKING TALK TO ME ABOUT THE SPEED THAT GOLD MELTS AT BECAUSE THEY'RE FIGHTING A DRAGON AND THIS IS YOUR BEEF) and some were sort of 'ok so this is still happening' (endless chases through Laketown, endless). 

Like the first film, it's a big, heavy juggernaut and it takes a while to get going and it stutters and chokes a little bit to begin with but then heave-ho, everyone puts their shoulders to the wheel and suddenly its weight is helping it gather momentum and oh wait, I am really enjoying this film, whoosh dragons molten tacky gold dwarf statues fabulous elves OH IT'S OVER.  Which was also exactly like the first film.  But also like the first film, it revels in the delight of this being a familiar universe, deftly balancing new elements with old favourites. Wisely, it doesn't dwell too much on episodes like Beorn's house because it knows that we know - and it knows that we know that it knows - that Mirkwood is just around the corner and that can mean only one thing.

Hey baby.  It's been a while.

Legolas: still sexy.  Still confused as fuck.  What's going on? Who are we fighting now? Legolas doesn't care.  He's going to stand on the heads of two dwarves in barrels and shoot arrows from his seemingly infinite quiver because he literally has no other clue about what he should be doing right now and the soundtrack in his head is going "dun dun dun LEGOLAS dundunnnn".

Stumbling in the direction of something more serious, the Mirkwood elves are a perfect example of what the film does right: "less wise and more dangerous" is how they're described, and it takes everything we love about elves (shiny) and invests it with personality and flaws and other tasty and sumptuous things.  I mean, man, these elves are such bitches.  We always suspected it and we were right.  They are the Regina Georges of Middle Earth.  Take Thranduil, for example.  All he wants to do is just comb his hair because what if it gets a kink in it, and then it won't go with his glittery mini-antlers and god Legolas, daddy is busy right now with his straighteners and for the last time Tauriel, the order of precedence goes Picking Up Robes from Dry Cleaner, Booking Facial, Giant Spider Attack in that order.  If you couldn't tell, Thranduil is my new favourite character.

Sorry, we were being serious.  For me the elves worked particularly well because book-universe-wise, there is nothing to say this wasn't going on, it's a logical extension of the Mirkwood plot, and film-universe-wise, we didn't really get to see communities of other races in Lord of the Rings, just societies of humans and the tagalong duds the other races sent along ("yes Legolas, it is a very special and important mission and you should on no account try to call or write and really, stay away as long as you need to").  If the mission statement behind fleshing one small book into three films is to deliver a richer and more complex universe as a reward for investing our time in it, then showing us not only a community of elves but a community of elves that is specifically different from other elves and have their own customs and hang-ups is a very good use of time and resources.  And now I have to stop typing "community of elves" as I can no longer keep a straight face.

But as well as the excitement of meeting new characters and catching up with old ones, what really made the film worth it for me was the plethora of little moments that just flicked out the paintbrush and added a little more dimension to the cast of fantasy archetypes.  Nearly every character gets one, which is just a nice reassurance that Peter Jackson knows what he's doing as a storyteller and - moreover - has probably spent more time immersed in the Tolkien universe than anyone else ever and really actually deserves to take The Hobbit and spin it into three films of (let's face it) ultimate nerdy self-indulgence.  My favourite of these little moments has to be Legolas literally being so hugged so hard by one of the Big End of Level Boss Orcs that he nosebleeds (well, we've all had that urge).  It's great because, again, it fits with the expanded view of these new flawed, impulsive, human-like elves and along with Thranduil's magicked-away dragon-flamed face (he must get through a lot of concealer) it suggests that actually elven beauty is a very important external symbol of immortality and imperviousness to the passage of time and how elves are a race apart, standing outside the natural ebb and flow of things, but basically also because my viewing companion and I showed our age and simultaneously went "You made me bleed my own blood!"*  And after a cursory google, I found that half the internet thought the same thing, so, Orlando Bloom: bringing people together through looking confused and outraged since 2001.

Speaking of new characters, I don't think anyone was a disappointment. I'm also just not sure how absolutely necessary Stephen Fry as the Master of Clumsy Social Commentary on Good Governance was but hey, it was still all super-delightful in its way.  Bard the Bowman** and his Adorable Children were all you could ask for in the way of good, decent, not terribly interesting salt of the earth folk, even if I did spend much of their scenes going, "Why is Bard the Bowman also sometimes Orlando Bloom but maybe also Welsh?"  He's not though, it's Luke Evans, and he is definitely Welsh.  Maybe.  I mean, his kids were.  But why they emigrated from Wales to Middle Earth, I couldn't tell you.  As a side note, a friend of mine described him as "bang tidy", a phrase which - regardless of whether or not I agree with its application in this particular instance - surely deserves more exposure.  Bang tidy. Hee.

And, of course, everyone is getting their robes in a twist over the inclusion of a character who - gasp -isn't even in the book (Deviations from the source material! Imagine!) and who is - double gasp - a lady.  Well let's all just unclench because Tauriel was basically pretty great and a very welcome addition to the series.  The problem, of course, starts when female characters have to represent their entire gender because they are the only female character in the whole thing and in this respect it would be very easy to bitch about the only significant female character in the film being shoved into a love triangle of sorts*** but you know what? Eh.  Besides, it must require a lot of fortitude being an elf lady in love with a dwarf dude, it is basically like Romeo and Juliet with an added height difference.  I mean, the romance plot was obviously horribly executed, it must be said, and happened in about five minutes flat and everyone was bandying the word 'love' around after a single conversation about the relative descriptors for starlight (dwarf chat up lines, ring a ding ding) but Tauriel as a character, on her own, was boss.  I'm not hugely bummed about the film introducing this warrior-lady and then shoving her into a romance plot as she also had agency and strengths and other stuff going on, whereas ironically it was at this point I went "oh so that's why they cast Aidan Turner" because Kili really was basically there to be dwarf totty.  I was a bit sad that his bromance with Fili wasn't so in evidence but this was also the time at which the film chose to take a firm stance on that particular relationship and went with "definitely brothers, however you may interpret Fili choosing to stay behind with his dying bro instead of going on the adventure of a lifetime to the mountain he has literally been waiting to see for his entire life".  Oh shit, I've just remembered how The Hobbit ends. Oh, fuck you, Peter Jackson.

Martin Freeman and Richard Armitage continued to rom-com it as Bilbo and Thorin, with Smaug as the conniving ex ("oh you think he's into you but you just try and get him to commit, there is no way he's coming all the way down here to save you").  Less smouldering for Thorin this time and more "slow descent into madness" but that sounds like a recipe for brooding to me, so I'm still happy.  Also it must be said that while his plan to get rid of Smaug was flawlessly executed, it was also dumb as shit. Oh Thorin, he has fire literally inside him, all you did was make him more bling.  Also was there just a giant gold dwarf statue hanging around and they melted it? Or - even weirder - a mould for giant gold dwarf statues because they were in such hot demand back in the day? Yeah, that was strange. 

La la la, a quick rundown of the rest because I think you can tell by now that I liked the film and just want to make affectionate sarky comments about it.  Benedict Cumberdragon was on good form, particularly the "I like you" line, a thought which I finished as "In another life, I feel like maybe we could have lived in a flat together and solved crimes."**** The problem is that while his voice is awesome and dragon-y and villainous, he's also - in my mind - clearly actually the nicest guy in the world which kind of confused me about Smaug so I came out of the film thinking of him as that friend who you all know is kind of an arsehole but then, like, he's got a big house and loads of cool shit and he's a bit lonely, and really his douchebaggery just mostly makes you laugh and he only sometimes tries to incinerate you. I actually could have watched Smaug and Bilbo chinwag all day and it was half the movie as it was.  Loved Smaug's design too, that slightly Keira Knightley-esque amount of jaw really putting the smug in Smaug (yeah, SORRY NOT SORRY).

What else? Gandalf, yes, cool, great.  He should be nicer to Radagast, though, since something tragic is clearly going to occur to explain his absence in LOTR.  Also, actual magic! I feel like up to this point wizard-magic in the LOTR universe has been more along the lines of New Age positive thinking and supreme good luck.  I mean, Voldemort would be all up in Gandalf's grill and Gandalf would be all "it is small acts and small people who stand against the dark" and Voldemort would like "Bitch be trippin', I'mma AK that shit."  I'm sorry, I've also been watching a lot of Orange is the New Black lately.

So yeah.  In summary, I couldn't take any of it seriously, not for a moment - but in the best possible way.  It's all so dear and familiar, it basically feels like a constant stream of in-jokes, heightened to increasingly ridiculous levels, and even when it's slow or clumsy, I just - oh, Lord of the Rings universe, I can't stay mad at you.  I just can't.  I'm not sure I'll pay to see it again but when it crops up on Netflix in six months time, I will most definitely grab a bottle of cornershop plonk and be glad to make its reacquaintance.

*If that's the wording you thought in, you're referencing The Simpsons, congratulations.  If, on the other hand, you thought "Nobody makes me bleed my own blood!", you are referencing Dodgeball and might be still in your teens, and also Blades of Glory is the far superior work of that particular cinematic movement. 

**Incidentally, Bard the Bowman is the character that I assumed Richard Armitage had been cast as when I first heard he was going to be in it.  I hadn't read the book for a good fifteen years and filtering amongst my hazy watercolour recollections of it, my brain clearly felt that 'heroic lost prince man who slays dragon' was a better fit for him than 'slightly pompous and kind of useless dwarf king'.

***Personally, I feel like the inclusion of an elf v dwarf love triangle is just Peter Jackson sticking two fingers up at Twilight, but that could just be wishful thinking.
****To be discussed in rabid, devoted detail in Part 3 - coming soon! Actually soon, not 'half a year' soon.

No Contest: 'Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS' (Doctor Who) and 'Kissed By Fire' (Game of Thrones) Reviews

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All the Feelings: 'The Rings of Akhaten' (Doctor Who) and 'Dark Wings, Dark Words' (Game of Thrones) Reviews

Two very different episodes, two very loud cries of fangirlish glee.  Television is definitely better than people.

Doctor Who Series 7, Part 2, Episode 2: The Rings of Akhaten

I'll say it now, there's no way I'm reviewing this episode objectively.  It was strongly reminiscent of 2007's 'Gridlock' (David Tennant, kittens), not only in aesthetic terms but in my reaction to it, i.e. I know it was in all honesty not the best but SINGING and THE DOCTOR and A CUTE THING and OVERTLY MESSIANIC SPEECHES and come on now, so many points for trying.  I swear to god, I would have teared up if I hadn't been watching with my mum, who has a very low tolerance threshold for sci-fi and fantasy.  When I showed her the trailer for The Hobbit, she giggled uncontrollably and asked me what Martin Freeman thought he was doing, to which I huffily replied, "HE'S GOING ON AN ADVENTURE."

Well, I was right about one thing: the episode started with the Doctor delving into Clara's past like a box of delicious chocolates.  Presumably no-one has ever told the writers of this show that there are potentially bad connotations to allowing a man whose face is able to twist into seemingly infinite contortions to sit behind a Beano and a pair of NHS specs staring fixedly at young children because Matt Smith + Children = Always Everything Good Ever.  Children are a bit of a recurring theme for Moffat, clearly, and not just the "wait here, I'll be back in ten years" trope.  If you can talk to children, you're good news in the Whoniverse - in Nicholas Sparks adaptations it's boats, here it's children.  (Sorry Mark Kermode, I stole your joke.)  On the one hand, it's a way of reminding all of the intensely-gazing mouth-breathers watching (it's only okay when I say it) that this is a children's show and do try not to crash the internet on your way out, but on the other hand it's often written with a knowingness that belies the adult perspective it's being written from and for - I think it's now obligatory for every child that turns up on Doctor Who to Teach The Doctor A Valuable Lesson and Be Very Unimpressed By Him Because Children Are Discerning.  I'm thinking more of the mini-prequal Moffat wrote (here) than this episode because, to be fair, the Queen of Years was more straight up creepy.

Speaking of children and growing and changing and whatever other spurious segue I can make here, it was a rite of passage this week, as Clara took her first trip into space.  I always wondered why more companions don't go for the 'back in time' option, personally, but then again I've had my first TARDIS trip planned since I was seventeen ("The South Bank 1599, leave off the brakes and I'll tip extra"*). Clara continues to grow on me, with Jenna-Louise Coleman elegantly avoiding the pitfall of choosing between 'smart' and 'kind' and instead showing herself to be extremely adept at both.  This bodes badly for the blog, of course, as I am generally only able to convey either extreme rage and/or despair (Amy) and extreme worship and/or lust (River Song).  Currently Clara lies somewhere along this axis at a point marked "warm respect".  But, y'know, I warmly respect the hell out of her.

So yes, I know the pacing was all wrong and the plot was predictable but it was comfy - it felt, again and at long last, like a proper episode.  It had aliens called Doreen and Indiana Jones references and a child in peril and obligatory alien forehead bumps and Matt Smith stood in front of a big orange glowy thing and said things that hit all the right spots** about stories and how we were all forged in the heart of a star and days that will never come being infinite and all that overreaching, grandiose bollocks that shouldn't work but really, really really does.  I love Doctor Who most when it forgets that it should just be a funny Saturday tea time show.  I love the fact that the people making it so clearly and earnestly believe in its importance, and I love how readily this is accepted by the people that watch it.  I love it because it takes everything that just shouldn't work, shoves it into a blender and shrugs majestically when it works, and when it doesn't.  Maybe I'm feeling sentimental because the show is approaching its 50th anniversary but it's episodes like this, largely underwhelming yet still able to pull off moments of frankly hubristic grandeur, that prove its uniqueness.  All in all, a showcase of the most familiar comforts of Who.

On a similar note, I just watched this trailer for the 50th Anniversary Special comprised of bits of all eleven Doctors and now I'm crying.  Crying.  Like, actual tears.  At a trailer.  I fear I may be blind by the end of the real thing.


Game of Thrones Series 3, Episode 2: Dark Wings, Dark Words

Because I am cold and heartless, I don't give many fucks about Bran and his Whiny Quest of Leglessness, so it was with a sinking sensation that I watched the opening of this week's episode.  However, I am glad to report I had not accounted for several things:

a) Bran has, hilariously, hit puberty in the, er, week between when we last saw him and now.
b) Bran who is, I say again, going through puberty, dreams about his brothers (it's only okay when I do it).
c)  Bran also has Jojen Reed turning up in his dreams, missing 'enigmatic' by a country mile and landing squarely on 'fucking smug'.  So it's at least faithful to the books, then.

Even better, when Jojen turns up for realsies later on (accompanied by his sister Meera, who is awesome), everything he says sounds like a come-on. "What else did you see?" asks Bran throatily, discussing second sight with his new bro.  "The only thing that matters," says Jojen staring into his eyes.  "You."  That's not fanfiction.  That's the script.  Who knows, Bran's Whiny Quest of Leglessness Now With Added Homoeroticism may become my favourite part of the series.

Anyway, after a scene with the second least interesting Starks (Robb and Catelyn***), in which the writers desperately try to justify Robb's Wife as a character, there comes the first real thrill of the episode: everyone's favourite odd couple, Jaime "Family First" Lannister**** and Brienne "Of" Tarth.  Hi Jaime and Brienne!  Hello also to Jamie's accent, which is rejoining us after a brief holiday.  It must have been hard for Jaime, growing up as the incongruously Scandinavian Lannister sibling.  Gifts of herring every feast day when the others get cloaks and swords and the like.  Anyway Jaime's game plan as of this moment seems to be a Westeros variant on "Are we there yet?" leaving poor, put-upon Brienne to shout that so help her, if she has to come back there, she will turn around back to Harrenhal and there will be no sexual tension for anybody.  His back up plan seems to be a Westeros variant on "lol u fancied Renly he was gay", but hey, it's working.  Just sit back and watch the magic happen.

Joffrey and Cersei next and, worryingly, I think I'm actually starting to enjoy Joffrey's scenes.  Then again, he has not yet forced prostitutes to beat each other this series, so there's still time.  Essentially, he acts exactly how every teenage king ever would and has acted times a factor of a thousand dicks.  Shae counsels Sansa on the wisdom of forming an alliance with a dude who sleeps with a lock of your mother's hair under his pillow.  Three seasons in and Sansa's gaydar is still not functional as she starts batting her eyelids at Loras "Rough Trade" Tyrell before being led off to tea with Margaery Tyrell and her grandmother, Diana Rigg.  Lady Di is, as always, a treat and I'm very much enjoying Natalie Dormer's scheming, butter-wouldn't-melt Margaery (in all seriousness, one of the things the series does very well is take the non-point of view characters from the books and go "fuck that ambiguity").  The later scene between Joffrey and Margaery is frankly brilliant, as Margaery starts to unpick what poor romantic Sansa never could, i.e. how to control a petulant teenage psychopath with near-absolute political power, using only a crossbow and some cleavage.

Not only did we get Diana Rigg this week but another pleasing addition to the cast in the form of Mackenzie Crooke doing Ambiguous Wildling Animal Magic.  One of the strengths of the series (both book and television) is how sparing it is with the magic - so sparing, in fact, that I occasionally forget about it altogether but being reminded by Mackenzie Crooke's nigh-on Lovecraftian features is perfectly acceptable.  Anyway, here he is alongside Jon Snow's girlfriend casting yet another withering look in Jon Snow's bewildered direction.  Bless, it's not his fault - no-one ever sat him down to explain the birds and the bees, as demonstrated by a long and actually pretty well done scene between Catelyn and Robb's Wife of which the gist was "oh man Jon Snow he ruins everything and basically we're all going to die now".  Cut to Jon Snow's lower lip quivering several hundred miles north of there.  His Woobie Sense is tingling.

But there's not much time to dwell on Jon Snow and his implausibly tousled hair because ARYA!  Damn, girl, where have you been?  I've had to sit through, like, five Sansa scenes already. Anyway in her three odd minutes of screen time, Arya manages to be at least thirteen times more awesome than anyone except Tyrion, encountering the Brotherhood Without Banners (apparently some kind of eco-terrorist organisation in this incarnation, led by Paul Kaye, another winning casting choice) without flinching.  Well, last season she did make time in her busy schedule of kicking ass and taking names to give to Faceless Men for one on one chats with Tywin Lannister.  Speaking of Lannisters, I thought we were a bit Tyrion-light, though as I said last week, we won't be seeing everyone regularly from here on out (no Dany either, surprisingly).  HBO has shown stunning good sense thus far in not inflicting on us more time with the Greyjoys than is strictly necessary - just a brief glimpse of Theon being tortured, and given spurious hope by Simon from Misfits, and I don't think anyone will be complaining about that.  Anyhow, sneaking in at 37 minutes is Tyrion who manages to be a total boss even when a prostitute is squeezing his face with one hand.

Back to Brienne and Jaime for the final treat, I didn't think we'd get to see them fight so early in the series.  It is, as expected, excellently and believably done, in part because Jaime insists on commentating like that one irritating kid playing football at school, in part because Brienne rolls her eyes and advances on him almost casually, only to be stopped by a brace of Boltons looking for Jaime's head.  End of episode.

All in all, an extremely satisfying affair.  Still not quite the balls-to-the-wall-awesome I'm waiting for but it's early days yet.  Like the series opener, there was a lot to set up, new characters to introduce, etc but there were also enough returning favourites (Brienne, Meera, ARYA) and unfavourites made palatable (Bran) that I enjoyed it start to finish.  The plotlines were juggled beautifully, the scene shifts were seamless, the dialogue was as (nay, more) impressive than the action and the performances were pretty flawless.  Keep it up, Game of Thrones, this is frighteningly good stuff.


This week's winner: Game of Thrones.  It was tough one because 'The Rings of Akhaten' had me feeling all the feelings there ever were, but I know in my heart it was a ropey episode with a few good set pieces.  'Dark Wings, Dark Words', on the other hand, had accelerated enough to be consistently excellent all the way through with its series of odd-couples, and, with all of the players now in place, marks the recommencing of the game fo' srs.  Makes you just want a grab and sword and kill something, really.

*I am aware that Martha Jones has somewhat stolen my thunder on this one, but I do an excellent impression of someone who doesn't know that Martha Jones ever existed.  The main difference is that they're smiling.
** I meant emotional spots, you perverts.
***This is unfair.  I forget Sansa.
****I toyed with Jaime "I'll Slay Your King" Lannister, but it's really hard to communicate the subtle intonation of the innuendo over the internet.

AVENGERS ASSEMBLE: CAPSLOCK MINIMAL (Spoilerific)

Spoilers, my pretties.  So many spoilers.

The Avengers is five star, solid gold, Class A blockbuster entertainment.

There, I wanted to get the obvious bit out of the way.

But THAT WAS THE COOLEST THING EVER, YOU GUYS.  Sorry, I'll ease up on the Capslock after the hammering it took in my reaction post.  (There are, in fact, subtle references to two of the Avengers in that sentence.  Answers on the back of a postcard.)  I don't think I've anticipated a film this much since Toy Story 3 and while it didn't shred my psyche into weeping shards of emotional shrapnel like that one did, it certainly pushed me well into 'hyperventilating nerd' territory.  For those of you in doubt, it's not a great look.  In terms of plot, it's a standard three-act structure: threat is set up, threat is contained, threat breaks loose for epic final battle.  If I had one niggle, it would be that the 'threat is set up' part takes a while to get going but then again, there's a lot of story to get in there, given that it ties in to every single film from the franchise so far.  And while I predicted that the Tesseract (last seen being retrieved from the Arctic in Captain America, and then making a cameo appearance in the stinger for Thor) would be the film's chief MacGuffin, it was a) actually not a MacGuffin and b) extremely clever as it gives each of the Avengers some form of personal investment.  Captain A already had to face-off with it once, it emits gamma radiation so Bruce Banner must provide his particular form of big green wisdom, Iron Man's dad was the one that yoinked it from the depths in the first place, it's a Nordic god thingamabob so Thor has to get involved, and Hawkeye gets zapped by its blue glowy powers in the first ten minutes so Black Widow spends much of the film silently vowing revenge for her squishy-faced companion.

Despite the line-up of A-listers and superheroes, the real star of the show is Joss Whedon.  He keeps the plates spinning so deftly that it never feels like there's any fan-based Avenger favouritism going on.  Iron Man's heroic sacrifice in the closing minutes of the battle does not, for example, feel like a writer pandering to one of the Internet's favourite characters but rather the necessary ending to his character arc.  If you are reading this without having seen the film and are suddenly stricken with doubts over Tony Stark's fate then I'll just say that Iron Man 3 is set for release next year and I was really definitely not at all taken in by it, not even for one tiny little second, not me, and it would have been extremely silly if I had, say, whimpered a little.

There's some stunningly Whedonish dialogue too; even the throwaway lines sound like they've been culled from scripts for unaired episodes of Firefly ("Barton, take them down." "It would be my genuine pleasure, sir.") and, of course, it's extremely funny.  Thor and Loki get some pseudo-Shakespearian speeches that don't so much walk the fine line between the grandiose and the ridiculous as hop from one side to the other cackling with glee.  I already mentioned the "mewling quim" line in my reaction post but special points also have to go to Loki's villainous opening parlay: "I am burdened with glorious purpose.  And cheekbones like goddamn fish slices, seriously."  (Disclaimer: only half of that line was written by Joss Whedon.)  Being Whedon, he also gets to satirise his own writing with Iron Man gleefully snarking at Thor, "Doth mother know thou wearest her drapes?" Occasionally one sensed that there was a Whedon line struggling to get through the performance of a non-Whedon actor (cameos from Alexis Denisoff and Enver Gjokaj noted though) but really, you'd have to give many more fucks than I actually do.

It also became apparent what a good choice of ring-master Whedon was when the film opened with some hardcore Trekkie-style sci-fi.  Ok, so technically superheroes are science fiction but not in the same way as, like, aliens or whatever.  Which is odd, because Marvel comics have a long history of courting the extraterrestrial - the whole Phoenix Saga in X-Men, for example - and yet aliens have never really made it into the films in a big way.  Well, there was the Venom/Symbiote business in Spiderman 3 but given that its major threat seemed to be toward's Tobey Maguire's wardrobe, I think it's better off forgotten.  Joss, however, pulls off the alien invasion with aplomb, as well one might expect.

But as I said, the main part of this deftness is the way in which Whedon keeps every super-and-non-super-powered plate spinning for the full two and half hours.  In order to do them justice, let's examine the major players one by one.  Buckle up ladies, because oestrogen levels in your bedroom are about to go way, way up.

Bruce Banner/Hulk (Mark Ruffalo)
Traditionally the hardest superhero to do onscreen, Whedon pulls off a masterstroke here by pointing out the intrinsic comedy value of a mild-mannered scientist with - as Iron Man puts it - "breath-taking anger management issues" combined with advances in Golum-style motion capture technology.  Ruffalo surpasses my (admittedly reserved) expectations in the role, finding something surprisingly touching in Banner's "I-just-want-to-be-good" Jekyll persona.  His explanation of the 'secret' to his control over "the Other Guy" left me a little baffled though - bounding away pre-Hulk, he turns and one-liners to Captain America, "You want to know my secret, Cap?  I'm always angry."  I guess there must be an in-depth explanation somewhere on the internet, but in the meantime I'm going to imagine this scene took place later:

Iron Man: Did Banner ever tell you what the secret to his whole rage deal was?
Captain America: Oh yeah, he says he's always angry, or something.
Iron Man: Jesus, guys, did you hear that?  Banner's always angry.  Wait, what does that even mean?  Holy shit, does that mean he's the Hulk like, all the time?  We've got to stop inviting that guy to our parties.

Or something.

Captain America/Steve Rogers (Chris Evans)
So, the good captain might be my least favourite Avenger, but he's still decent, in every sense of the word.  I think the problem is that he's a nice guy and he has a strong moral code and, oh yes, he uses a defensive weapon to show how he's a protector so we're all supposed to nod sagely and go "aaw, what a great guy" when secretly we're going "FOR GOD'S SAKE, ROGERS, BLOW SOMETHING UP."  My feeling is that he could have been a little goofier if they wanted to give him some more defining character traits (though the Wizard of Oz moment was very sweet) but they went with a leadership arc, which also worked fine.  Of the girls I went to see the film with, he was also the only Avenger who no-one wanted to sleep with, having been declared "meh".  Then again, it's entirely possible that we just can't get past a superhero called Captain America.

Thor (Chris Hemsworth)
I'm discussing Thor next because I kind of bracket him with Captain America in the big, dumb and good-natured category of superhero.  However, Thor/Hemsworth has something that Cap/Evans does not: comedy gold.  Whedon sends up the whole Norse god idea with tongue firmly in cheek and Hemsworth joins in with evident glee - because, seriously, I get that comic book writers were on a lot of crack in the 60s, but they took a very early lunch the day they went "Oh hey, let's just nick this whole Norse mythology deal.  Maybe we'll put some wing doodads on the helmet though.  Good work, Tim, no-one'll notice." Getting Branagh to direct the first film was also sort of genius and pretty much cements Thor as one of the best not-even-that-guilty pleasures of all time.  The only real beef I had with Thor was that Thor himself is such an unlikeable douche for the first half that my (admittedly morally unsound) sympathies gravitated so naturally towards Loki that they've kind of stuck there.  But post-Thor, the eponymous god has learnt some humility and is just really, really charming and likeable and funny.  Not my type but if he ever transcends the bounds of fiction and finds himself in South West London, I have a friend who would be very willing to give him the guided tour.

Iron Man/Tony Stark (Robert Downey Junior)
How fucking cool is Iron Man?  Or Tony Stark?  Or Robert Downey Junior?  Individually they all have something fundamentally cool about them but combined, they create a tsunami, nay a firewall of charisma.  Downey Junior predictably gets the best lines too, coming up with several nomenclatures for his eclectic teammates that made me nigh-on weep with joy.  There was also some much-needed character development in play so we can all look forward to a slightly humbler Stark taking the helm in Iron Man 3, for which I now have high hopes.  Still cool though.  Still fucking cool.

Nick Fury (Samuel L Jackson)
And one cannot mention cool without mentioning Samuel L Jackson in the same sentence.  It's actually illegal in six different states.  At one point, he holds a bazooka and shoots down a plane.  Off an airship. 30,000 feet above sea level.  Also, the dude is 60.  You can't argue with that.  There's no-one else who could play a man with no superpowers other than ineffable sang-froid, yet can keep reasonable control of a group of divas with planet-destroying abilities.  I mean that literally: when they rebooted the Marvel universe, the comic book artists purchased the rights to Sam Jackson's appearance just because they too knew that you will never find anyone better to play this role.  Ever.

Agent Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg)
Continuing with the 'normals', Coulson might be the normalest normal ever to kick ass and take names in an extremely polite fashion.  Since I've warned for spoilers, I'll do my inconsolable weeping over his death now, thanks: WHY WHY WHY CURSE YOU WHEDON, DAMN YOU AND I HOPE ALL YOUR PETS DIE HORRIBLY.  That was a masterclass in making you like a character, just so that you could kill him off.  Gregg is understated and wonderful, his dialogue is sharp and sweet, his fanboying of Captain America is adorbs, and his badassery in his dying moments is tear-inducing.  Coulson, you'll be sorely missed.

Hawkeye/Clint Barton (Jeremy Renner)
An Avenger and S.H.I.E.L.D. agent with no superpowers, I've known I was going to like Hawkeye ever since his cameo appearance in Thor.  I didn't know I was going to fucking love him.  Hawkeye is so incredibly boss, I can't even form coherent sentences.  Renner is a) very funny and b) manages to make his uniform of sleeveless vest and bow-and-arrow convincingly heterosexual.  A couple of the film's finest "fuck, that was cool" moments belong to him, most notably the shoot-behind-you-without-bothering-to-look and the turn-and-shoot-as-falling-off-a-building.  Those old chestnuts.

Black Widow/Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson)
And we can't talk about Hawkeye without discussing Black Widow.  Again, in the interests of getting the blindingly obvious out of the way, Scarlett Johansson is very hot.  In fact, she's almost breathtakingly hot in this film.  But that is so, so, so, so not the point of Black Widow (much) because good lord, she's a killing machine.  I mean genuinely frightening.  I would willingly put the next few Iron Man films on hold if it means we can get a Black Widow/Hawkeye film first.  I want to see Budapest.  I want to see him going to take her out and deciding to recruit her instead.  I want more fights like the epic smack down in the control room.  I want to see her dark and mysterious past and all the delicious attendant angst that goes with it.  Gah, I want more.  Now.  Please.  Fourteen-year-old boys everywhere will thank me.

And speaking of delicious attendant angst, let's just take a moment to talk about our villain.

Loki (Tom Hiddleston)
I'll be brief, I swear.  Well, ish.  Now, I will put good money on a redemption arc for Loki by the time the Marvel Cinematic Universe is done.  Because Loki is basically a really shit villain.  He's hopelessly outgunned for the majority of the film, allows himself to be outmanoeuvred and manipulated countless times and - this is the kicker - everyone knows it.  Tony Stark takes great delight in pointing out that Loki has wilfully antagonised some of the most powerful beings in the universe and seems not to give a flying alien fuck.  Thor makes no bones about the fact that his little brother clearly just wants to play with his toys.  Even Coulson deadpans "you lack conviction" before promptly dying.  Add to this the fact that it's not even his own brand of divine retribution that he's putting into play - rather, he's more like a middle manager for the Chitauri's planned takeover bid - and, yeah, Loki really isn't a great villain at all.  His villainous demands amount to classic Youngest Child temper tantrums.  Even his undeniably pimpin' outfits fuel the overwhelming sense of "LOOK AT ME!  LOOK AT ME! LOOK AT MEEEEEE!  NO SCREW YOU, THOR, THE PEOPLE ARE HERE TO SEE ME."

Look, I don't know if it's Whedon's writing or Hiddleston's performance but Loki is still dancing ever so slightly on this side of the redeemable.  Not forgivable, but redeemable - probably through dying.  If there isn't some kind of heroic self-sacrifice waiting at the end of Thor 3 or The Avengers 2, then I'll eat my winged helmet.  It's in his nature.  Villain motivated by greed/lust for power/Iago-esque-for-shits-and-giggles (cf. the Joker, Doctor Doom) = timely defeat and the world breathes a sigh of relief.  Villain motivated by jealousy/insanity/extremely dysfunctional family relations (cf. Doctor Octopus, Two-Face) = humiliating defeat or redemption equals death.  I know my genres.  And so does Loki, I suspect.

Oh and by the way, if you were wondering whether Loki's villainous ineptitude tarnished my shiny, near-worshipful love for him, then what are you, new?  As far as I'm concerned, anyone with those cheekbones gets a free pass.  To be honest, I found him kind of endearing (mass-murder aside).*  Hiddleston sells the role with marvellous aplomb too.  He must have an assistant just to pick the scenery out of his teeth.

All in all, The Avengers is a sustained and exhaustive exercise in being as awesome as is humanly possible in 140 minutes.  And even if it wasn't, I was never going to hate a film that gave me a legitimate excuse to shout "AVENGERS ASSEMBLE" across a crowded club as a way of finding errant group members.  God bless you, Joss Whedon, and all that sail in you.

What an unfortunate mental image to finish on.




*Charlie Brooker compares Hiddleston's Loki to Mad Men's Pete Campbell, another fictional sociopath for whom I have unfortunately tender feelings.  The management would like to point out that a) tastes in fictional men do not in any way reflect tastes in non-fictional men and b) if anyone ever invents some kind of universe-warping raygun that melts the bounds between fiction and reality, I am fucked.

AVENGERS ASSEMBLE (IN MY PANTS) (NO PLOT SPOILERS BUT MANY FEELINGS)

HERE, THESE ARE ALL MY FEELINGS ABOUT THE AVENGERS, WHICH I HAVE JUST SEEN THIS VERY NIGHT:

1) PEW PEW PEW GUNS AND EXPLOSIONS AND WHEEEEE THINGS BLOW UP GOOD TIMES YES NOW. OW, I HAVE A HEADACHE.

2) SCARLETT JOHANSSON IS HOT.  BLACK WIDOW IS ALSO HOT BUT MORE IMPORTANTLY MORE BADASS THAN CAN BE REASONABLY SUMMARISED IN A SHORT AMOUNT OF TIME.

3) TOM HIDDLESTON'S VOICE GOES STRAIGHT TO THE KNICKER AREA.  THIS IS SCIENTIFIC FACT, PROVED BY ALL THE SCIENCE RESEARCH I DID.  TOM.  TOM.  SAY "ON YOUR KNEES" AGAIN.

4) HULK CAN BE DONE SUCCESSFULLY ON FILM BUT FIRST JOSS WHEDON MUST POINT OUT HOW INTRINSICALLY RIDICULOUS HE IS.

5) NOOOOOOOOOOOO, DAMN YOU WHEDON.  OF FUCKING COURSE THAT IS WHO YOU WOULD TARGET FOR YOUR DEMONIC WHEDONISH PURPOSES.

6) THERE MUST BE A HAWKEYE/BLACK WIDOW FILM NOW PLEASE PLEASE NOW I MUST SEE MORE OF THEIR PAIRED AND SHARED AWESOME, AND I MUST KNOW MORE ABOUT THEIR MYSTERIOUS AND SEXY PAST.

7) HAWKEYE HAWKEYE HAWKEYE.  RENNER, YOU SQUISHY-FACED PART-ELF ANGEL.

8) IRON MAN CALLS HAWKEYE 'LEGOLAS'.  THIS IS NOT EVEN THE MOST AWESOME THING THAT HAPPENS IN THE FILM.

9) SAMUEL L JACKSON HOLDS A BAZOOKA AT ONE POINT.  REPORTS INDICATE THAT THIS IS TOO MUCH BADASS FOR THE UNIVERSE TO CONTAIN AND IT WILL BE IMPLODING SHORTLY.

10) JOSS WHEDON AND LOKI VALIDATE THE COMPULSORY MIDDLE ENGLISH COMPONENT OF MY COURSE WITH TWO WORDS: "MEWLING QUIM".

11) LOKI IS SO FUCKING PIMP.  EVEN IN THAT FUCKING STUPID HELMET.  NAY, ESPECIALLY IN THAT FUCKING STUPID HELMET.

12) CAPTAIN AMERICA UNDERSTANDS ONE POP CULTURE REFERENCE AND WE ARE ALL VERY PROUD OF HIM.

13) TONY STARK'S EGO CAN ONLY BE SATED BY A PHALLIC SYMBOL THAT TOWERS ABOVE THE NEW YORK SKYLINE AND BY GOD, I WOULD NOT HAVE IT ANY OTHER WAY.

14) STILL NO-ONE HAS MADE ANY GIANT HAMMER JOKES ABOUT THOR.

15) LOKI JUST NEEDS A HUG.  I WILL GIVE IT TO HIM.  SERIOUSLY, I WILL MAKE THAT SACRIFICE.  FOR THE TEAM.

16) THERE WAS ACTUALLY QUITE A LOT OF HOMOEROTICISM AND I REALLY THOUGHT THOR AND LOKI WERE GOING TO KISS AT SEVERAL POINTS, AND ALSO CAPTAIN AMERICA AND IRON MAN.  I, FOR ONE, WELCOME THIS MORE FLUID APPROACH TO SEXUALITY IN MAINSTREAM MEDIA.

17) NOW THAT THE RAINBOW BRIDGE HAS BEEN DESTROYED, THOR TRAVELS BY THE POWER OF PLOT CONTRIVANCE.

18) I CANNOT REALLY SAY MUCH MORE WITHOUT SPOILING THE PLOT.

19) WAIT, WAIT, ONE MORE FOR LUCK.

20)  LOKI. GOD OF ARMANI.


I'm seeing it again on Tuesday.  I'll probably do a proper review then.  Don't hold your breath though, it's probably just going to be the word "awesome" copy-pasted 500 hundred times.

A Pop-Cultural Confession

I love bad TV. And bad films. And bad books. And bad songs. And bad sandwiches. No, wait.

Actually, I love a certain type of bad TV/film/literature/music. When you say "bad TV", you probably think of My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding or Take Me Out or my sister's latest favourite, some show with an awfully punning name that I can't remember where gay man have to sprint back into the closet for money by fooling a heterosexual woman into having feelings for them. I think it's called "Where Taste Goes to Die".* But these are artlessly bad telly. They know what they are. They make no pretensions to greatness, and thus are curiously humourless - despite their abundance of ribaldry and 70s era Brighton postcard naughtiness. I'm talking about the programmes that are preposterous. Absurd. Almost surreally bad. So much so that you're sure someone is wiping away tears of mirth behind the camera at the expense of the poor saps who actually pay the licence fee. If this was America, I'd say these are the programmes knocked out between the hours of the 11am cocaine break and 11.38am when it's time to take an early lunch and also more cocaine. Being Britain, it's more likely that these are the shows knocked out between a nice cup of tea and a biccy at 4.30 in the afternoon and weeping over your BA in Arts History at 5.15.

My criteria for detecting such shows (and films and books) is simple. If, at any point, I lean back in my chair, pull my (sometimes real, sometimes imaginary) glasses down my nose, chortle and say firmly "SILLY", it's a winner. Sometimes good shows have "SILLY" moments. Sometimes they have entire episodes of "SILLY". Being Human falls prey to this more than I'd like. Doctor Who too, especially in the Russell T Davies era. That episode with Agatha Christie and the giant wasp. I'd say that on paper they thought it sounded charming and off-beat but I've just typed it out here and it sounds like a parody of a Doctor Who episode. And a better parody than that Lenny Henry one with the Margaret Thatcher dalek. Saying that Maggie Thatcher is a life-destroying emotionless ooze encased inside a metal outer shell constructed by supremacist masters isn't satire, it's just fact.

Sorry, think I got some politics in your pop culture, there.

As I said, there's a difference between SILLY television/film/etc and downright bad stuff. There's the bad stuff like Take Me Out (upon my first viewing, I was reminded of a line from Jane Austen**: "Man has the advantage of choice, woman only the power of refusal." If the premise of your show aligns with the sexual politics of the late 18th century, you need to take a long hard look in the mirror). It's joyless. It's crass. It's (incoming snob alert) Lowest Common Denominator television. I'm aware that many watch Take Me Out et al because they find it hideously compelling, sort of like driving past a car crash on the motorway. I get this. I'm on board with this. And the game show format means you can catch the occasional episode here and there and not feel hideously guilty.

I differ in that I watch whole series that I think are badly written, acted and filmed. I follow the plot. I root for the characters. I decide it would be better if x happened to y instead of z. People are - understandably - puzzled by this. I don't advocate this relationship with the gogglebox: it's terribly unhealthy and please let us remember I am a terrible freak of nature and my mother should probably never have let me out of the attic. "But why?" People ask me. (In my head. Nobody actually cares about what I watch on TV.) "Why spend so much energy on shows you don't even like?"

Oh-ho, I say. Shows that are bad, yes. Shows I don't like? No, no, no. Merlin. The Tudors. Whitechapel. These are my crack. Silly, silly shows full of ridiculous dialogue, flimsy premises, unbelievable plot twists (yes, even in Merlin where they can explain things away with magic). And I love them. I love kicking back with a bottle of something cheap, a gal pal and iPlayer (or whatever) and roaring sniggery, joyful commentary at Rupert Penry-Jones pretending to have OCD because someone thought it would give his character on Whitechapel depth.

Whitechapel is especially dear to my heart, actually, because it started out pretty well. The first series operated on the premise that someone was imitating the Jack the Ripper murders with such exact detail and unstoppability that people started to think he'd come back to life. This worked. Jack the Ripper stands pretty tall in the Murderer's Hall of Fame. He's scary because he was never caught. There's a ton of theories about him. And the slight suggestion of the supernatural gave it a nice edge and saved it from being too...Red Riding-y, I guess. Then it got a second series. About the Krays. Yes, the Krays were famous people who did bad things who lived in Whitechapel. That's about as far as anything made sense. Copycat Krays...don't. The Krays did naughty murders because they were building a criminal empire. It was to a purpose. A bad purpose that we at Jane Shakespeare do not in any way condone, no matter how much I might casually drop into conversation my family's spurious connections with the Mafia, but a purpose nonetheless. So they spent an entire series avoiding asking the huge, glaring, obvious question:WHY? Why in heaven's name mimic the not-at-all-famous individual killings of two gangsters? As serial killers go, that's one spending a lot of time in the library. The third series is airing right now and they've basically run up against the wall that most of us saw coming a way back: there are no more crimes in Whitechapel to imitate. Instead, they've opted for a 'crime archive', run by Steve Pemberton, wherein is contained a record of crimes from the world over, many of which bear shocking and convenient resemblances to the crimes being committed in modern day Whitechapel. Hey. Psst. Rupert Penry-Jones. I'd start investigating the guy from The League of Gentlemen, if I were you.

They even have to spell this out in the first episode. "Are you saying it's another copycat?" asks RPJ handsomely (he does everything handsomely, he can't help it). "No," says Steve Pemberton, making sure the audience are paying attention, "but we can use reports of crimes that happened centuries ago or abroad in different social and cultural contexts to help solve ones happening specifically in a very small area of London today." Except that's preposterous and you're ridiculous and god I love this show. Every innovation they make is hilarious: they try and find RPJ a love interest and his initial (handsome) reaction is always along the lines of "Good God, a woman! Get it away! It might use its pheromones or wiles or breasts on me. I hear they have those." Whitechapel (as I said) is also a pretty small area of London, these days mostly populated by upper-middle-class hipsters who consider themselves daring for moving to East London and a handful of belligerent actual East End natives. Whitechapel on TV is a shadowy world of outrageous murders every week or so, Kensington Gore being slung around like it's going out of style, and a "community" of "locals" who are apparently something akin to the villagers in The Wicker Man as every week Salt-of-the-Earth Lady-Policeman reports back that "the word on the street" is that hapless innocents are being stalked by fell agents of darkness for Lucifer's own infernal damned purposes. And they always seem to remember murders that happened in the Victorian era. "It were a dark time," they shake their heads and say, staring traumatised into their builder's tea. Whitechapel: gotta love it.

It's not just crappy telly though. Films are not exempt. Again, I'm not talking obviously shite romantic-comedy-by-numbers bilge like New Year's Eve or whatever Jennifer Aniston is in now. I mean films that have ideas, dangerous ideas, that they wish to achieve. Take Thor. Since posting my review of it (here), where I was fairly "eh", if I recall, I have since watched it more times than any other superhero film I own. Including Iron Man, including The Dark Knight, including X-Men: First Class, all of which are legitimately good movies, which Thor is not. But it has Asgard! Shiny, shiny, camp Asgard! It has a rainbow bridge and a giant hammer and frost giants and I'm already laughing because it is so goddam gloriously ridiculously brilliantly SILLY that I enjoy it with a level of unholy glee good movies can't quite match. I even got over the whole Thor-isn't-really-my-type thing when I decided that Loki was really the main character but Kenneth Branagh didn't want to make Chris Hemsworth jealous. What? What?

The point is, you should try it. I'm not against crap TV, far from it. But there are degrees of crapness. Instead of watching My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding paint an entire culture in what can be generously described as broad brushstrokes, watch Primeval. It may be tosh of the highest order, but it's not exploiting anybody (except you, probably). Instead of popping on Twilight (which, by the way, doesn't count as enjoyably bad because the SILLY moments are outweighed by the THAT'S NOT OKAY moments), why not dig out Heart and Souls, a painfully 80s (despite being produced in 1993) comedy wherein Robert Downey Jr must help four dead people complete their unfinished business before his girlfriend dumps him? What I'm saying is that crap TV can be an innocent guilty pleasure. You too can sit for hours in front of Merlin's uncomfortable shirtless scenes, stuffing your mouth with popcorn and roaring indistinctly "SILLY". Live the dream, people. Live the dream.

*Apparently actually called Playing It Straight. I prefer my title.

** Yes, I'm aware of how pretentious that sounds. Come at me, bro.

An Exercise in Awesome: Doctor Who - 'A Good Man Goes to War' Review

First, let me do this: OH MY GOD I WAS RIGHT I WAS SO RIGHT NO-ONE HAS EVER BEEN MORE RIGHT IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD THAN I WAS ABOUT DOCTOR WHO. Einstein? Bite me.

I don't know whether to dance for joy or weep at the preposterousness of my rightness. After all, this means that the Lulzy Mega Theory that I came up with to jokingly tie together every strand of the plot was...well, it was right. Like, actual bona fide canon plot. Steven Moffat you crazy man, I am no person to be filching storylines from their subconscious. LOL WUT.

Initial astonishment done with (it is quite lucky that I am so taken with the fact that I totally called this one because otherwise it could have been very disappointing), I genuinely loved this episode. Haters to the left, 'cos this is going to get raw like sushi. Honestly, I get why people might be disappointed. It's not like I've loved every minute of this series, it's been distinctly uneven in quality and I have serious doubts about the wisdom of a mid-series break in the first place. It obviously works for American shows that have a gazillion episodes per season and can take a convenient break around Christmas but for Doctor Who's thirteen episodes it just feels arbitrary and another ploy for the American market. Plus, it's just bad storytelling. Moffat is clearly invested in his overarching storyline and splitting the series in two means he gets to spend more time on it: three out of four episodes are justifiably siphoned off into Series Arc territory. But it does a disservice to the individual episodes - it makes us feel like we're just waiting to get back to the Important Stuff, especially when individual episodes turn out to really be about the series arc all along (Rebel Flesh/Almost People), especially especially when they have devastating cliffhangers tacked on the end (Almost People). And it's a shame because episodes like Neil Gaiman's are proof that the individual episode has as much to offer as the serialised one. So yeah, I'm not with you on this one, Steven: either do a four-part serial like Who of Yore or stick to the thirteen-episode series. No halfway house.

Plus the timelines are totally fucked now. I actually paused iPlayer to try and work out how River could know what happened at Demon's Run when Law of Inverse Timelines states she shouldn't know - I mean, it's her own future, right? It hasn't happened to her yet. I guess the Doctor told her or something? Yeah, Moffat has really screwed himself into a corner on this one. Personally, I hope they just abandon the prospect of trying to make the Inverse Timelines thing work because a) it doesn't and b) it's stupid. Plus it occasions unprecedented levels of angsting in my favourite badass and makes me all "Hey, Moffat, you got some 10th Doctor in my River". And please god, finally, I hope it means we just get to see them having crazy adventures together. Please. That would be awesome. Andtotallyhot.

And yeah, there wasn't really a story per se, just a load of build up and then...not much, and yeah, it really doesn't qualify as "the Doctor being raised higher than ever and falling harder than ever", like AT ALL, and yeah, for the 'Battle of Demon's Run' or even the titular War, it wasn't much of either but I honestly don't care. It was one of those ones where Moffat's real talent shines through: being awesome. If I'm totally honest, he's sort of gone mad with power and completely overreached himself this series, what with River's timelines and too much overarching plot but boy, can he make me forget his shortcomings quickly. There was some comment on the Guardian blog to tune that if this episode had been produced by Russel T Davies we'd all be baying for his blood and maybe so, but I think that just goes to show how much of the payoff is in the delivery: under RTD, this could have been a mess of mawkishness, goofiness and David Tennant's face collapsing under the strain of gurning. Under Moffat it was dry, tongue-in-cheek and Just. Plain. Cool.

I love that the show was finally confronting its own mythology - specifically NuWho mythology, that is. When they took the decision to rid the Whoniverse of Gallifrey and those pesky Timelords with a convenient genocide back in 2005, they might have done a service to the storylines but they lumbered the main character with a metric fuckton of angst and a dark side bigger than the freaking moon's. And yet they were always at pains to point that It's Totally The Same Doctor and He Never Really Changes. So, in my humble opinion, River's little speech where she called him out on what he'd become/was becoming was timely and effective, thank you. And again, will hopefully pave the way for glorious silliness come the second half of the series.

So there. I've dealt with all your petty complaints. Now can my joy be unconfined?

Because I flailed. Literally. And I do not use that word mistakenly, ever. I flailed with glee, I flailed with joy, I flailed with sorrow and I flailed with Matt Smithness. My limbs were all over the place with the wanton abandon of my flailing.

A long, long overdue Badass Upgrade for Rory there. I mean just that pre-credits sequence alone was great, with the callback to the Amy-talking-about-the-Doctor-but-really-talking-about-Rory trick (and yes, I admit, Moffat, you got me a second time) and that blank rage of the delivery of "Would you like me to repeat the question?" In fact, pretty much all the Rorytime of that episode seemed to be underscored by a little voice going, "Oh, you thought you didn't fancy Rory, did you? WELL WE'LL SHOW YOU." Seriously. Rory with cool explosions behind him. Rory in a centurion's outfit. Rory with a sword. Rory with a baby. Rory taking charge. Rory calling Amy "Mrs Williams". Rory Rory Rory, I salute you. Snaps for Arthur Darvill. (In fact, I think Moffat's having a wee giggle at the expense of the female fans there - after many episodes playing up excitingDoctor v homebodyRory, he suddenly gives us Rory in armour holding a baby in one hand and a sword in the other. He's practically the Old Spice man.) Plus, while I didn't totally buy Karen Gillan as a mum (no-one looks that good after childbirth), Arthur Darvill nailed it as a dad. (Or maybe find a female companion who can actually, y'know, act. It's just getting awkward.)

Some cracking classic Moffat one-liners in there as well. Stevie Wonder under the bridge in 1814 (we must never tell him), Jack the Ripper was stringy but tasty, all of Nurse Sontaran's Health Tips ("Don't slump, it's bad for your spine"). And I'm so glad River has the same thoughts as I do (Two Doctors? "That was a whole different birthday"). In fact, the whole episode had a distinctly Coupling-esque vein of British naughtiness running through it, as is only right for a story pivoting around the exact logistics of where and when Amy and Rory did ther nasty (presumably while roleplaying as a policewoman and a centurion - perhaps that's why the Doctor got Rory to dress up). I think my personal favourite (besides the Two Doctors gag, of course) was Cockney Strumpet pouting over her Silurian Lady Friend's roving eye, answered by "I don't know why you put up with me". Cue incredibly long, flexible tongue and some smouldering eye contact. Oh Steven, you are naughty.

I also love Moffat's PC vision of the ethnicity and gender diverse future (and the past) with the female president (speaking of which, it seems you really can't have a vision of the future without a bit of steampunk), the female pope, the thin fat gay married Anglican marines, the lesbian cross-species sword-wielding couple. Who are you, Russel T Davies? Seriously though, it was fun. And I know people say Moffat can't write character but honestly I shed a little tear over Lorna Bucket's death (what's the betting we get to see her encounter with the Doctor as a child in the second half of the series?), which is the second time I've cried over a character Moffat has introduced and killed off in the space of 45 minutes (thank you, Father Octavian). In fact, poor old Lorna Bucket. Let's take a minute to salute her. Yet another example of my favourite of the Doctor's qualities and its sharp edge: the ability to inspire people to be the best version of themselves, even if sometimes that just means dying. Anyway. Badass Silurian and her Sidekick of the Ridiculously Exaggerated Cockerney Accent were great. Blue Man Group Reject was amusing. Nurse Sontaran was Moffat at his most fun - he doesn't pull his punches on the show's more ridiculous aspects, does he?

But really, the star of all this was, of course, the Doctor. As I said, it was an episode that probed what the reboot had done to the character but celebrated it as well. It was a bold move not to have the main character in evidence for almost twenty minutes but for me it paid off; I was practically hopping with excitement by the time that ever-so-classy reveal of Matt Smith under the hood came around. And this, really, was why I loved this episode: it spoke to every adrenalin-junkie, explosions-and-one-liner-loving, lip-biting nerve of my inner seven-year-old. I bounced with excitement from start from finish; I didn't even mind the return of those goddamn Spitfires in Space. The whole thing was a feast of Woah Cybermen, Woah Explosions, Woah Cool Swords, etc etc. Steven Moffat is great at adrenalin. There's no other writer on television that manages to sustain quite that sense of snarky glee that I get from watching his stuff, and that's not just Doctor Who, that's Sherlock and Jekyll and countless others as well. And by the looks of it, it's not just me, I'm pretty sure that's the most fun Matt Smith's ever had, he seemed like he loved every minute of it.

Matt Smith who was, for the fourth week in a row, stellar. By the way. Not that I don't always think he's good, it's just that he hasn't been given much to do of late and I felt like the magic was lacking a little somewhere around the middle there. But what with Idris/Tardis and the Two Doctors and now this, he's fully cemented himself as My Doctor. I am seriously apprehensive about Doctor Twelve. I think Smith is at his best when he exploits that young-old appearance he's been gifted with, and this was a prime example - all that high energy glee when his plan went right, all that blushing prudery (somehow childish and old mannish at the same time) over the specifics of the conception. I also thought this was a tremendously endearing performance; I defy anyone watching not to feel at least a little affection for that space lunatic. Special mention to the Doctor imitating the Spitfires overhead, I was seconds away from doing the same myself. And the carousel of facial expressions as he realised that the first time Amy and Rory had been on the TARDIS together was their, ahem, wedding night. I am trying to be delicate.

And (because I've managed to avoid talking about The Reveal in detail so far) how great was that bit between the Doctor and River as he realised he was shortly to be hopping on the good foot and doing the bad thing with the daughter of his two best friends? It's a funny thing, that twist. I came up with my Mega Theory precisely because it would be preposterous for it to happen and now it has, it kind of is, but I've accepted it remarkably easily. So River Song is Melody Pond is the Regenerating Girl is Amy's Daughter. Yeah, I can get on board with that. Do we get to see her regenerate again? Will she join the TARDIS gang full time now? Will we have some Hilarious Shenanigans where Amy pauses mid-adventure to try and wipe her face? For the last, undoubtedly. For the others, we shall see. I hardly dare try and match my current Theory Predicting Success but the dots we're clearly supposed to join are that River kills Flesh Doctor and is sent to prison for it. I'm not sure though. With recent developments, perhaps she ends up killing Rory? 'Greatest man she ever knew'? It would be a neat way to end the They Keep Killing Rory arc and would continue Amy's trick of conflating descriptions of her two favourite men. Guess we'll find out. As to whether we'll find out this year, the jury's still out on that one; Death of the Doctor could be Moffat's way of linking this series to the next, just like the Silence linked us to the last. Anyway, so long as none of this affects River Being Awesome, I'm cool with it. (Also, remember when River said "he's not my Doctor yet"? I have a sneaking suspicion that now the Doctor's going to start being 'her Doctor'.) Plus, this sort of confirms something else I suggested a while back: River is completely justified in being a badass who tells everyone else what to do - she's a part timelord who's been specifically trained to be a badass. I can't even drive. I feel better about myself now.

Overall, a corking episode: wildly exciting, snarky-funny, tear-jerking, and with a reveal that most 9-year-olds probably saw coming a mile off because they have no concept that it just might be ridiculous. Not five star Doctor Who, but entertaining enough to be damn close.

...

So. What's the verdict on Series 6 Part 1? Um. Not sure. First off, it's a story only half told, there's still lots to come that may well determine what we think of the whole. Secondly, I don't feel like there's been enough of it to judge. But I do know that I preferred Series 5. Why? Well, it was just more unified. I've been thinking a bit about 'themes' in Doctor Who and whether they have a place there or should remain the preserve of more 'adult' drama (by which I mean, specifically written for adults, thank you).

Russel T Davies, he didn't really have themes. He had character arcs and, for the most part, he did them well: Rose, Martha and Donna all learned the value of themselves in one way or another and in turn, they were the show's links to the audience, our representatives. Moffat's characters don't really do that; they're more ciphers that represent certain things. I still don't really know who Amy is, beyond the fact that she's Scottish and 'feisty', and I certainly don't feel like she's my representative. (In fact, I sort of feel like Rory is my representative as the only one who ever suggests running away from the Scary Thing instead of towards it, but he's objectively a much better written character than Amy - but then, I don't think Moffat can really write women very well at all, although there are notable exceptions.)

But Moffat does do themes. Oh boy, can he do themes. Series 5 was dominated visually by the fairytale motif but there was also a strong Peter Pan-esque 'don't grow up' element as well as a 'real life v. adventure' aspect and, of course, the ever-present timey-wimey stuff. Most of all though, it was a discussion of storytelling and the way that the stories we tell end up shaping the tellers as much as the tellers shape the tale. I love that. That ticks every single one of my boxes. And it held together the series, elevating even the more formulaic episodes so that they became part of one long chain of adventure, Amy's Reward for Waiting. Ironically, Moffat stated somewhere that he doesn't 'do' themes consciously, he just writes his ideas and sees what happens. This seems to work well for him and I'd advise him to give it another go: Series 5's fairytale/storytelling preoccupation seems something organic, something even the Doctor didn't notice until it was important. Series 6, on the other hand, has suffered from too many decision by committee: we keep being told it's 'darker', 'scarier', 'more mature', elements which have clearly been shoe-horned in even where they don't fit. The Curse of the Black Spot should have been a romp - a proper one.

The current success of the show (and the Davies v. Moffat debate) really comes down to what you think Doctor Who should be. With Davies, it was a representation of our universe, in which there happened to exist this clever guy who talked too much and had a time machine and accordingly the Doctors were more humanised and the companions more woman-on-the-street. With Moffat, we hardly ever see our own earth; instead we're taken to mystical places with exotic names where fantastical events play out and consequently, the Doctor is extraordinarily alien and the companions are story archetypes. In a way, Moffat's era is just fleshing out all the planets Davies' Doctors name-dropped in Series 1-4: Davies showed us the familiar side of the universe with chips and council estates and daleks, now Moffat is showing us the unfamiliar side, where all it takes to bring back the Doctor is to remember him. I don't think either approach is necessarily better than the other but I prefer Moffat because a) my tastes run in that direction (beautiful escapism over hyper-realism every time) and b) I think he writes his approach better.

Series 6 has been a mixed bag. Jewels of episodes like The Doctor's Wife made up for clunkers like The Curse of the Black Spot. The scope and ambition has been impressive and the production values remain high, producing one very good-looking show. The series arc has been intriguing but overbearing and there are definite signs of Moffat overreaching himself. I prescribe cutting back on the timey-wimey, investing in a little more character development and continuing with the great line in wisecracks, scary monsters and awe-inspiring coolness. I may not be a Doctor, but I watch enough TV to know what's good for it.

The Doctor Is In: Doctor Who - 'The Doctor's Wife' Review

*insert grovelling usual apologies for puntasticly titled review here*

HOW GOOD WAS THAT, EH? THAT'S MORE LIKE IT, DOCTOR WHO. I'M GOING TO TURN OFF THE CAPS NOW. That's better. But yeah, how bloody good was that? And not a single reference to the wider story arcs or anything (except that prophecy, more on which later), just a great standalone episode. Stephen Thompson, take note. Actually, this episode has even dried up some of my rage towards that unfortunate individual because, sadly, we can't all be Neil Gaiman.

And that episode was vintage Gaiman from start to finish. From the opening with "Auntie", "Uncle" and "Nephew" and the "I just wish I could go in your place, Idris... Actually I don't because it's really going to hurt", I was reduced to a state of lip-biting, toe-clenching glee. For those of you unfamiliar with Neil Gaiman (and for anyone with access to a bookshop/library/e-reader, there's really no excuse if you are), this is what Gaiman does: fantasy writing with a very homespun British feel to it that often plays off a core of darkness and unnerving...ness. This is a very general description though, and his short stories are probably the best illustration of his versatility, spanning from whimsical ones like 'Chivalry', where an old lady finds the Holy Grail in a charity shop and Sir Galahad turns up on her doorstep to get it back, to ones that play with established tropes and characters like 'A Study in Emerald', which is a crossover between the worlds of Sherlock Holmes and H.P. Lovecraft and does some very clever things in managing your expectations to unnerving ones like 'Babycakes' (the title is almost literal) and downright scary ones like 'Closing Time', which I can't tell you too much about without spoiling it but you'll never look at a wendy house in the same way again.

He's also written several novels, including Stardust (of which an ok-ish film adaptation was made a few years ago), The Graveyard Book (based on The Jungle Book, but the protagonist is brought up in a graveyard instead of a jungle, somewhat obviously) and a collaboration with Terry Pratchett called Good Omens, which I would sincerely advise everyone to read at some point because it is genuinely one of the funniest, warmest, scariest, most uplifting books I have ever read. Amongst various things, it's about prophecies and the apocalypse and the 11-year-old antichrist and witchfinders and the four horsemen of the apocalypse (on motorbikes now) and mostly focuses on the unlikely friendship between a fussy earth-bound angel who runs a bookshop and a sarcastic demon who "did not fall so much as saunter vaguely downwards" and has a tendency to hiss when agitated. And it's probably getting a four-part television adaptation soon, so there is a god. One last Neil Gaiman plug, I swear: he also collaborated with the Jim Henson Company to make a film called MirrorMask, intended as a kind of spiritual successor to 80s cult classic Labyrinth (yes, the film with David Bowie's crotch in it) and I think it succeeds admirably. Again, very English (it stars Stephanie Leonidas, Rob Brydon and Gina McKee) but very strange, absolutely beautiful design and some very unnerving moments.

Basically, what I'm trying to get across here about Nail Gaiman (apart from the, by now obvious, fact that he's awesome) is that he's basically the perfect person to write for Doctor Who - with the proviso that he does standalone episodes only. Because it was very...well, Neil Gaiman-y. I don't what it is but everything that man touches is marked with his own peculiar Writing Pollen. This is by no means a criticism - Gaiman has, quite simply, one of the best imaginations writing today and it's an imagination that goes into strange and dark corners of the world. If we could have Gaiman to write all the one-off adventures and Moffat to keep the series storylines on track, I would be a happy woman. Perhaps what made it feel so different was the warmth and heart of the episode - something which, sadly, Moffat episodes (for all their fantastic twists and turns and pitch perfect one-liners) seem to lack occasionally. I always feel, when reading Gaiman, that no matter what corner of time and space he's occupying at that moment, he's still this boy who grew up in Croydon (no, seriously) and read comics.

Sorry. I'll talk about Doctor Who now. And I really have to talk about Suranne Jones' Idris/TARDIS first, don't I? A tough act to follow for any future guest stars (again, Hugh Bonneville, take note), sort of Queenie from Blackadder II crossed with Helena Bonham Carter (which I think was actually the character briefing for the Red Queen in Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland film, but of that monumental disappointment, We Do Not Speak). To give the TARDIS human characterisation when she's always seemed to have a personality of sorts anyway could have been incredibly risky but I think Jones and Gaiman pulled it off with aplomb: capricious, naughty, haughty, vulnerable and very much in love with "her" Doctor. After all, the Doctor/TARDIS relationship predates every companion and the Smith/Jones (what is it with Doctor Who and Smiths and Joneses?) chemistry was excellent, a great reflection of this. I particularly liked the childlike joy and fear that seemed to infect the Doctor this episode; we don't often get to see him partnered with an entity even older and more complicated than he is and it seemed very appropriate that being able to converse with his time machine for the first time in 700 years would reduce him to a state of bright-eyed a-quiverment. Much like I was by this episode. The way the relationship switched from wariness to excitement to flirting to bickering to a display of extreme mutual appreciation and love was beautifully written and deftly executed and I salute all those involved. My favourite line was, of course, "Biting is excellent. It's like kissing, only there's a winner." Although all the references to calling the TARDIS "Sexy" were pretty - to borrow an internet neologism - for the win.

Essentially, this episode was a paean to everyone's favourite blue box. It's long been part of Whovian lore that the Doctor stole ("borrowed") the TARDIS and it's long been a favourite fan theory that the TARDIS takes the Doctor to trouble spots, rather than holiday resorts, no matter what he wants. We got closure and confirmation on both of these things and it was absolutely thrilling. I think part of it was that being told things about the Doctor is still a special treat. For a show called 'Doctor Who', we really don't get to know him all that well, a situation which is often exacerbated by the focus on the human companions because they're "us", they react how we would etc etc etc. I really loved the way the the focus was balanced in this episode, placing the Doctor right at the centre and focusing on his relationship with his past. Speaking of which, I'm willing to bet that throwaway line about 'The Corsair' being female in a few regenerations will have actually exploded a fair few internet message boards, blowing the lid off the "Will there ever be a female Doctor?" debate. My guess is that the answer is Yes, There Could Be But No, There Won't Be. I also love the literary referencing going on there: The Corsair was a poem by Byron, one of the clutch he wrote that crystallised the whole Byronic Hero thing, focusing on the adventures of a brooding rake rejected by society who went around bedding women dressed as men and men dressed women. The obvious conclusions to draw from this are that a) Gallifrey was very permissive society and b) Byron was a Time Lord.

But for all its grounding in Whovian mythology and Doctor/TARDIS shenanigans, the episode wouldn't have worked without the Ponds enduring a series of truly horrifying mind games in the bowels of the TARDIS. It was great to see Rory and Amy working on equal terms again, although they really, really must stop killing him off now. I'm sure it must be leading up to something bigger, although (as I've said in previous posts) I don't think it can be a permanent death for Rory because we just wouldn't believe it so...Amy dies? Perhaps in childbirth? RTD said he'd never kill off a companion but I wouldn't put it past Moffat. I think he forgets sometimes that he's writing a children's show. Anyway. Rory and Amy. I love that the TARDIS has a little crush on Rory, or possibly just completely different aesthetic standards ("Your chin is hilarious!") Plus Karen Gillan really dialled it up a notch this week in the acting stakes. No overblown shouting, no strident petulance, and some nice sobbing in those corridors. Actually, I just really liked the way Amy was written this week: in a position of fear and ignorance but still competent and trying to think her way out of the situation. That's how all companions should be. Including Rory. And he was. Nice.

The whole ending sequence, from Idris fading away to that great gag about the bunk-beds, was superb. "Hello, Doctor" has never sounded more heart-breaking. But we know all this. So let's just take a moment to think about that tasty little prophecy line, "The only water in the forest is the river." Of course, the question we're all asking ourselves is "river or River?" To which I would add, "forest or Forest of the Dead"? Forest of the Dead, being of course the library in which we first met River Song. Taken like this, it could be some kind of exhortation to the Doctor to trust River (and believe me, I would love it if River and the TARDIS were friends) but I actually sort of doubt it. I feel like it might be a red herring, much like the "He will knock four times" thing from Tennant's exit, where we all thought it was the Master and it was Wilf (well, it kind of was the Master so maybe that was more of a double bluff). I don't know though, the TARDIS said it was something he would "need" to know, so it could be way down the line and not to do with the series story arcs at all. Also just occurred to me if we're debating water sources here: River v. Pond? Some kind of choice? Ooh.

(Like a total idiot, it's also just struck me that if River is Amy's glow-y regenerating-y child, as per my mega-theory, then Rory is her dad, as I really don't think they'd introduce adultery into the show. It just puts that Rory/River conversation from The Impossible Astronaut into quite a nice, paternal light, that's all. Daw.)

All in all, I'd say that was a pretty flawless episode. Not quite as cinematic as we're used to but Doctor Who isn't cinema, it's bloody good TV. It was a tightly packed, beautifully designed, 45 minute feast of ideas and emotions and funny lines and it didn't need to tie into the series story arc to feel important. Satisfaction achieved. Next week looks like another 'too scary for the kids' week with something called The Gangers (off the top of my head but sourced from Wikipedia) and some creepy prosthetics. Goody. After this week, I'm expecting a natural drop in quality, something along the lines of the Silurians two-parter from last series (good but not great) but you never know, it could turn out to be a Human Nature/Family of Blood (way up there in my top five episodes). Either way, my faith in Doctor Who is restored. Neil Gaiman, please come back soon.