The Blog to Nowhere

I clearly watch too much television

locker_monster — Wed, 22 May 2019 00:56:53 GMT

Well, the TV season is done, more or less. Just some long winded thoughts on my shows:

- Arrow: Season started off strong, but once Ollie got out of prison it sort of lost its focus. The whole thing with Emiko and the Ninth Circle was sort of convoluted. It's like they didn't know what to do with her. Like, why was she dressing up like the Green Arrow? If Emiko was all about terrorizing the city and killing people, why was helping people in the Glades? I get that you need a twist and a personal dilemma for Ollie, but there are other ways of going about it then by making his newly discovered half sister evil. I much would have preferred if Emiko hadn't been the villain. An arc about her trying to trust her new brother and eventually joining him in his crusade would have been much more interesting. You could even have had Ollie passing on his mantle. The ending that Emiko got was so flat. The writers rushed things so they could get to the real ending.

But I do understand why things were so rushed. You have to work in a series finale of sorts before the epilogue. I totally didn't expect the Monitor to show up to take Ollie away. I guess Ollie did make a deal with the Monitor back in "Elseworlds"; his life for the lives of Barry and Kara. I think I'll have to watch "Elseworlds" again. Was the deal to save Barry and Kara while they were trying to stop the world from spinning? Or was the deal to save their lives during the upcoming Crisis? Either way, the Monitor showed up to settle Ollie's debt. Now, I wonder if Ollie is taking on the role of Harbinger in the comics? The Harbinger in the comics was the Monitor's assistant and his herald of sorts. I would totally watch a season of Ollie travelling to other Earths and warning them of the approaching Crisis. There has been buzz that season eight won't be like any of the other seasons.

Oh, and the scene with Future!Felicity and the Monitor, where he takes her somewhere to see Ollie again? Um, are they doing a variation of the thing from "Crisis on Infinite Earths" where Earth-2 Lois and Earth-2 Superman got to live out their lives in a pocket dimension utopia? Or is the Monitor just taking Future!Felicity to the past so she can say good-bye to Ollie before he dies? While a reference to the ending of "Crisis on Infinite Earths" would be nice, that ending also led to Superboy Prime punching the walls of reality (it's a long story). We'll see, I guess. Maybe they can get Emily Bett Rickards back for a quick cameo in the crossover.

Over in flash forward land... Yeah, I don't know what was the point of flash forward. It kind of had a parallel sibling storyline with Mia and William, but I'm not sure what else it added. Actually, if you think about it, it kind of ruins the ending in the present day, since you know that Star City eventually becomes a slum and vigilantes are banned, so any good work done by Team Arrow is for nothing. Are the writers trying to do a spin-off? Arrow Beyond? I really don't want the last ten episodes of season eight dividing their time between the present and the future. This is the last hurrah; spend it with the characters we know the best.

Random: Well, I guess Flashpoint has erased the future we saw from "Star City 2046" on Legends of Tomorrow from existence. Ollie was alive and well in that future. They also changed the identity (but not the actor) who plays Connor Hawke. Making him not John's son but instead Bronze Tiger's son is fine, I suppose. Never made sense why J.J. decided to use the name Connor Hawke anyway. When they introduced the Zeta soldiers, I had hoped it was related to The Zeta Project, the spin-off from Batman Beyond, but alas, the soldiers were not A.I.s but just guys in fancy helmets. They introduced John's previously unmentioned stepfather, whose last name is Stewart, thus hinting that John is John Stewart on Earth-90. Oh man, if they have Earth-90 John/Green Lantern for the next crossover, that would be amazing. The only live action Green Lantern that they've done on TV was for that Justice League pilot that never went anywhere.

- The Flash: They also had an uneven season. Cicada was not a strong enough villain to sustain an entire arc. Even introducing Cicada II from the future didn't help. Cicada just wasn't compelling. Sure, the power dampening dagger put a kink in things, but when your villain always runs away when things get dicey, I really don't feel threatened. Maybe The Flash does need a speedster as the main villain. Perhaps after two seasons of non-speedster bad guys, they will go back to an evil speedster for season six. Sadly, they used up Godspeed as a bad guy in 2049, so there's little chance he can show up as a villain in the present.

The stuff with Nora was fine. The reveal that her time travelling was all part of an elaborate scheme of Thawne's? Meh. It was nicer to think that Nora was simply in the past to see her dad. It gets very timey-wimey when you involve Thawne. Also, how is Thawne still around? He was erased from time in season one and then erased again in season two of Legends of Tomorrow. The events of Flashpoint might explain how he was around for season two LoT, but not for this. I guess you can just claim he's a time remnant and call it a day (but that still doesn't explain why he still looks like Harrison Wells, but anyway...). Nora being erased from time was not that surprising. Time meddling never ends well. But did she disappear more because the Crisis has moved up from 2024? Nora said Barry disappeared not long after she was born. So if Barry disappears in 2019, then she was never born. But how can Nora's travelling back to the past affect when the Crisis happens? Barry seems resigned to the fact that he will disappear in the future, so it's not like he's trying to prevent that. Perhaps Ollie's deal with the Monitor messed things up and that causes the Time Flux. Or maybe Nora never became XS, so that version of her was erased. Ah, time travel. It's never straightforward.

As for everything else... Man, Carlos Valdes is so ready to leave. I wouldn't be surprised if he doesn't come back for season six. But the solution was for Cisco to take the metahuman cure? That didn't feel earned. Sherloque is back on his Earth and I assume he's staying there. He doesn't seem like a Wells worth revisiting. Will they introduce a new Wells? Or maybe they'll bring back Harry. I would prefer having Harry back, even if he's not a genius anymore. Better to have an established character around for the crossover. Caitlin lost her dad, but it looks like her mother could potentially become a cold based bad guy. And a tease for a proper suit for Killer Frost! Also being teased: a love interest for Ralph. If they introduce Sue next season, that would be fun. She's a pretty decent detective, too, so they could have Ralph and Sue on a case.

Random: It's kind of funny that they pretty much forgot about baby Jenna. Joe and Cecile must have the world's best babysitter. I like that Singh figured out that Barry is the Flash. I wonder how long he's known. With Joe as police captain now, I guess he can cover for Barry more often. Will Wally be back for the crossover? It'd be nice if he made an appearance. I don't understand how everyone showed up in 2049 to battle Thawne. It's been established that the Time Sphere can only hold one person. That's why Ralph had to squish himself flat when he went with Iris to the future. Did everyone just pile in and there were arms and legs in everyone's faces?

- Supergirl: I have to say that this season was an improvement over last season. Season four had a better focus; they really knew what kind of stories they wanted to tell. I don't know if it was always the plan to have Lex behind everything, but it did help to tie together the Children of Liberty stuff with the Red Daughter stuff. It was also a good example of how you can have two villains for a season; no one arc felt stretched out. It's a shame they only had Lex for three episodes, but he's the sort of character that you want to use sparingly anyway. If he had been around for more episodes, there would have been a lot of scenes of him just standing around and scheming.

I have to say, I was impressed with Jon Cryer's performance. When they first announced him as Lex, I kind of raised an eyebrow. Super stunt casting is great and all, but just because someone has been in one Superman production that doesn't mean they need to come back as a different character on another Superman production. Thankfully, my skepticism was proved wrong. Jon Cryer and the writers portrayed Lex with the right amounts of intellect and menace and glee and wrath. I guess he has redeemed himself for Superman IV: The Quest for Peace (which I have never seen, but I hear it's terrible). They left the door open for him to come back, too. I can only assume that the Monitor resurrects Lex in that last scene. Alexander Luthor of Earth-3 was an important part of "Crisis on Infinite Earths". Perhaps a resurrected Lex will play a similar role? Oh, and the writers addressed the whole age thing (how Jon Cryer and Brenda Strong are close in age, so it's weird that they play mother and son), by having Lillian say that cancer prematurely aged Lex. :-D

Of course, Lex is only dead because Lena shot him. Lena has done some pretty questionable/morally ambiguous in the past, but this was outright murder. Is the show slowly leading her down a path to supervillainy? Her world is shattered when Lex tells her that Kara is Supergirl and that everyone has been lying to her. Personally, I would have liked it if Lena had said she has known all along. It's always better when the character in the dark finds out/figures out the whole secret identity thing on their own. Makes them look less stupid. However, it would be super interesting to see Lena eventually become Kara's enemy. How do fight someone who is your best friend? Though, I wouldn't put it past the writers to do a fake out and have everything work out once Kara tells Lena the truth.

Red Daughter is conveniently dispatched. I'm surprised the writers didn't have her turning against Lex. Sure, it might have been cheesy, having the bad guy have a change of heart because of some rousing words from the hero, but it would have been very Supergirl. Then you could have had Kara and Red Daughter fighting Lex together. Afterwards, you could send Red Daughter off to Argo to live with Kara's mother, and thus, you write her out and never hear from her again. Oh well. Melissa Benoist did do an excellent job playing both characters. My god, she can sell those emotional moments so well.

Random: The storyline with Manchester Black just fizzled out. J'onn kills him and no one thinks it's a big deal? I feel like that plot point could have been touched on a bit more, but I suppose the season was already a bit stuffed. I'm not sure what the whole point of wiping Alex's memories was. It added some drama, but then it was undone in the end. They better visit the 30th century for next season, damn it. The Legion of Superheroes were involved in "Crisis on Infinite Earths" so they better be part of the crossover. I know that would involve introducing more characters and making costumes for everyone, but it would be so fun. The writers sent Winn to the future for a reason; they better well follow through. So, J'onn has a brother that he's never mentioned before? The credits call him Malefic J'onzz. A quick Google tells me that Malefic is indeed a character from the comics and a villain. Malefic is also voiced by Phil LaMarr, who played John Stewart on the Justice League cartoon. I'm a little bummed he's not being played by Phil Morris, who played J'onn on Smallville. Well, maybe things can change during the off season. I'm also bummed that Alex's adoption didn't go through. Just imagine Kara being the best super aunt and flying around grabbing diapers and formula. I had to Google Leviathan as well. Turns out they're a criminal organization run by Talia al Ghul. One assumes Talia won't be running it on Earth-38, but it is something to revisit next season. Ooh, can Lois and Clark (and their super baby) come back for season five, too? You can have them come back just in time for the crossover.

- Legends of Tomorrow: Season four started out strong but the back half lacked the same oomph. I blame it on the sudden re-write they did when they realized that they didn't want Tom Wilson's character to be the bad guy. With no clear follow through, things just sort of flitted about. The government wanted to train monsters for nefarious purposes. No wait, really Nate's dad just wanted to train monsters to be attractions in a theme park. And over here, Neron wanted to steal souls to cause mass panic. No wait, he wanted to open a portal to hell to free his evil girlfriend. No, actually, he wanted harness souls to tak over hell. But wait, he really wanted to unleash hell on earth through the power of fear. Even without the sudden mid season change, we all know there was no way they were topping last season's finale. You really can't beat a giant Beebo fighting a time demon. The writers still tried to go for big and weird, but they didn't quite stick the landing.

Despite all this, the show still had a good emotional heart. There weren't just crazy shenanigans just for the sake of crazy shenanigans. Nate worked out his father issues, Sara and Ava had their relationship woes, Ray tackled his feelings for Nora. Heck, even Mick had a meaningful arc with his romance writing. The only thing that felt off was the sudden relationship that developed between Zari and Nate. I don't know if that was part of the re-write, but it didn't feel organic. It might have worked if they had had more time to develop it. It was established that Zari does have issues opening up herself to other people and her panic over becoming emotionally vulnerable with someone felt genuine, but just because she had to pose as Nate's girlfriend she suddenly has romantic feelings for him? LoT has shaken off a lot of the terrible trappings from their first season, but their habit of forcing characters into relationships that weren't there doesn't ever seem to go away. Characters can develop without having romances.

Of course, now Zari is gone. Her past has been re-written such that she never joined the Legends. Is this a permanent thing? Because I really like Zari and it'd be horrible if she was written off just like that. Considering that LoT is coming back in the mid season, maybe the crossover will mix things up and Zari will be brought back that way? Or maybe it's an arc they will tackle over the course of the season. The finale doesn't offer much about what's to come. Astra seems to release the souls of evil doers back into the world? So, are the Legends hunting them down next season? It would be a good reason to keep Constantine around. I really expected them to write him out, since this seemed like a one time deal, but maybe Constantine likes being on a team now. Though, it also seems like Mona and Gary are sticking around, too. I hate to say it, but they are kind of annoying. Gary has always been best in small doses, but I don't think I can handle him being around full time. Mona doesn't add much, either. Maybe the crossover will play around with the crew roster.

Random: So, the power of love through song brought Nate back from the dead? Um, couldn't Gideon just heal him on the Waverider? She has healed people who were strangled before. Or maybe Ne-Ray killed him with magic. Either way, totally weird, but very on brand for LoT. It's also no weirder than Kara healing herself with sunlight pulled from plants and grass. What happens to the magical creatures now? They certainly can't go back to hell. Are they now stuck being side show attractions at Heyworld? Is Nora also stuck being Gary's Fairy Godmother for the foreseeable future? Quick appearance by the Monitor just to tie all the shows in to the crossover. He kind of looks unimpressed with them; like, he's thinking "I can't believe I have to recruit these guys." Though, later on, he is eating popcorn and enjoying the show, so maybe the Legends proved themselves worthy. Sara, Nate, and Gary dressed up like Supergirl, Green Arrow, and the Flash was so bizarre, but it worked. The call back to "Legends of To-meow-meow" ("Hard pass") was perfect. And they called Kara, Ollie, and Barry the Trinity! Quick cameo by Vandal Savage. Oh my god, I never expected to see him again. What's great is that they played his appearance as one big joke, as you should with his character. Also great, Ray and Savage playing giant Jenga.

While I know that LoT's mid season premiere is probably due more to the fact that the CW doesn't have enough room in its programming schedule, it would be cool if Arrow had a scene where Ollie shows up on the Waverider and he recruits the team to help him travel around the Multiverse. Just swap out Gideon's time drive with interdimensional extrapolator. The Legends can get in half of season of adventuring before coming back in their own show. It'd be like Sliders, only with superheroes. I mean, you have to visit the other Earths before destroying them and mushing the remains together (assuming they are going down that road). It's most likely just wishful thinking on my part, but stranger things have happened in the Arrowverse.

- So, for the crossover, it's across all five shows, though the first three episodes will air in December 2019 and the last two in 2020. I'm disappointed that Legends of Tomorrow is getting pushed back to a mid season premiere, but at least they are a part of the crossover this time. Seems strange that they're splitting it like that instead of airing it across an entire week, but maybe it's so big, they need the extra time to do special effects or something. And I would honestly love it if they visited other Earths that were old DC TV shows, like Smallville Earth or Lois and Clark Earth. They did it with 1990 The Flash, so it's not a stretch. Oh, and it's cool that they're bundling the CW-DC shows next season. Supergirl and Batwoman on Sundays and The Flash and Arrow on Tuesdays.

And now to the non CW-DC shows...

- Star Trek: Discovery: All I can say is, thank god Discovery is now stuck in the future. The show never really worked as a prequel. But by throwing the characters in the far future, the writers are freed from having to maintain continuity and canon so now they can get really creative. It remains to be seen if the characters will meet up with Starfleet in the future or if they'll just hang around Terralysium. While it would be neat to see how the Federation and Starfleet has changed over the centuries, I kind of also want to see the crew just trying to make it on their own. Yes, it's kind of a riff on Voyager's premise, but Voyager never really leaned into the potential of its premise, so it would be nice to see it done properly.

I never really got into Ethan Peck's portrayal of Spock. It was so stiff. Spock is emotionless, but he's not a robot. I guess one could argue that the character here hasn't evolved yet into the character we know and love, but still. I did enjoy Anson Mount as Pike. I could definitely get behind a spin-off with Pike and Number One and the adventures of the Enterprise before Kirk became captain. Yes, it would be another prequel, but I think the writers could make it work.

- The Orville: Renewed for season three! It's still weird how much I like this show. I guess it's because it feels like the Star Trek show I'm used to (i.e. TNG). Season two was a definite improvement over season one. They dialled back on the stupidity of the jokes and they focused more on the characters. I'm also game for more guest spots from Star Trek alum. I laughed so hard when they had not one, but two doctors in one episode (The Doctor and Phlox).

- The Rookie: Also renewed! I watch mainly for Nathan Fillion, but it's not a bad show on its own.

iZombie and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. are still going. Last season for iZombie but I'm not sure how it's going to end. Meanwhile, on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., stuff is happening, though it's not super clear why. There's also the matter of the elephant in the room:

So, is the show set post-Snap/post-Endgame? Season six is set a year after season five, which would put it a year after the Snap. However, there's no indication that Thanos wiped out half the population of Earth. No one brings it up and all of the team is conveniently still alive. So, is the show purposely ignoring the movies? You could argue season six is set during the five year gap. Just because the characters don't talk about the Snap, doesn't mean it didn't happen. One character mentions he lost his husband recently. You could interpret that as the husband turned to dust. The outdoor scenes aren't conclusive, either. There doesn't appear to be fewer people around. As for the probability that none of the main cast disappeared? Well, what are the odds that all of the original Avengers would survive?

But I think it's easier to assume that AoS now takes place in an alternative timeline where the Snap never happened. The team did do some time travelling of their own, so maybe they landed in a new timeline once they got back to the present. Maybe in this reality, Thor went for the head. Now that the multiverse seems to be a thing in the MCU, this doesn't seem that out there.

The only new show I'm interested in seeing right now is Batwoman, but honestly, I haven't seen what the other networks are offering.

CCEE 2019: Sunday or So much snow...

locker_monster — Mon, 29 Apr 2019 03:08:13 GMT

Snowstorm stopped sometime overnight, but there was still a ton of snow everywhere. I think this deterred a lot of cosplayers today. Hell, they had to cancel a lot of the outdoor activities that the expo usual has going on. Thankfully, the sun came out later, so the melt is on, but I wouldn't be surprised if we have another snowstorm before the Victoria Day long weekend next month.

I didn't get up to much today. Maybe the snow sucked away some of my energy. I did wear my Jessica Jones Defenders cosplay, which is surprisingly effective outfit for after a snowstorm. So warm and comfy.

I sat in on John DiMaggio's panel (though I didn't take any pictures). He was here a few years ago with Billy West, but he's great on his own, too. A lot of questions about Adventure Time; there were two requests for him to sing the Bacon Pancake song. I've never watched the show, but I guess it's really popular? He also said that he's never watched the last episode of Adventure Time because it's too emotional for him. And I always forget he voices the main guy in Gears of War. John had a funny anecdote about playing one of the earlier games. He was living in an apartment back then and was playing the game really loud. So loud, that his neighbours thought he was talking to himself. :-D

Next panel was Christopher Lloyd and Tom Wilson. They were here last year to do the Back to the Future cast reunion, but then Michael J. Fox had to cancel. This year, Michael J. Fox was able to make it, so everyone was back again.

I have to say that Tom Wilson is a funny guy. He spent like ten minutes setting up a Go Pro to film the panel and playing to the crowd. I can definitely see why the Legends of Tomorrow producers decided to change the direction of the season and not make him the villain. Tom said he ventured out into the snowstorm, thinking it wouldn't be that bad, but he ended up huddled in an alcove just to escape the biting wind and the sideways snow. He eventually ended up in a restaurant and he said the staff were surprised anyone came in. Then he had to make his way back to the hotel after dinner. I think he was joking when he said he had to buy some winter gear, but who knows. That snow was pretty brutal, especially when it was blowing into your face.

Christopher Lloyd seemed less engaged than Tom during the panel, but his memory of past films and stuff isn't so great, so maybe that made it kind of hard for him to answer questions with serious thought. But I guess when you've been in as many movies as he has, it is tough to keep it all straight.

Capped off the weekend with The Goonies panel, even though I've never seen the movie. But hey, I like Sean Astin, and hey, it's the guy who played Short Round, so why not.

Also, Corey Feldman is one interesting dude. Just look at his outfit. He too was also baffled by the snow. Andrew, the moderator for both panels, grew up here, so he had to assure everyone that this is totally the norm for late April.

I wish I could relay some of the stuff they said, but having never seen the movie, I didn't know what they were referencing. Though, I think Corey Feldman may have spilled the beans on a certain aspect of Avengers: Endgame. No one called him out on it, so maybe enough of the audience had seen it? Or maybe it went by too quickly. I really need to watch The Goonies now.

Well, that's it for another year. I say this every year, but I'd really love it if the expo got David Tennant as a guest. Him or Christopher Eccleston. Hell, both would be awesome.

CCEE 2019: Saturday or Snowstorm in April

locker_monster — Sun, 28 Apr 2019 03:58:12 GMT

Yes, a snowstorm in April. Such is the city I live in. Though, it is funny watching the reactions of the celebrity guests who aren't used to our wacky weather. Zachary Levi was just mystified on his Instagram.

Speaking of Zachary Levi, the man is a hoot. He did throw off my entire schedule this morning, though. I really wanted to see him first thing, but while waiting in line we were told he was skipping his first round of autographs and was going straight to his panel. My friend and I eventually caught up with him in the afternoon. Man, he had a lot of photo ops today.

So the main reason I wanted to meet Zachary Levi was because I knitted him a Shazam doll:

He really seemed to like it; he said it reminded him of "those sock monkeys". I don't know what will happen to the doll once he heads home, but at least I got it to him.

While we were at it, my friend and I got a selfie/table photo with him.

Man, I'm short.

I also got Catherine Tate's autograph and photo, hence why I'm dressed like Ten in the Zachary Levi photo. Catherine is nice enough to stand on the other side of the table, rather than just sit behind it, so you get to interact more with her, which is so nice of her. She's the first person to sign October/Ten's month. I feel like I'm the only fan hauling this calendar around because no one seems to have seen it before.

So much room left. I really need to meet David Tennant.

Catherine was also pretty fun in the photo-op. She got so excited when a fan gave her knitted finger puppets of Donna and some Adipose that she decided to keep the Donna one for the rest of the photos going forward. You can just see it on her left hand.

She also asked if we wanted to do an action pose, which is what we're supposed to be doing in this photo. Clearly, Catherine has done this many, many times before. I have no idea what I'm doing. I can never get the Doctor poses right. Oh, and someone gave her a crocheted Adipose yesterday and she was carrying it around today (it even ended up in the photo with the fan who knitted the finger puppets). So, if you gift Catherine with something, she will definitely keep it.

Spent the rest of the day in panels. Christina Ricci was a last minute guest. She was brought in after David Harbor had to cancel. Apparently, she started doing cons last year.

Not the best photo in the world, but still pretty good for sitting near the back of the room. She said she's game to be cast in a superhero movie. I don't know who she could play, but someone in the audience suggested Squirrel Girl. :-D

Next was the Smallville panel. It was supposed to be Tom Welling and Michael Rosenbaum, but Michael had to cancel last minute to get surgery on his throat, so they brought in Laura Vandervoort to replace him.

The two of them got white hatted at some point and they were kind enough to wear the hats for the panel. The Michael Rosenbaum cutout was something Tom brought out. I thought it was weird that they brought out a table for the panel, but I guess having a table is more common than sitting on couches, so that's what Tom and Laura got. They also did a game where you weren't allowed to say "super", just to make things more interesting. If someone said "super", you got to boo them. Tom slipped up twice while Laura said it three times, though Tanner, the moderator, tried his best to get Tom to say words with super in them.

Oh, and Laura proved just how polite Canadians can be. She had a story where she was strapped into a harness and was there for a long time, but she was too Canadian to bother someone to be brought down, so she eventually passed out from the lack of blood flow. When she woke up, she apologized for passing out. She apologized. Tom, on the other hand, told her to eat a sandwich when she woke up. :-D

I sat through a panel with Peter Weller next since I was too lazy to get up.

I've only seen him on Star Trek: Enterprise and Star Trek Into Darkness, but obviously he talked a lot about Robocop. He's a very intense guy, but that just mean he had some very eloquent and well thought out answers. I also didn't know that he's an art history professor. He said he'd loved to make a movie about Da Vinci. I also didn't know that he directs. See, the things you learn when you're too lazy to get up from your chair.

Last panel of the day was the Shazam! panel with Zachary Levi, Asher Angel, and Jack Dylan Grazer. At first, only the two kids came out, and I seriously thought Zachary wasn't going to show up. He eventually popped up about midway through. I think he was trying to get through more autographs.

You can tell that Zachary knows how to work a panel. Tanner quickly became forgotten as Zachary easily fielded questions from the audience. He's just so enthusiastic. You can also tell that he's spend a lot of time with Asher and Jack and they have that lovable snarky banter down. Oh, and Jack isn't on his phone because he's bored; there was a guy who asked a question who was wearing a canoe on his head and Jack was Googling what that was about (as per canoe head guy's suggestion).

Oh, and Jack gave Tanner more flack for accidentally spoiling Infinity War last year. Tanner will never get to live that down.

And yeah, there was practically a blizzard going on when the panel was over.

I'm not up to much tomorrow so I get to sleep in! Sun should be back out, too, thank goodness.

CCEE 2019: Friday or Thank god it didn't snow

locker_monster — Sat, 27 Apr 2019 03:59:39 GMT

I don't know if someone at the expo made a sacrifice to the weather gods, but it didn't snow! By some miracle, the weather held. It was damn cold but no one had to walk in the rain and/or snow.

Since the weather put some people off, I was the only Whovian in the parade. Oh well. The TV section did get to walk right behind Catherine Tate's car, so that was fun. I was blasting Doctor Who theme songs from my mini speaker, but there was a bus playing loud tunes right behind us, so my music was drowned out. I really didn't see who else was in the parade, but I do know the Mayor was in it, as was Sean Astin and Anson Mount. Catherine, Sean, Anson, and another guest who I didn't know got white hatted at the opening ceremonies, which basically means they were given white hats and were made honourary citizens of the city. It's actually a pretty big deal.

I didn't do a ton today. I did get Jennifer Hale's autograph:

She voices female Commander Shepard in the Mass Effect series. She is my Shepard through and through and I managed to tell her that without sounding like an idiot. I wish she was doing a panel on her extensive voice acting, but instead she's doing a panel about money. Um, okay. I might check it out on the hope she does talk about voice acting at some point.

I only did two panels today. Catherine Tate's and Anson Mount and Ethan Peck's.

Catherine didn't have a moderator, which was awesome. I'm always glad when the guest can manage on their own. Catherine can definitely work the stage, much like John Barrowman. And as you can see, Catherine wore her hat for some of her panel:

And you can't see them in the photo, but Catherine is wearing snow boots. She bought them specifically for the expo, and dang it, she's going to wear them for the next three days. They will come in handy tomorrow since we're supposed to get 20 cm of snow. :-( Anyway, Catherine freely admits that she can't remember anything that well from Doctor Who and if you make references to other things she probably won't know what you're talking about. Case in point, someone asked her what Donna would do if Thanos burst his way into the TARDIS. Yeah, Catherine clearly doesn't watch any Marvel movies.

But man, Catherine is so funny. Someone brought up the "I've Got a Business" game they used to play on Doctor Who. If you've listened to the commentary for "The Doctor's Daughter" then you knew about the game, but she had to explain what it was so we got a few gems from her. She also told the story about how she thought the Sontarans were actually robots; she didn't realize they were being played by human beings. And it sounds like she and David have a new show in the works, something called Americons. She couldn't talk about it, but she confirmed it's a project. So keep your eyes peeled. I would love to see her do a panel with another Doctor Who person; I haven no doubt it would be hilarious.

Next was the Star Trek: Discovery panel. Now, Anson Mount used to film here for Hell on Wheels, so he knows the city very well. Heck, he met his wife here while filming the show, so he has Alberta roots now. So I think it was a big deal that he got white hatted. Being the gentleman that he is, he also wore his hat. Actually, he wore it all day. What a pro.

And he was wearing cowboy boots. He's like an actual cowboy.

I didn't know he's also a big Star Trek fan. He used to watch TOS as a kid and he loves TNG. His favourite ep is "The Inner Light" (though he thought it was called the Light Inside or something, so I had to shut out the actual title). And he had a cool insight on his portrayal of Pike. Since Pike was Roddenberry's original captain for the Enterprise, Anson wanted his Pike to embody all of the ideals that Roddenberry created for the show. I thought that was a neat way to go about it and a nice way to reflect the best of this universe. I do wish Pike was returning for season three of Discovery. Pike needs more canon stories. Oh, and I caught a quick interview that Anson did for the local CTV station and he said he had visited the expo before, back in 2012. I think that totally means he attended to see the TNG reunion.

And while I wasn't a huge fan of the idea of bringing in Spock to Discovery, Ethan Peck had some interesting insight, too. He admitted he was scared out of his wits taking on this iconic role. While Pike only exists in a few episodes, Spock has this incredibly long history. Ethan said he watched the first few eps of TOS, but he couldn't go any further. But he's not playing the exact same Spock as Leonard Nimoy so he had some room to put his own spin on the character.

Oh, and Anson hates working on sound stages. He said he loved working outside for Hell on Wheels. He needs to come back here to do Fargo or something.

Tomorrow I have to grab Catherine's autograph and get a photo-op with her. I also knitted a Shazam doll for Zachary Levi, so I need to give that to him. Here's hoping he accepts gifts from fans.

Part of the journey is the End[game]

locker_monster — Fri, 26 Apr 2019 05:48:54 GMT

So this should be a post about day one of the comic book expo, but there was a little movie I had to go see instead. Man, seeing movies on your own is no fun. I had no one to talk to at the end. And man, there's a lot to talk about.

Overall, I think Infinity War is the better movie. It had a more focused plot. Endgame still knew where it needed to go, but it kind of meandered.

But let's first talk about the things I didn't like (which aren't a lot):
- And let's start with the big one. Black Widow/Natasha is dead. No bringing her back from this one (unless a future movie explores the Soul World, which resides inside of the Soul Stone). It's not even like Tony's death, which is a big sacrifice to save the universe. Sure, Natasha sacrifice's herself to get the Soul Stone, but it's still a waste. I would have preferred if Clint had been the one to jump. You already killed one prominent female character to get the Soul Stone the first time; why does another woman have to die to get it again? I also don't get why Nebula didn't tell Natasha and Clint what was involved to get the Soul Stone. She would have worked it out that Thanos killed Gamora. A little head's up would have been nice.
- God damn time travel. I had really hoped they wouldn't resort to time travel to reverse the Snap, but I guess it was the only way. It just felt kind of... out of place. Time travel as a concept hasn't come up a ton in the MCU. To suddenly have it be front and centre was weird. I can see why they did it, to revisit old movies and characters and tie up arcs and build some more character development, but just because you can doesn't mean you should. And this leads into my other beef...
- The thing with time travelling Nebula getting her wires crossed with past Nebula was so clunky. It only served as a way to get Thanos to the present so he could get his ass kicked.

Things that were great:
- Again, let's start with the best. Captain America wielding Mjolnir!!! Oh my god, I didn't see it coming. Though, when the fight with 2014 Thanos started, I did think to myself, "Gee, Cap doesn't bring that much to the fight. Thor has lightning, Tony has his suit." And then, whoosh! There's Steve with the hammer. I like to imagine that while Steve was time travelling to put the Stones back that he was having some fun times with Mjolnir. And speaking of time traveller Steve...
- Peggy! And Jarvis! And a happy ending for Steve and Peggy! The timeline makes no sense now but whatever. I suspected we would see Peggy in some fashion the moment they had a shot of Steve's compass in one of the trailers, but I never would have guessed that Steve would go back and have the life he never had with her. It kind of doesn't make sense in regards to Steve's arc, since he seemed like he had moved on, but I guess I'm just glad that they didn't kill him. Now he's just old and he has passed his shield on to Sam. But seriously, I squeed when I saw Jarvis. This has to be the first time that a character from the Marvel TV shows has popped up in the movies.
- Women of the MCU unite! The whole thing with the Iron Infinity Gauntlet turned into a glorified game of Hot Potato, but it was so just damn amazing seeing all of the major female characters banding together to back Carol. I didn't expect to see Pepper in a suit, but hey, why not. She's been there since the beginning.
- Might as well as mention the big scene where everyone assembles. Steve finally got to say "Avengers Assemble!"! You knew everyone would show up for a big battle, but it was still a little spine tingling just to see the scope of it.
- Going back into the old movies was fun. I may not agree with the how and why they get there, but I'm a sucker for when characters go back to previous scenes. And it makes sense to revisit things since this is the end of an era. The Cap vs Cap fight was great and there's a reference to the elevator fight from Captain America: The Winter Soldier. And they managed to lure back Natalie Portman to film a quick scene! Thor getting to talk with his mother was also very sweet. It's too bad they couldn't get back into an Iron Man movie, but the trip to 1970 covered all of the necessary bases for Steve and Tony.
- Oh yeah, Tony. He saves the day but dies in the process. I wasn't surprised when he died. He's the character who's been around the longest and it makes sense for his character arc. It just hits a little harder when you know that he and Pepper have the cutest daughter ever. I love you 3000, Tony.

And some random thoughts: Carol had her short hair from the comics! She better be rocking the short hair or a faux hawk in her next movie. Fat!Thor was hilarious. Maybe it was a touch too much, but you do have to show how messed up Thor is. I really hope people cosplay him. Korg survived the Snap! And Valkyrie, too! So, is Thor joining the cast of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3? Does Gamora still exist? 2014 her is around for the battle, but Quill can't seem to find her later on. Merged Bruce/Hulk was a little weird. It's just a bummer that Mark Ruffalo had to be CGI for the entire movie. I laughed really hard at Stan Lee's cameo. His appearance was peak 1970s Stan Lee. No one in my theatre really reacted, though, like they didn't recognize him or something. Or maybe everyone was just sad because this is likely his last or one of his last cameos. No mid or end credit scenes, which was so weird. There is the sound of a hammer striking metal at the very end. I don't know if it's just a reference to the first Iron Man movie or a hint of things to come. Maybe Spider-Man: Far From Home will establish the future of the MCU. The timeline is so messed up now. So, Peter missed five years but he still appears to be in high school for his next movie. I guess the people who were Snapped just pick up where they left off? I'm a little bummed that Cassie Lang is a teenager now. I will miss the actress who played young Cassie. But hey, at least this opens up the possibility of Cassie becoming a hero alongside her dad.

I will have to watch the movie again, in 2D this time. 3D is just so distracting. Okay, now I have a very full weekend of geeking out ahead of me.

Still here...

locker_monster — Sun, 10 Mar 2019 00:28:28 GMT

- Hmm, I haven't posted here since New Years. Haven't felt very chatty, I suppose.

- Saw Captain Marvel this weekend. I quite enjoyed it, but I wouldn't say it's in my top three Marvel movies. I am excited to see more of Carol now that her origin movie, so to speak, is out of the way. Just some quick thoughts:

The Stan Lee tribute at the beginning of the movie was amazing. Usually the Marvel Studios logo is made up of images of the various MCU characters, but this time they replaced them with images of Stan Lee's various cameos. There was also a "Thanks Stan" after the logo montage. I don't know if they will keep it for all of the MCU movies coming out this year, but I hope they do.

The 90s setting made me laugh. As a kid who grew up in the 90s, there was just so much that was so familiar. The scene where everyone is waiting for a CD to boot up on a computer was probably much funnier than it is when you've lived through the same experience. Carol has to ask why everyone is just staring at the screen, so I bet that line is in there for kids who are used to things loading immediately on their phones and iPads.

Goose needs to be in every Marvel movie now. I'm still bummed that they didn't keep the cat's name from the comics, which is Chewie, but I guess Disney can't have two characters with the same name. I did read some of the Captain Marvel comics before the movie, so I knew going in that Goose is actually a Flerken, but the reveal that she's an alien is still fun. It was certainly the scene that got the biggest laugh. I wish Carol had taken Goose with her into space, though. Also, finding out that Goose is the reason Fury lost his eye was great. You expect Fury to lose it in an epic fight, but it's even better when you see he loses it because Goose clawed his face.

Speaking of Fury, the de-aging of Samuel L. Jackson was surprisingly good. Usually, the actor's face looks a little plastic-y, but I didn't notice any of that. I guess they sunk a lot of the budget into the de-aging effects. You do notice it on Clark Gregg, though, so I guess his scenes didn't receive as much attention.

Carol's level of snark is spot on. She has some great lines, but she's not super quippy like Tony. Oh man, there's one scene where an idiot biker tells her to lighten up (which basically translates to "Hey, you should smile more"), and you could just feel Carol suppressing the urge to knock the guy on his ass. Instead, she steals his motorcycle. :-D

Much of Carol's backstory from the comic is intact, which surprised me. Mar-Vell is still in the movie, but instead of being a guy, they changed the character into a woman. Though, instead of some weird alien tech that infuses Carol with Kree DNA, you just have her getting hit with a blast of energy from the Tesseract. Yup, Carol got her powers from the glowy cube from Captain America. I didn't quite like this change, since it needlessly ties her origins in the backstory of the MCU and feels like a huge coincidence, but hey, maybe it becomes more important in Avengers: Endgame.

And they had footage from Endgame in the mid-credit scene! It's short, obviously, but it ends with Carol meeting Steve, Natasha, Rhodey, and Bruce. Well, when I say meet, really she just appears and asks "Where's Fury?" I'm curious to find out why Carol hasn't aged in 20 years. The only things different about her are the length of her hair and a few new gold accents on her uniform. I wonder if she's been fighting in the Skrull-Kree war for that long. Though, that assumes she never made it back to Earth in those 20 years. Who knows; maybe Carol came back for a visit. I can't wait to see Carol interacting with everyone.

Once again, the latest Avengers movie is out the same weekend as the comic book expo. I have no idea when I will have a chance to see it.

- Oh, and speaking of the expo, they announced Catherine Tate as a guest again. She was supposed to appear last year, but had to cancel, so it's great that she's free to come back. I can finally wear my femme!Ten cosplay for the main reason I put it together: to get a photo-op with Catherine. The expo also announced Jennifer Hale as a guest. She voiced Commander Shepard in Mass Effect, and she's also a pretty prolific voice actor, so I'm super excited to see her. If they got Mark Meer to come back and the two of them did a panel together, that would be so awesome.

"Is that your intruder alert or mine?"

locker_monster — Wed, 02 Jan 2019 03:20:27 GMT

Happy New Year! Or, I suppose as we shall call it now, Happy Who Year!

So, any episode that's over an hour doesn't have opening credits? I like having the opening credits. I don't care if it pauses the story. You need the iconic theme music to kick everything off. But anyway... So, the first New Year's special. Was it any good?

As someone who doesn't particularly love Daleks, it was kind of neat to see them again. It's always good fun when a new Doctor gets to face off against them. But this episode was... slow. Here's this upgraded Dalek that wants to destroy Earth but it takes like half of the episode before the Doctor gets to talk to it and it's even longer before she lays eyes on it. Compare this episode to, say, "Dalek" (which has similar stakes), and there's clearly more going on in "Dalek" even if the entire episode is set within one underground bunker. A Companion is in peril, there's a kind of ticking clock with the levels being shut off, and the Dalek itself comes off as a scary killing machine. "Resolution" needed more of that. There was momentum, but only just enough to keep the story moving (yes, the Dalek had missiles in this episode, but the gun is way more menacing). Specials are meant to be bigger than the average episode. I'm fine with the regular season being a bit slower, but you have to add some pizazz when it comes to the bigger stuff. Chibnall has applied Broadchurch pacing to Doctor Who and it doesn't alway work.

Oh, I know what else bothered me with this episode. The trailer and the opening made a big deal out of the three Custodians splitting up the body of this ancient evil. I totally thought we were getting this big globetrotting story and the Doctor was going to have to track down the other pieces of the body before other people could piece them together. Nope. The Dalek was completely intact in one piece that was buried. Then what the hell was in the other sacks!?!? The rest of the casing? Chibnall missed a golden opportunity to have the Doctor travelling to other New Year's Days all over the Earth.

On the other hand, there was some lovely personal stuff with Ryan and his dad. I didn't expect a resolution of that story line, but I guess the clue was in the episode title. Thirteen usually doesn't snub people, but her cool disapproval of Ryan's dad worked here. She's become fiercely protective of her friends and she only wants the best for them. Graham starts off similarly stand-offish, but typical Graham, he warms up to Aaron. And while the scenes between Graham and Aaron were nice, I do wish it was Ryan who had been left behind. Sure, he gets to talk with his dad at the coffee shop, but they needed to spend more time together for the ending to have more oomph. Or, Aaron needed to spend more time with Team TARDIS just to show that he's not as bad as he seems. I can only assume Aaron will make another appearance next season.

But they did destroy a Dalek with pieces from a microwave oven, which seems completely ridiculous, but it wouldn't be Doctor Who without a bit of crazy science.

Random: Oh, there goes Chibnall, starting off the episode with two characters you like so you feel bad when something terrible happens to one of them. I'm glad Lin didn't die. It's funny how they hand wave away why Dalek is so powerful. "Oh yeah, it's just a scout, even though we've never heard about these kinds of Daleks before, and scouts have these extra skills because why the hell not ." The bit where the Doctor tries to phone UNIT and gets some call centre instead was fun. I wouldn't have minded seeing Kate. But UNIT is disbanded now? That sucks. But has it really been that long since a full scale alien invasion? I guess the last proper one was the Cybermen invasion in "Death in Heaven". Hmm, that was 2014 so it has been a few years. I would seriously love an episode where Kate meets Thirteen. Junkyard makeover for the Dalek was... interesting. Makes sense, though. The Dalek only has Earth materials to work with. Graham being super miffed that the Doctor and Ryan and Yaz left without him was great. I felt a little bad for him, too. It's just odd that Ryan or Yaz didn't say anything. The bit with the Internet and Wi-Fi shutting off for all of the UK was a strange aside, but it made me laugh. Oh god, we have to make conversation with actual human beings. :-D

I would love more references to the show's past going forward. You've reeled in the new viewers so now you can be a bit more out there with the stories. And if you include more references, it might convince the new viewers to go back and check out some of Classic Who.

Well, that's it for Doctor Who for 2019. 2020 can't come soon enough.

So long, 2018...

locker_monster — Mon, 31 Dec 2018 13:18:09 GMT

Another uneventful year, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.

- Finished 61 books, same as last year. The last book I read for 2018 was Record of a Spaceborn Few by Becky Chambers, which is part of her Galactic Commons series. Man, I love these books. This series has quaint, simple stories with much smaller stakes and the world building is amazing. It's right on par with the world building in The Expanse novels; well thought out with plenty of details. What else did I read... Finished the first trilogy in the Red Rising series. The fact that it's the first trilogy annoyed me to no end. The third book finished in a good place. There was no need to keep the story going. But nope, got to keep churning out books to make the bottom line. Sufficed to say, I will not check out the rest of the series. Started an... interesting comic book series called Sex Criminals. Main premise is that a guy and girl can stop time when they have sex, so naturally, they decide to rob banks. It's definitely not a comic that can be read on public transit. But it is written by Matt Fraction, who did that awesome run on the Hawkeye (Hawkguy) comics, so the writing it pretty snappy and the art is done by a Canadian, so you can't go wrong there. Not many other books stand out. Didn't really read any stinkers, so that's nice.

Annoyingly, my library stopped service with the hoopla app, which is how I read most of my comics. Hoopla was an awesome resource for old and current comics; the selection was pretty vast. My library still carries graphic novels, but the selection is a little limited. Thankfully, I guess, the only comic that I stayed up to date with on hoopla is on a year long hiatus, so right now I don't have to worry about that.

- Completed 9 knitting projects for the year, plus a handful of mini Christmas sweater ornaments. One highlight was knitting a Wesley Crusher doll and gifting it to Wesley Crusher himself, Wil Wheaton. It's only the second time that I've gifted something to a celebrity and he genuinely seemed to enjoy it. Hurray for knitting skills! I'm still trying to knit a shawl for myself and I do want to start knitting proper socks. I think I will be knitting baby socks with actual sock yarn for a friend's baby shower, so that's a start. Oh, and a sweater that can actually be worn by a human being and not be hung on a Christmas tree.

- Not much else to highlight. Did a nice cruise around the British Isles this summer, with the last port of call in Amsterdam. Amsterdam is a lot like Venice with all of the canals, but with more pot and sex shops. It's also very easy to get horribly turned around. I had to do a lot of backtracking while trying to find a popular yarn store. Got another cruise booked for late May with ports in Norway, so I expect there will be a lot of "pining for the fjords" jokes. :-)

Well, that's it from me. I hope everyone had a somewhat enjoyable 2018.

Merry Christmas!

locker_monster — Tue, 25 Dec 2018 16:27:21 GMT

In lieu of any new Doctor Who content that would typically air on this day, here's a Doctor Who themed yule log:

Is it New Year's yet...

Mega post for "Elseworlds" crossover

locker_monster — Thu, 13 Dec 2018 03:11:09 GMT

I'm a little sad that this year's crossover was less integrated than last year's. Instead of the Super Friends Power Hour, they went back to having each part be a somewhat regular episode of each show with some very special guest stars. Though, my understanding is that the scheduling from "Crisis on Earth-X" nearly broke everyone, so I get that the producers would want to make things a little easier this time.

With that being said, "Elseworlds" was still pretty crazy and a whole lot of fun.

- It's funny how The Flash is always the show that kicks off things. So much so, that they rearranged the schedule to accommodate this. I don't see any reason why Barry and Co. have to encounter the problem first. Maybe they just have more experience with weird and kooky occurrences? I suppose Ollie waking up as Barry is funnier than seeing Barry realizing he's Ollie, so why not start there? Plus, you get a line from Ollie automatically assuming that Barry screwed up the timeline again. :-D

When they first started releasing photos of Ollie as The Flash and Barry as the Green Arrow, I had hoped they were setting up a classic Elseworlds scenario: a different origin story. I thought maybe that Ollie never got on the Queen's Gambit and thus was not on Lian Yu and then that led to him getting struck by lightning. As for Barry, he took up archery and vigilantism to get justice for his father who was wrongly imprisoned. Instead, we got a Freaky Friday/Quantum Leap scenario; Barry and Ollie just swapped lives instead of bodies or minds. I felt a little gypped, but then they started deconstructing the tropes on The Flash and Arrow and it was magnificent. So maybe in-jokes.

But then the whole thing led to Earth-38 and the Kent farm and, oh my god, things got even more meta. They had the freakin' theme song from Smallville playing over the establishing shot of the Kent farm. The same damn Kent farm location as Smallville!!! I nearly died laughing. Actually, it made sense to have the same location. It's a nice little wink to a past show and there were many of those peppered through the entire crossover. And we also got to meet Earth-38 Lois Lane! Her scenes were pretty short, but I like what I've seen so far. She's got a bit of Margot Kidder's Lois in her along with Dana Delany's Lois from the Bruce Timm Superman cartoon. People forget that the cartoon is the one that started with Lois calling Clark "Smallville". I do hope they bring back Lois, and Clark, for future episodes of Supergirl. I mean, why else would they introduce her if they don't plan to bring her back?

Since this is the first episode, there's mostly just set up for the Monitor and John Dee, so the main threat of the episode is none other than... AMAZO. Of course you would have the power absorbing robot in the episode with all of the superheroes together. Though, I'm a little concerned that A.R.G.U.S. built a robot to track down metas and to duplicate their powers. In the future, A.R.G.U.S. runs a totalitarian state and I have to wonder if this was a step towards that. Hmm, now that AMAZO is destroyed, maybe the future is changed... Definitely something for Legends of Tomorrow to follow up. But anyway... I thought maybe they would use Kryptonite to defend AMAZO, but shutting him down made sense, too. I don't get how AMAZO duplicated Kara and Clark's powers, since they're not metas, but whatever. We got Ollie using his newfound speed in fun ways and Barry got to utter the infamous "You have failed this city" line.

My only complaint with this part is how it felt like Kara was just along for the ride. The whole crisis of the crossover revolves around Barry and Ollie's predicament. Kara should be integral to the plot, not an afterthought.

Random: The episode missed out on the golden opportunity of having Ollie as Barry narrate the opening voice over. It would have been hilarious. Finally, they revealed that the cells in the Pipeline have toilets. I laughed when Ollie called the Pipeline Barry's secret prison. The callback to the first crossover was a nice touch, but obviously with the boys' roles reversed. I love that Lois went to Argo with Clark and that she wants to write an article about it, even if it makes no sense why Lois Lane went with Superman to the remains of his home planet. I also liked that Kara and Clark decamped to the Kent farm to talk about the changes in their respective lives. That scene felt very much like a scene that would have happened on Supergirl regardless. A slight flourish of the John Williams' Superman theme when Clark ripped open his shirt to reveal the S shield was great, as was the "A friend" line. Like I said, so many references. Since when can Ollie draw? That was a very detailed sketch he did. Good thing Wayne Tower is such a prominent landmark in Gotham.

And, oh yeah, the episode ended on a tease of Batwoman. They already have theme music for her if her show gets off the ground.

- Speaking of, the detour to Gotham did not feel all that natural to the plot, but who cares! Batwoman!!! I don't know if her show is a sure thing or not, but they definitely laid a lot of the groundwork here. Bruce/Batman has been gone for 3 years, Gotham is a hell hole, and Wayne Enterprises is pretty much non-existent. Kate, Bruce's cousin in this version, is left behind to look after everything. Solid start. Having Bruce be absent makes sense. You can't have him showing up and taking away the focus from Kate. And with Gotham being the pits, it gives Kate plenty to do. The show seems to tease that Lucius Fox is around, since Kate mentions an R&D guy who's still in the building. And perhaps Alfred is around as well?

Batman's Rogues Gallery is certainly around, though most of them seemed to be locked up at Arkham. Penguin, The Riddler, Poison Ivy, Clayface, and possibly Mr. Freeze and Scarecrow. No Joker or Harley Quinn, but I assume they are off limits. Whatever the case, it does give a potential Batwoman show the opportunity to come up with new villains, which would be nice. Kate needs her own Rogues Gallery.

Anyway, back to the crossover. There's a weird line from Ollie about how no one talks about Gotham because of it's rampant crime and poverty was totally there to try to justify why no one before this has even mentioned Gotham. And then there was the whole about Batman being real or a myth. That came out of nowhere, too. It would have been nice if they had seeded Gotham and Batman a bit before the crossover (one reference to Bruce Wayne by Ollie doesn't count). Like, have quick mentions of either one when they have the 52 newsreader come up. It's not hard to add a little something to the scrolling news thing at the bottom of the screen (or maybe there have been mentions and I just wasn't paying attention). It's so great that Ollie thinks Batman is a myth because if he's real, then the guy is totally copying the Green Arrow. :-D

There was a little bit of the ongoing stuff between Ollie and Felicity, but thankfully, it's kept to a minimum, and not just because this is like the millionth time that Ollie and Felicity have been on the rocks. More crossover antics, less relationship stuff. Also nice is how they didn't try to shoehorn in the rest of the Arrow cast which is what they kind of did in the second hour of "Invasion!".

Extended Arkham fight was fun, but you know you're in for a good fight scene when James Bamford is the director. I don't quite get why Ollie hallucinates Reverse Flash and Barry sees Malcolm Merlyn, but I guess it furthers the whole subplot of Ollie and Barry gaining a better perspective on each other's lives. And hey, surprise John Barrowman! Actually, I wasn't surprised to see John Barrowman. If you follow his Instagram, he had posted photos while in Vancouver, and gee, why would he be in Vancouver if not to film some Arrowverse stuff.

Random: I'm glad Arrow went all the way and had Barry as Ollie doing the opening narration. They even filmed new scenes just for it. Guys, they had the Shakespeare head that hid the button to the Batcave from 1966 Batman in the episode. Random Nora Fries at Arkham played by Stephen Amell's wife. Strange that Nora is locked up at Arkham as well. Where is Victor? The continued debate on whether the body swap was a Freaky Friday or a Quantum Leap made me giggle. I'm surprised no one proposed to call it a "Freaky Leap". On Earth-90, Diggle is a freakin' Green Lantern!! That hospital that stood in for Arkham has been used a lot in Vancouver productions. Hell, Arrow has filmed there before; Thea had a very memorable elevator fight there. So great that they went to Chicago to film the Gotham scenes. Vancouver does not have a downtown sprawling enough that could stand in for Gotham. Makes me wonder where the Batwoman show will film. If they want to keep production in Canada for the tax credits, the best option would be Toronto. 1990 Flash and confirmation that he is the same Flash from the TV show! I hope we get to see more of him. They made the suit and all, so why not just some more use out of it.

I do wish that John Wesley Shipp's appearance had been more than a cameo. He just shows up, delivers some exposition, and then the Monitor waves his hand and sends him away. But the Monitor does drop some very important information in that scene: there's a Crisis coming. A Crisis is not a good thing in the DC world.

- And, oh my god, they're doing it! They're doing "Crisis on Infinite Earths" next year!!!!

(Sorry, this trumps everything else in the episode, but I will talk about that in a second...)

I wonder if this means that they're going to finally smush together all of the shows into one universe. It's always a bummer that Kara is on another Earth. They need extraordinary circumstances for her to join the party. But if they do do a Crisis and reboot the multiverse, then they can have her on Earth-1 and she can have fun team-ups with Kate. It's also a perfect opportunity to retire any characters. Notably, Barry and Kara died during "Crisis on Infinite Earths". Though, Ollie seems to have re-written their fates, so one assumes they're safe. Ollie on the other hand... Well, Arrow has been on a while now. Maybe it's time for a new brooding hero to step in. Ooh, they could roll in Black Lightning as well if they wanted.

Hmm, I wonder if that's the reason this crossover was less elaborate. They're pulling the crazy schedule shenanigans for an even more epic crossover. Please include the Legends. Poor guys missed out this time (though for very good reasons). It would also be an excellent opportunity to have John Wesley Shipp back. Hell, have other actors from past DC shows, too (Tom Welling and Justin Hartley come to mind). As for the big threat that's coming, it's probably the Anti-Monitor. Or it's Superboy-Prime. ;-)

I felt like this part wasn't as great as the others. Part 1 had body swapping antics. Part 2 had Batwoman. This part... Sure, Deegan becomes Superman and we get a Superman vs Superman fight and we see alt versions of most of the characters, but it lacked the same oomph. And poor Supergirl. Your cast was the one to get shoehorned in this time and Kara gets absolutely nothing to do. There was that subplot with Alt!Alex, but that was the only part that made it clear that we were in the Supergirl hour. Interesting to note that Alex and James do exist on Earth-1. I think when the big MacGuffin of the crossover is a book, it's hard to do big action-y things. It's not very dynamic when your Big Bad is reading from an enormous tome. Also, why didn't Deegan just wipe out Barry and Ollie from existence? That would be the ultimate way to win the day. And why is Clark the only one strong enough to read the book? Lame.

So, did Ollie make a deal with the Monitor to save Barry and Kara? The dialogue seems to imply that Ollie knows his time is up. Or did Ollie propose that they destroy the book and let fate go whichever way? The arrow he uses on the book did look a bit different. I don't think it was the Kryptonite arrow; the arrow head looked blue. I guess we'll find out in the next crossover. Man, that's a long time from now. Of note: on The Flash, they established that the year of the Crisis is 2024. It appears to have moved up 5 years. I like to think that Nora's time travelling has changed the timeline.

Random: Barry and Kara running/flying fast enough around the Earth to slow down time made no sense what so ever, but hey, if it was good enough for the first Superman movie, why not borrow the idea? What is the hammer thing Lois used? It's not Thor's hammer (though that would be an epic crossover). I thought Lois and Clark were already married, but I guess not. Nice little moment to have in the Supergirl hour. Clark crushed a coal into a diamond! What was Lois wearing? Is is meant to reference the dress Margot Kidder wore in the first Superman movie? But it's funny that Clark was just barbecuing in Fortress of Solitude. I'm bummed they have to have another reason for Clark not to be around, but wanting his baby to be born on Argo is a really good reason. I wished someone had made a joke about how Brainy and Cisco have similar hairstyles. Fist bump for Barry and Kara! The .gif of the scene can join their high five from "Invasion!". Who is the guy in the mask at the end of the episode, the one talking to Deegan? The gold mask doesn't ring a bell, but it seems to be important.

The whole "good guys are evil and bad guys are good" switch felt really familiar for a bit I couldn't place why. Then I remembered that Legends of Tomorrow had an entire finale that revolved around re-writing reality. The Legion of Doom re-wrote reality so they were in charge and the Legends were depowered or their lackies. They even had one character whose history couldn't be re-written (Rip) and was simply locked up so they were out of the way. No wonder the Legends didn't take part; this stuff is old hat to them. ;-)

It only seems fair to discuss Legends of Tomorrow's winter finale as well.

- B Team to the rescue! I suppose LoT had a crossover, it was just with themselves. This episode could have easily been a weird, huge mess, but the writers managed to make it work. What helps to justify all of this wackiness is a very simple act: Constantine wants to save the man he loves. His motives come from a place of loss. He doesn't travel back on his own timeline for frivolous reasons. Seflish, yes, but it's with the best of intentions. And a kiss, between two men, saves the day. :-)

While Charlie does her best to fix things, it's Zari who steers Constantine true. She's tried to hack history, too, so she understands. Even when Zari's a cat, she's still there for Constantine. Oh my god, when cat!Zari placed a comforting paw on Constantine's arm, I laughed so hard. Leave it to LoT to have something so ridiculous paired with something poignant. You do get a sense that Zari and Constantine have bonded a bit since "Dancing Queen", so it will be interesting to see their friendship from this point on. Actually, what I really want to see is them playing D&D with Ray.

As for the rest of the episode, it was insane in the best kind of way. Ray's very meta line the annual crossover. Custodians of the Chronology! Sirens of Space-Time! Puppet Legends!!!! Not many shows can get away with having their characters as puppets. Nice to see LoT carrying on the bizarre tradition. Oh, and Ava got to say "timey-wimey", which made me smile. I don't know anything about Neron, the demon that's after Constantine, but I assume he'll be the Big Bad for the season. I don't know how they're going to top the Mallus-Beebo fight from last season.

Well, that's it for the DC-CW for the year. I do believe that Supergirl and Legends of Tomorrow won't be back until April. :-( But a lot to look forward to in 2019.

"Yippee ki yay, robots."

locker_monster — Sun, 09 Dec 2018 21:31:52 GMT

Well, here's the end of the season. I miss having 13 episodes a season. This was all over too fast.

This also didn't feel very finale-ish. Sure, it brought back Tim Shaw (and the Sniper Robots), but the stakes didn't feel that high. There was a lot of wandering around and the Doctor and Tim Shaw had a chat, but nothing too crazy happened. Even the thing with the planets didn't feel like the end of the world. It would have been nice to see people freaking out on Earth. A weird red beam from the sky envelopes the whole planet and we don't get a single shot of panicked people in the streets? I get that past seasons constantly had to ramp up the stakes in each finale - army of Daleks to armies of Daleks and Cybermen, from the Master ruling the Earth to Davros moving the Earth and so forth - so I understand wanting to keep things a little understated, but you're capping off a season. You need a little more pizzazz.

Or maybe they saved all of the money and excitement for the New Year's Special? The preview certainly looked more sprawling.

Anyway, while we didn't get universe ending chaos, we did get some great character moments from Graham and Ryan and that helped to make up for any lacklustre plot details. Graham coldly stating that he wants to kill Tim Shaw isn't something we've seen from a Companion. The Doctor sort of lectures Graham about why he shouldn't, but it's Ryan who really makes a case and obviously that makes the most sense. The look on Ryan's face when he says "I love you" was the absolute best. It would have been nice to see Graham struggling with his decision a bit more. You know, some lingering shots of him staring down Tim Shaw or his finger hovering over the trigger, but I guess it would have just drawn out a moment that you know wouldn't come. The main characters on Doctor Who aren't killers. They all strive to be the better person. Though, Graham shooting Tim Shaw in the toe was pretty funny. Tim Shaw was wearing armour; I'm sure it only stung. ;-)

And we finally got the fist bump! Graham's immediate line after "So what do we do now?" is obviously about Tim Shaw, but a tiny part of me interpreted as "So, we did a fist bump... Can we do them all the time now? Or it is just a one time thing?"

As for the other part of the plot, with the miniaturized planets, the Doctor and Yaz kind of got the short end of the stick. The Doctor cobbles some pieces of tech together and all is saved. Yaz... I don't even know what Yaz contributed this episode. Give her more to do, dang it! Even the thing with the neuralizers didn't amount too much. There would have been way more tension if the Doctor's mind starting falling apart just as she needed to figure out how to get the planets back to their right locations. I get that Chibnall wants to take a step back from the rousing speechifying of past Doctors, but it's the finale! It kind of calls for a big, iconic moment for the Doctor. Perhaps the special will have that in spades.

Random: What happens to Tim Shaw now? Is he stuck in stasis forever and ever? Or will he be sent back to the Stenza? Or will the Alliance of the Nine Planets deal with him? I didn't really catch the name of the race that Andinio and Delph are from. It sounded like Ooks or Auxs. More information about them would have been nice. They get thrown up on screen and then aren't useful until the end. I appreciate that Ryan took a moment to put on a toque. Keep your noggin warm during a crisis is very important. :-) Nice reuse of the Sniper Bots. No need to explain why Tim Shaw suddenly has an army since it's already established that they're Stenza tech. The Doctor being surprised to see miniaturized planets was odd, since that was the main thing in "The Pirate Planet". Nice references back to "Boom Town" and "Journey's End".

The preview for the special made it seem like the episode will be skipping around time. Or maybe that's just an establishing montage. The DNA of something bad has been on Earth for a while, so I can easily imagine bad things happening around the spot where the DNA is buried or whatnot. But who or what is the mysterious thing that's after the DNA? The preview conveniently ends just before the Doctor can say a name. It is someone we've met before? Or a familiar alien race? I feel like Chibnall came up with someone new. And have you seen the Doctor's fabulous new scarf in the promo images from the special? It looks like it's a knit scarf that's been felted. Come on, Whovian knitters! I know you can figure out a knitting pattern.

Well, Jodie Whittaker has been confirmed for season 12, so that's good. I hope the rest of the cast are also along for the ride.

"We'd know if we were vampires, right?"

locker_monster — Mon, 03 Dec 2018 03:03:19 GMT

We're almost at the end. So how was the penultimate episode of the season?

I thought this episode was all right. Once again, it's one of those eps that didn't wow me but it's not terrible, either. The season has been full of those, it seems. They did do a bait and switch in this episode. Going in, you think you're going to get a story about a scary monster in the woods, but instead, you get, well, I'm not exactly sure. A lonely universe who just needs a friend? It's certainly different. I'm sure if they had gone the monster route, it would have turned out that it was a confused alien or something and the Doctor would have found a way to talk to it and get it home.

I'm not exactly sure I completely understand what the Solitract is. Is it kind of like matter and antimatter and how the two can't exist or else there's an explosion? Is that why the Solitract was banished? But why did it reach out to a single father in the middle of nowhere in Norway? Or was the cabin a conveniently weak point that's always been there? And do anti-zones happen automatically when space time gets messed up or does some all powerful being or race put them in place? And how did Ribbons get there? The middle bit is kind of vague, like the writer wasn't too sure how to set everything up and so it all gets hand waved. Spectacle over logic. Though, once the gang does end up on the Solitract plane, you do get some lovely stuff with Graham and Grace, so the journey to get there is worth it.

We haven't really seen Graham dealing with his grief, since the team has been too busy going from adventure to adventure, so it's good that he does get a moment to face his uncertainties. But there was a lot of telling going on in that scene. The Doctor is lecturing everyone on what they need to do, so Graham doesn't naturally reject Solitract-Grace on his own. We also have the Doctor saying that Graham feels guilty about Grace's death, but I think that line would have made more sense coming from Graham. I also wish that Ryan had been in that scene so he and Graham could have faced the Solitract together. It would have made the scene at the end of the episode a lot better. Ryan finally calls Graham grandad, but the characters would have really earned that moment if they had showed more solidarity in the episode. Yet again, the show makes some odd choices about which Companion stays behind and which Companion stays with the Doctor.

And sad frog! What a truly bizarre set up. The Doctor chatting with a frog. The Solitract could have looked like anyone or anything in that moment, so, why not a frog. I'm always amazed when they make something fake or CGI look like it's really emoting. Too bad Chibnall is so set on not having any major references to previous seasons. I would have loved it if the Solitract had turned into someone from the Doctor's past.

Random: I love that Graham has taken to carrying sandwiches with him every time they leave the TARDIS. That strikes me as very him since he's the practical Companion. I see the Doctor's tendency to taste weird things is back. Is she sensing some psychic traces this time? Because how do you tell that something has a poor Trip Advisor score from just tasting some dirt? The idea that humanity goes to war with sheep just made me laugh. Did they rise up because they realized their wool was being used by knitters to make some stuff and they wanted a share of the profits? I wonder if they filmed the mirror world stuff normally and then just flipped the footage? Probably. That seems the easiest and the cheapest. Thank goodness the Doctor has an asymmetrical hair cut or you wouldn't have noticed something was up right away.

It's the finale next week. I hope it's a good one.

"Apple bobbing! I love apple bobbing!"

locker_monster — Sun, 25 Nov 2018 21:52:40 GMT

This episode reminded me of "The Visitation" with a bit of "The Curse of Fenric" and "Tooth and Claw" thrown in.

The time period certainly evokes "The Visitation" and dead people rising up has a touch of the Haemovores to it. Then you have the alien who wants to take over the monarch, like with Queen Victoria in "Tooth and Claw". That isn't to say this is a bad episode for recalling elements from other plots. I quite enjoyed the episode, at least, until the last 10 minutes or so. But before that, there was plenty of tension and mystery and just enough humour that it didn't seem out of place.

This is really the first episode that has a character looking down on the Doctor because she's a woman (there was a bit in "Arachnids in the UK, but it was just one scene). King James immediately dismisses her as useless and, oh man, the Doctor is not pleased. People don't always listen to the Doctor, but few ever all out just assume the Doctor is a pointless nobody. In an episode about looking down at women, this was an obvious place to have that conversation. But it's good that they waited so long before anyone had a speech about the stupidity of the Doctor's new sex. Though, the Doctor has that line along the lines of "If I was still a bloke people would listen to me" that I was wish hadn't been in there. The Doctor shouldn't be comparing their current self with past selves (and it also implies that the Doctor had better powers of persuasion as a man).

I knew the second that the episode was about witchcraft that the Doctor would be accused as a witch. People in the past are usually suspicious of the Doctor's ways and this time period makes it even worse (and, of course, the Doctor being a woman now also plays into it). I'm trying to recall if anyone has purposefully tried to drown the Doctor before. That level of bodily harm is a rare circumstance. The episode isn't very subtle about getting the Doctor to that moment. All of the Companions run off to follow the mud corpses, when one of them could have easily stayed behind with the group. You know the Doctor won't drown, so the scene ends up being a bit of spectacle but it also becomes about King James trying to do the right thing. Willa, and hopefully King James, learn not to give into their fears by the end of the episode, which, again, is a nice message.

But then you get into the reveal that Becka has been infected with the mud and the episode kind of lost me. First off, it's a long sequence where a lot information is dumped on you. The Doctor seems to know a lot about the tree as a lock from just a cursory examination. And then, everyone gets knocked out. For a second, I seriously thought that was the end of the episode. But it's not and you lose some of the momentum by going to black at a critical moment. The other thing that bothered me is how the Doctor knew that the smoke from the tree would bother the Morax. I know the Doctor can do those intuitive leaps, but there's no evidence for the basis of that assumption. Using smoke would imply that the Morax can absorb the smell or the particulates, but can a creature that's liquid breathe like us? Also, why does it take the Morax so damn long to get King James to the ruined tree? Yes, the Doctor and team need time to break up the tree and formulate a plan, but surely the hill isn't that far from the dunking pond. But anyway...

Random: Alan Cumming was clearly having a blast being King James. Yet again, I need to read up on history. Was King James notorious for hunting down witches? The team was trying to visit the coronation of Elizabeth I? I'm sure if the TARDIS had taken them there, there would have been aliens involved like with Elizabeth II. The Doctor zeroing in on the apple bobbing made me laugh. It's such a Doctorish thing to do. Why does Yaz go talk to Willa? I get that Yaz will always be concerned about people's safety since she's a police officer, but Ryan could have connected more with Willa since he recently lost his gran as well. Of course, then we wouldn't have had scenes with King James admiring Ryan. I like that Graham commits to wearing the Witchfinder General hat for most of the episode even if it's a bit ridiculous. The Doctor quoting Arthur C. Clarke before the TARDIS disappears was a great way to end the episode.

I have no idea what's going on next week. The team's in Norway? Though, I am bummed we are down to the last two episodes.

"It's the Kerb!am man!"

locker_monster — Mon, 19 Nov 2018 02:37:27 GMT

Oh, creepy robots. A Doctor Who staple. It's like they say in "The Robots of Death". Robots have no emotional cues. I suppose that's what makes them so creepy. That neutral expression can be read in so many different ways.

The episode started off with a good premise. A mystery for the Doctor to solve is always good entertainment. The ending fell a little flat for me. Once we learn it's just Charlie behind everything, the urgency was just sucked out of the plot. But I guess it's like last week. The real monster isn't an alien but just a misguided person. It's easy to go the route of, say, "Paradise Towers" and make it so it's the system that's gone bad or "The Beast Below" where the thing at the heart of the operation is an abused creature. Maybe I was hoping too much for the typical sci fi reveal. The season seems to be all about people and seeing them at their best and their worst.

I'm not sure the thing with the robots and the system made complete sense. Was the main system sentient? Or did it have just enough awareness to realize that Charlie was doing something bad? And Charlie had some control over the Team Mates? It did seem weird that Charlie didn't run up and teleport away with everyone. Yes, let's run into the giant field of robots who are all holding boxes full of explosive bubble wrap. But maybe escape was better than going into custody? I get the episode was commenting about a few things, but maybe there was too much to wrap up into a coherent package?

I did feel like Team TARDIS actually had enough to do this week. Everyone is effectively split up to maximize the snooping around. Yet again, Graham has a casual chat with someone and they give him what he wants. Graham was totally that bus driver who recognized his regulars and chatted with them while on the route. Ryan had some good ideas since he used to work in a warehouse. I knew the second they mentioned that they couldn't climb onto the conveyor belts that someone who hop on one. And it's a little thing, but Yaz is the one who restrains Charlie, not one of the guys. Putting her police officer skills to use. Now that they're hanging out more with each other, we do see them gelling more as a unit. Oh, and I laughed when it was revealed that the Doctor had been assigned to custodial work. She's the smartest person, but she gets assigned menial labour; I wonder if the system figured out that she's never had a proper job (well, proper paying job).

Random: So, Eleven ordered a fez a while back and it was only now that the Kerb!am man found the TARDIS? Makes sense, since the TARDIS is hard to track down. Though, I don't know if Eleven would order a fez with a tassel. His taste in fezzes skewed more towards tassel less kind. I had hope Thirteen would wear the fez for a bit, but I guess she doesn't have a thing for hats. Once again, the nice guy with a family bites the dust. At first, I thought the Doctor wasn't wearing a purple hi vis vest, but then they shot her from behind and it was clear she was wearing one; her coat just hid it from view. Though, the Doctor not wearing the appropriate work wear does seem like her. The first Kerb!am robot (was it called Twisty?), was pretty cute. "Life in the future is very confusing." The Doctor continues to brag about the people she's met, but this time, it's an actual episode we've seen.

Hey, it's Alan Cumming's episode next week. They've also announced that there indeed will be a New Year's special rather than a Christmas special this year. That's fine. Cramming Christmas into an episode was starting to get tedious. Oh, and I went looking at Doctor Who calendars. The ones I saw only featured the first twelve Doctors. No calendars with Thirteen. I hope it was just a case of the store not carrying any calendars of Thirteen rather than the BBC or whoever completely ignoring Thirteen.

"I love biscuits!"

locker_monster — Sun, 11 Nov 2018 21:55:03 GMT

I wish this had been one of the pure historicals they used to have back in the day. It's a powerful enough story without aliens.

The thing that Doctor Who does that I love is how they make history personal by seeing it through the eyes of ordinary people. The Doctor doesn't go back to deal with the politicians of the time. She meets two families who live on neighbouring farms nowhere near a major city and whose lives are torn apart. The true monsters of the story aren't the scary looking aliens, but people. The Doctor has spoken a lot about hope this season and it's certainly a message that we need right now.

I was actually reminded of "Father's Day". The Companion goes back in time to meet a family member and ends up in an event that can't be changed. "Father's Day" actually did a lot to bring me around to liking Rose as a character since she was such a huge part of the plot. This episode doesn't quite do the same for Yaz, but I think it's because you have two other Companions hanging around. If Yaz had been the sole Companion for this story, this would have been an amazing story for her. As such, she's not present for every reveal and she doesn't get to spend time with every character. Like, I would have liked if she had talked more to Prem. I get that Yaz goes back to meet her grandmother, but wouldn't she want to figure out who this guy is? I don't get why it's Ryan who goes off with the Doctor and Prem into the forest. I also would have liked it more with Yaz was a bit more resistant with the Doctor about letting Prem die, but she doesn't put up a huge fight. But for what the story initially sets out to do - have Yaz meet her grandmother when she's younger - the episode does achieve that, so that's something. It's a story about remembering on Remembrance Day, which is very fitting.

Speaking of the aliens, whose name I can't remember and probably couldn't spell anyway, it's nice that they do a bait and switch with them. Not all aliens on Doctor Who are bad. Their design vaguely reminded me of the Tetraps, with the multiple eyes and the fangs, but there are some major differences, too. Actually, there is some commonality with the Shansheeth, who also look over the dead, but the Shansheeth do function more as undertakers. And also look like vultures, which isn't exactly demon like, so I can understand the need for a new monster. I do wonder if the Stenza were the ones who destroyed the aliens' planet. If the Stenza are the major threat of the season, Chibnall needs to start laying more hints and tying stuff together.

Random: First episode not written by Chibnall. Yay! But we only have four more to go, so there's probably a good chance he's the writer on half of the remaining stories. The sonic is conveniently disabled again. It was swallowed for a bit by the Pting last episode and here the sonic can't analyze the purple dust because it gets overwhelmed. What an underwhelming excuse. There isn't even much point in sonic not reading the dust. The Doctor builds that weird distillery thing, but there's no build-up. It would have been hilarious to see Graham trying to get the spit from the ox. And then the reveal of what the dust is is kind of anti-climatic, too. The Doctor officiates the wedding. I'm surprised they haven't done more of those in the past. None of the Companions comment on Prem's line when he says they all speak passable Punjab for foreigners. I'm surprised that Graham didn't say anything at that point. Where did they film this episode? Wherever it was, it looked amazing in the show's new filming format. I liked that there were poppies everywhere in the fields. Also a nice tie in to Remembrance Day. The Doctor is always talking about food, but she never gets to eat any. She needs to use that biscuit dispenser more often.

Oh, and you know how I couldn't figure out what the team was looking for at the beginning of last week's episode? Well, they never say what they're looking for so no wonder I was confused.

Looks like we get some creepy robots for next week.

"Somebody needs to have a big rethink about the signage in this building."

locker_monster — Sun, 04 Nov 2018 22:34:00 GMT

I don't know why, but I had a really hard time understanding the dialogue this episode. It's these Northern accents. I need to readjust my brain or something.

Like, I have no idea what the team was doing at the beginning of the episode. They were looking for something, but I never quite caught what. The Doctor said something about junk planets all looking the same, but that was about the extent of it before they found the sonic mine. Not that the starting scene is terribly important. Most times, that first scene is just filler before the adventure starts, though it is an opportunity to have some fun conversations (i.e.: the space conversation between Clara and Twelve from "Sleep No More"). But anyway, that's just my problem and a re-watch with subtitles or closed captioning will clear up any issues.

Until then, I'm left with similar feelings that I had with last week's episode. Not terrible, but not great. This was one of Doctor Who's patented "okay but it won't be cracking the top twenty of any best of lists" episodes. Containing the action to a ship with no means of escape should have made it tense, but I didn't really feel it. The Pting was too damn cute to be much of a scary threat. Just look at its chubby cheeks! I guess the point of the episode is right there in the title. It's a conundrum, not a blood bath. The episode is more about being smart than watching these characters get picked off one by one.

Speaking of the characters, you kind of get to know them, but it's the bare minimum. Mabil is new on the job and unsure of herself. Eve and Durkas aren't the best brother and sister to each other. Yoss isn't sure about having this baby. Ronan is an android. Seriously, that's all we learn about Ronan. Everyone does eventually step up in their personal storylines, but it's mostly to serve the story. I would have been interested to see Mabil more involved with the problem solving, but all she ends up doing is delivering a baby. If Ryan and Graham had been left on their own to figure it out, that would have been more entertaining.

There were also some odd story beats. When the Doctor is running around the ship trying to find a way out, she just leaves her Companions behind at one point and shows no concern that they aren't with her. The Companions also make no attempt to track down the Doctor or figure out where they are. Then we get an extended conversation between Ryan and Yaz about his background. Asking Ryan about how his mom died seemed really out of place, especially in the middle of a crisis. And then, there's the cherry on top, where the Doctor spends like five minutes explaining anti-matter. I mean, yay for accurate science, but all we needed to know was that the Pting shouldn't reach the anti-matter core. This was part of my worry when they expanded the episode run time to 50 minutes. Sometimes there's not enough plot to fill the time. Though, the Doctor's pure joy while talking about space travel was pretty great.

When you get down to it, the episode had an interesting premise, but it doesn't quite live up to its full potential.

Random: It was funny watching Graham and Ryan trying to help Yoss give birth to his baby. The looks on their faces at certain points were the best. I laughed when Graham said he's seen every episode of Call the Midwife, but he always looks away when there's a squeamish bit. At the same time, the baby side plot was clearly just a way to give the boys something to do while the Doctor is trying to save the day. This looked like a fairly cheap episode, in that there's only one short scene planet side and minimal special effects and the setting is all one location. Those stun guns looked so awkward to carry. I'm intrigued that they keep separating the Doctor from the TARDIS. I get that it's for obvious reasons in this episode - if the Doctor had the TARDIS, she could get everyone to safety super easy - but it does force her to be part of the crisis. This isn't a lark. The crew's problem is the team's problem, too. I wonder if next week the teleport doesn't go as planned and that's how they end up in the past, but probably not. I don't see how a teleport could malfunction like that. Can Chibnall not write every episode this season? We're halfway through and he's written or co-written everything so far. At some point, Ryan will fist bump Graham, right? It's not far to leave him hanging.

Next week seems to delve more into Yaz's family history. As fine as it is to learn more about Ryan's family, Yaz needs some more time devoted to her.

I read that we're not getting a Christmas special this year, that it'll be a New Year's special instead. I'm not picky so as long as we get one more episode.

Here's to another year of crazy superhero antics

locker_monster — Mon, 29 Oct 2018 12:24:49 GMT

All of the CW-DC shows are finally back!

Which premiere came out on top? Well, The Flash had some time travel shenanigans in the form of Nora, Barry and Iris' daughter from the future, Supergirl had some timely political commentary, and Arrow had Ollie in a super max prison, but you know what Legends of Tomorrow had? An honest to goodness unicorn. And not just any unicorn. A unicorn that gored people and ate their hearts. Yeah, you really can't top that. But let's talk about the shows one by one:

- I'm not sure if I want more time travel antics from anyone in the West-Allen family. We all know how that went for Barry. On the other hand, Nora seems likeable enough and I don't think she went back in time with the notion of stopping her father from disappearing. Of course, now Barry and Co. know he disappears in the near future, so that knowledge might screw things up. Oh god, if they end up doing another Flashpoint, I may just cry. It's also kind of annoying that they just replaced Wally with Nora in the role of Flash's sidekick. It's the same damn story; Barry mentoring an unexperienced speedster. What's wrong with Wally?

As for the new villain this season, I have no idea what's going on. Cicada wants to kill other metas, but why? In the comics, he seems to have the power to drain other people's life force, so maybe there's an element of that. I just hope the reveal isn't as lame as last year. We don't need another guy who just sits around all of the time.

New Wells for the season. Harrison Sherloque Wells. When he's first introduced, I couldn't pin down his accent. At first I thought he was English, then Scottish, and then I realized he's supposed to be French. Yeah, I would prefer a Wells that doesn't force Tom Cavanagh to put on a weak French accent all of the time. On the other hand, Tom Cavanagh is Canadian, so I assume he knows a little bit of French (At one point, Sherloque tells Cisco to shut up in French and I actually understood him! Way to go high school French.). Let's see how many episodes they go before they drop the accent completely.

Oh, and Barry's new suit. The cowl really, really needs that chinstrap again. Seeing all of Grant Gustin's chin and lower jaw is just weird. Someone else online pointed out that Grant Gustin doesn't have the jawline to pull it off and I kind of agree. I do like the brighter red, though.

- Supergirl finally remembered that Kara works at a newspaper/magazine! The writers would be idiots not to have her hanging around there this season, especially with the kinds of stories they are going to tell. Out of all of the shows, Supergirl has always used its premise to tell good stories about current events. Arrow kind of tried to comment about violence, and particularly gun violence in one episode, but it felt really heavy handed. Meanwhile, Supergirl can use aliens as metaphors for other issues and it's much easier to digest. It is subtle? No, but maybe subtly is not what is needed right now.

And I can see why they swapped Winn for Brainiac 5. Winn is a normal guy while Brainy is an alien. Winn wouldn't have had any interesting stories this season, I think. He'd just be sitting in front of the monitors, doing the techy guy thing. Brainy is from a different time, so he's not used to all of this rampant racism. It gives the show another angle from which to tell stories. And with J'onn off doing non-DEO things, he's also the only other alien at headquarters. So when things inevitable implode at the DEO, Brainy will probably be in the thick of it. Hopefully, this gives Alex the opportunity to kick a lot of butts.

Other new addition is Nia Nal. It's a huge deal that they have a transgender actor playing a transgender superhero and kudos to the show. Nia is season one Kara awkward right now, but I hope she evolves from that. I thought it was a little weird that she went to a pizza place to get coffee, but before that, she was sleeping, and most likely dreaming, so it's probable that she had a vision about Brainy and went there to help him. I don't know much about the comic book character Nia is based on, so it will be interesting to see where her storyline goes. Does that mean she's a meta? Supergirl hasn't really dealt with metas, since that's more of a thing on The Flash, but how else do you end up with precognitive powers?

Oh, and the writers re-imagined Mercy Graves and Otis as brother and sister. I can't recall if Otis ever had a last name, so no big deal. It seems to work with what they are going for this season. Though, I will miss the bumbling Otis from the Christopher Reeve Superman movies. I read that they will introduce Lex on Supergirl later in the season, which will be fun. They've slowly seeded Lex's backstory for this version of the mythos, so we will finally see the culmination of that. Some fans want Michael Rosenbaum back, but that's not how it works for Superman alum cameos. Save Michael Rosenbaum for something else. Also, they already have a Smallville alum playing the main villain this season.

Also, I really hope they have Lena finding out about Kara's dual identity as Supergirl. For a second, I thought they might do a reveal in the second episode, but nope. Instead, we got Kara trying to protect everyone without revealing her identity, which was just as good. Kara doing fake panicking as a way to try to split off from Lena was perfect. It's the kind of super dork-ery that works great for the character.

- I hope Ollie's prison stay is a bit longer than Barry's. Barry was in prison for, what? Three episodes? Of course, we all know Ollie will get out in time for the crossover. The same thing happened last year. Ollie stopped being Green Arrow but he conveniently put on the hood again just before "Crisis on Earth-X" happened. For now, the show seems to be serious about keeping Ollie locked up. The premiere had him moping around a bit, but now he has more motivation, so that will keep his story from going stale. I was kind of expecting more former bad guys to be in prison with Ollie, but maybe some of them ended up in Iron Heights instead.

The team obviously hasn't been a team in the time since the finale. I have to wonder how long the show will keep them out of their costumes. It's fine for now, but this is a show about vigilantes. Maybe the team will operate again even though vigilantism is illegal. Star City isn't going to clean up itself. As for the new Green Arrow... I had thought it would be Roy under the hood, but then they did the reveal that he's on Lian Yu. That is in the future, though, so maybe it is still Roy. The new Green Arrow's build looks kind of slight, and shorter, too, so maybe it's a woman under there. I'd love it if they revealed it was a woman. But who could it be? If it's someone we've already met, then the reveal will be way cooler. If it's a new character, then it's kind of boring. I can't think of any female characters who have been on the show who would have proper motivation to become the Green Arrow? Huntress is off being Huntress somewhere I'm sure. Evelyn Sharpe is very much dead.

Oh, I just had a thought. What if it's future William under the hood? I know it would be a slight repeat of Nora's situation on The Flash, but what's the point of the flashforwards if it's not tying back into the main story? Hopefully, this is just a crazy theory and not the actual case. In regards to the flashfowards themselves, what are they setting up? Lost did it and the time period of the flashforwards became the main time period while the stuff on the island was in the past. Is Arrow setting up an endgame for the show? Will the end of the show have Ollie passing the mantle to William?

I do wish that Ricardo Diaz wasn't still the villain. He's not running the city anymore, but it's just more of the same. Just get rid of the guy already. The addition of the Longbow Hunters does change it up a bit. They seem formidable enough that the only way to stop them is if the team gets back together. I guess right now it's more a revenge thing with Diaz, but I'm sure it will lead to something city wide threat thing for the end of the season.

- Oh, Legends of Tomorrow. On a wackiness scale of the CW-DC shows, they are definitely at the top of the list. Despite this, it's the most entertaining. Yes, things can get a bit kooky, but there are still solid character moments, too. The entire premiere could have been about a bloodthirsty unicorn, but there was stuff for the team as well. 1) Sara has some relationship stuff with Ava. I think it's been a very, very long time since Sara has been in a happy and stable relationship with anyone so she so wants everything to be perfect. 2) Nate is trying to work through his issues about his dad. It's always been a sore spot with Nate, so it will be interesting to see if he can work on his relationship with his dad without resorting to time travel (unlike some people on the team who use time travel selfishly). 3) Ray is trying to sort through his feelings about Nora Darkh. He thinks she can be redeemed, but he's also feeling guilty that she might be out in time killing people.

But it's Zari's short scene at the end of the episode that was the best. She wants nothing more than to tell her mother to get out of the country before things turn terrible, but Zari is responsible enough to know that she shouldn't break time for personal reasons. See, this is how things should be handled (are you paying attention, Amaya? Oh wait, you already broke time to fix your family history). I also loved that when Zari was tripping on unicorn glitter that she saw love everywhere. It was kind of weird that she had the hippie cliché while the guys saw the things they wanted to see most, but perhaps, Zari was also seeing the thing that she wanted to see the most. The future she's from is oppressive regime with little room for trust and love.

Oh, and Mick saw Axel, his old pet rat. :-D

It was strange seeing the team down to five members. When the show started, there were nine principle cast members. They'll fill out the roster soon enough, but who's the latest recruit? Why, everyone's favourite occult specialist. Well, Constantine will be a recruit soon. Or, I hope he will. I'd prfer he travel on the Waverider rather than the team coming to him every week for some mystical help. Come on, Constantine! You could use some company. You know you could charm the pants off Ray or Nate. Looks like Constantine ran afoul of some demon, which is why he's so grumpy. I hope it's the demon that was involved in the Newcastle incident. I didn't watch all of Constantine the show, so I don't know if we ever saw that demon, but Legends would be a good place to address that issue.

Man, I don't know how they are going to top Beebo from last year's finale.

I look forward to the crossover in December. Going off the pictures the actors have posted to social media, it's going to be crazy.

"I call people 'dude' now."

locker_monster — Mon, 29 Oct 2018 02:51:53 GMT

Heaven help you if you're afraid of spiders and you had no idea what this week's episode was about. Though, with a title like "Arachnids in the UK", it's not hard to figure out what the main focus of the plot is.

I think I can firmly say that this is the first episode of the season that I was quite indifferent about. There are some character moments that I appreciated, but overall, I mostly came away with "meh". I guess there's always one of these stories, the episode where the Companion makes it home after their first trip out in the TARDIS and there's an invasion of a sort going on. It's here where the Companion can put their newfound experience to work. If it's a theme we've seen more than a few times, then it does start to get a little hard to do anything fresh.

I was quite reminded of "The Green Death" in that that episode also had oversized creatures due to something from beneath the Earth. Does mixing genetically engineered spiders with toxic waste make sense? I'm not sure I totally followed the whole pheromone thing in regards to how the person in Yaz's complex died, but this is Doctor Who, so accurate science isn't exactly its top concern. However, they do bother to mention that once you start to scale up smaller creatures, like spiders or ants, they can only get so big before they get crushed under their own weight. As a way to deal with the mother spider, it was the most humane thing they could do. Of course, then the gun wielding American had to come in and ruin everything.

They definitely made a statement with Robertson. He's not exactly Trump, but he's certainly a derivative of Trump. I think I could have used less of him. You do need someone to blame, and hate, in the episode, but I'm not sure what he added overall to the episode. Actually, there were a lot of people running around in the hotel. You already have Team TARDIS, but then there's Yaz's mom, Jade, and Robertson. Usually, you only have a large group so people can get picked off one by one, but they didn't do that, so I guess some kudos is needed since Chibnall felt no need to indulge in a cliché. He also didn't conveniently have Robertson get eaten by one of the spiders as a comeuppance, which probably would have happened in another episode with similar circumstances. Chris Noth was certainly chewing some of the scenery, so I hope he had some fun with this.

The thing I enjoyed the best was the personal stuff with the team. Thank god we got to learn more about Yaz and her family. Najia now joins the long line of mothers who disapprove of the Doctor. I thought maybe Yaz had a terrible family or something, but they seem average. An annoying sibling, a embarrassing father, and a nosy mother. But maybe that's why Yaz wants to travel. She has this average life. Even being a police officer doesn't do anything to make it more exciting. So I can get why she leaves with the Doctor. It's the same sort of wanderlust that a lot of the other Companions have had over the years. Ryan leaves behind his absentee dad to embrace his new Team TARDIS family. And then there's Graham. Poor Graham. He leaves so he can leave his grief behind. I don't know if that's healthy. He claims travelling with the Doctor will help him to get over his grief, but I wonder if he's actually just running away and he won't be dealing with his loss. I'd actually be interested in seeing that. Like, we'll have a moment when Ryan calls him out on it.

And oh my god, the Doctor is so happy when everyone comes back. Her face just lights up. It's nice that she warns them about life in the TARDIS before they leave. They won't be the same people when they come back. I really liked that line because it's so damn true. Time and space travel will certainly change you. I'm also noticing how short the Doctor can be with people. She doesn't shut them down with yelling, but she can issue a lot of orders and she expects people to follow her lead. Essentially, that boils down to a lot of scenes where she's just telling everyone what to do. This annoys me slightly because it makes it seem like no one has any initiative. The Doctor is good with plans, but that shouldn't mean that the Companions or the guest stars shouldn't have ideas of their, too.

Random: What was with the, I'm going to use the UK term here, bum bag that the Doctor was wearing? It's just there with no mention of why she's wearing it. I think she reaches into it to grab the psychic paper, but why bother with a bag when the coat has pockets bigger on the inside? Is there some cut scene where the Doctor tries it on and likes it? That would be very much the Doctor, liking something that no one else thinks is cool. The Time Vortex is so pretty and elaborate now. I liked how there were numerous branches, indicating different time paths. Did they film this episode earlier in the shooting schedule? I feel like this was shot with the premiere in the same block. Maybe that explains the sudden appearance of the bum bag. It was something they wanted to do early on, but then dropped it when the show went to film in South Africa. I actually felt sorry for the spider in Yaz's neighbour's place. The Doctor show such sympathy towards it. It was one instance when I thought the giant spider was cute. Najia hounding Yaz about whether she's dating any of her new friends was typical TV mother, but you do get a funny little twist now that the Doctor is a woman. I think Najia would be happy if her daughter was dating someone, regardless of gender. All of the spiders were CGI. Gone are the days of the fake rubber spider.

I have no idea what next week's episode is about, so that should be fun. But can we please get some episodes not written or co-written by Chibnall? Please and thanks.

"Is anyone excited 'cuz I'm really excited."

locker_monster — Sun, 21 Oct 2018 20:58:27 GMT

I see the show is doing the time tested routine of having a future set story followed by a past set story after the season premiere. The debut season of every Doctor and Companion did the same thing (except for season four where the past story came before the future story). It's easy to see why, though: it's a nice way to tell new viewers that Doctor Who can have stories set across all of time and space.

It's hard to hate this episode when it deals with such an important moment in history. I'm trying to think of other episodes where the Doctor had to fight to maintain the timeline of one specific event ("The Fires of Pompeii" comes to mind, but the ending on that episode is a little less cherry to say the least). The Doctor often travels into the past, but there's never the intent on becoming part of the history. Though, there are points when it's uncomfortable to watch the episode because of the attitudes. I wish I could say that these are archaic attitudes, but we all know different. Kudos on the episode for making me want to read up on Rose Parks. I mean, I know of her, but I didn't know the details. Maybe my ignorance was helpful. I didn't know what was coming, so every road block seemed like legitimate problem. I also can't judge if something was inaccurate or not. It will be interesting to read other reviews. See, Doctor Who is still an educational show. :-)

The TARDIS team is really starting to gel. This is where having three Companions comes in handy; if you have a lot of ground to cover and the Doctor can't be everywhere. I'm glad Yaz had a bit more to do this episode. I'm starting to get that Graham is the chatty type who can get information out of people without being too forward. Yaz and Ryan are still kind of nebulous to me. Yaz wants to be in charge, but why is that important to her? She doesn't seem to mind following the Doctor's lead. With Ryan, I think that no one ever put much faith in his abilities and this is his chance to prove he can do more. Since none of the Companions signed on to travel with the Doctor, it is slightly harder to nail down their motivations and wants. Looks like everyone gets home (to the UK at least) next week, so it will be the end of that episode, presumably, when everyone will have to make a decision about continuing to travel with the Doctor. Ryan fits right in. He's always asking the important questions, like, "should we open this?" or "can I touch this?" Graham would definitely go with Ryan to keep an eye on him. Yaz... She doesn't have that personal connection and she's good at her job, so it's a little harder to imagine why she'd hop back into the TARDIS for a few more adventures. I look forward to the scene where the Doctor woos everyone back for one more trip.

Random: The crystal on top of the console goes up and down! Yay, the time rotor actually does what it's supposed to. I also noticed that the crystal in the Doctor's sonic rotates, which is different. Damn, do the toy sonics do that? I may have to buy one. The Doctor teasing Graham that she might or might not be Banksy was cute. I'd err more on "not Banksy", but since the Doctor does like to brag about the people they've met you do have to take a second to wonder if it's the truth or not. I haven't commented on this before, but Graham calls the Doctor "Doc" and the Doctor hasn't had any complaints, so I guess she doesn't mind, though I think some of the other Doctors would be annoyed. Yaz mentions coming home from the mosque so I assume she's Muslim. Religious backgrounds usually don't come up on the show, but it's good to see that they are striving for diversity. The Doctor rips her coat on purpose and I actually gasped. I guess I'm getting attached to the costume. Speaking of the costume, the Doctor's shirt was a burgundy colour this week. Looks like that will be the part of her outfit that will change from week to week. She also wears a white, long sleeved shirt underneath that I didn't notice before. Oh, and the rainbow stripes are just on the front. For some reason, I had assumed they went all the way around on the shirt. Since when does Stormcage use tattoos to identify prisoners? River never had a tattoo on her wrist. Or maybe the bad guy (who's name I can't remember) is from a different era from River's stay.

So next week has spiders. Yay? This also appears to be Chris Noth's episode. He was one of the few people I recognized in the Coming Soon montage trailer, if only because he was the lone American actor. It's rare for Doctor Who to have American actors. I wonder if he's a fan of the show...

"Brains beats bullets."

locker_monster — Sun, 14 Oct 2018 20:58:45 GMT

Hmm, I feel like I should get an icon of Thirteen or something.

So, the triumphant return of the opening credits and the TARDIS! One I liked, the other not so much. Weirdly, I liked the new style of the opening credits. It kind of harkens back to the old days, when the shapes in the background were kind of abstract. The, for the lack of a better word I'm going to call them oil slicks, have that same sort of symmetrical movement but obviously there's a bit more complexity to it. And no face of the Doctor zooming towards me! I've never been fond of that aspect. I'm also enjoying the heavy drums of the new theme song. Someone online called it heavy or "stew for your ears". :-D

As for the new TARDIS interior, I'm not loving it, though I probably said that about Eleven's second set when it was first revealed. I'm sure it will grow on me as I see more of it. I think my problem right now is that we went from this lovely two storey set that looked well lived in to something that's just one storey and very organic looking and not homey at all. And I have no idea what is going on with the walls. It's vaguely roundel-ish, but there's too much metal. I do wish we had a better look at the console as well. There's an hour glass and some levers and a foot pedal and something that dispenses biscuits? Oh, and a glass (?) mini TARDIS that spins. Does the time rotor even rise and fall? The crystal design does reflect the new design of the sonic screwdriver, so that's fun. The one thing I did like was how the vestibule looks like the interior of the police box. So, when they show just a glimpse of the interior through the police box exterior, it looks like a normal inside. I'm sure it helps the crew when they are filming those certain angles.

I'm getting a better feel for this Doctor. She's much more polite, I'm noticing. She remembered everyone's name last week after first meeting them and she says thank you and please a lot more. Wait, did the Doctor regenerate into a Canadian? ;-) I think the word I would use to describe Thirteen would be buoyant. She doesn't let anything get her down. I mean, she was so steadfast on getting everyone home and it's only when she thinks she has failed everyone that she lets herself feel that crushing disappointment. I feel like there will be less angry shouting from Thirteen. There's no need for posturing with her. But that's just my initial take.

The Companions are doing well. The beginning of the episode used the classic "split them up into two teams" approach. I suppose it's good for us the audience. We get to see more of the plot this way. But beyond having more hands to search out places and more brains to offer ideas, I still don't feel like having three Companions is useful. You don't need three people to ask questions. It's just fewer questions per person. In regards to the characters themselves, though, Ryan, Yaz, and Graham are all just interesting enough that I can overlook how many people are travelling with the Doctor. Ryan seems to be our focal point. We wake up with him on two separate occasions, so we learn information as he sees and hears it. Graham is still a bit of a grump, but I love it. But he's also trying so hard to connect with Ryan and that's totally going to be a thing between them going forward. Yaz... I don't quite know what they want to do with her. I can't recall if she did anything useful, or useless (since she is a Companion), in this episode. See, this is where three Companions becomes a problem. Someone always ends up just standing around and listening to the Doctor.

Anyway, the episode. It wasn't bad. It certainly looked lovely. Looks like they went to South Africa to film (if the end credits are any indication). The idea of an intergalactic rally was neat. Leave it to the Doctor to find a compromise about having one winner. Though, I am glad everyone is dropped into the end of the race. If they had landed in the middle of the race, there would have been more competitors and the episode would have been more about the backstabbing and such that can happen in a competition. Here, the episode is more about survival and the lengths you're willing go to get to reach the end. So, they mention the Stenza again. Are they going to be a recurring thing this season, because I didn't find Tim Shaw very threatening. And what did the killer cloth thing say to the Doctor? Something about a Timeless Child? If this is some convoluted, mysterious timey wimey thing, I'm going to throw up my hands. Season long arcs are fine, but keep it simple.

Random: Of course, the TARDIS was the Ghost Monument. That was absolutely perfect. For a second, I thought the Doctor had handed Graham the sonic sunglasses, but nope. No cliffhanger this week, but did the Doctor take everyone home to Sheffield or is there a detour involved? Or, does she drop off everyone and then comes back for everyone for another adventure? I feel like that it less likely. I wouldn't mind if everyone was stuck on board. We've had a few seasons of the Doctor popping back to Earth to pick up the Companion for an adventure. It'd be nice to go back to the old model where the Companion lived and/or was stuck on the TARDIS. I'm having a little trouble understanding the Doctor's new accent. I need some nice subtitles to help me along.

I see the first episode did quite well in the ratings. I hope the numbers stay steady for the rest of the season.

"I hate empty pockets."

locker_monster — Sun, 07 Oct 2018 20:16:40 GMT

It's been a while since I posted here. I didn't feel like I had anything to post about, but now Doctor Who is back!

Loved that BBC did a "global premiere". I got to watch the first episode at the same time as the UK (though with commercials the episode probably ended after the episode was over in the UK, but anyway). So, new Doctor, new Companions, new, well, everything.

Were there no opening credits? I was all excited to hear the new theme song, but there was nothing, just the end credits. Which, okay, technically is almost the same as the opening credits, but I still wanted to see the new title card with the names of everyone. Like, did they put Jodie Whittaker's face in there? I guess we'll get proper opening credits next week. But from what they did have in the end credits, the new theme isn't bad. Got a bit of the old in there, but with new things over top. The score wasn't bad, either, not that I know music or anything. Can't wait to see if the Doctor has a new theme as well.

As for the episode itself, I felt like it took a while to get going. I know the episodes are longer now, so you have more time to linger in scenes, but I don't know if that's exactly a boon for Doctor Who. There's always been a certain frantic pace to the show. You might have more time to spend with the characters, but you also want to get to the adventure and fun. And then there's the risk of overstuffing an episode because you have the extra time. The Marvel Netflix shows all face this problem at some point and that's usually the point where your interest starts to lag. In regards to this episode, at least you have Jodie's performance to get you through until stuff starts happening. It was a joy watching her try to figure out who she was. She may not remember her name, but the Doctor it still there, and she can still save the day even when her brain is still rebooting. I don't have a true sense of how Thirteen will be, but that enthusiasm to see the universe and that drive to help people will always remain.

(And thank you for not lingering over the fact that the Doctor is a woman now.)

I'm still annoyed that they went with three Companions (or friends as they're being called now). Three has never been an ideal number for Companions. Sometimes it does work (i.e: Barbara, Ian, Susan and then later Vicki), but sometimes it doesn't (i.e.: Tegan, Nyssa, and Adric). Since Ryan, Yaz, and Graham had no plans to travel with the Doctor, that might make things more interesting, but I don't want to end up with situations where two Companions are off doing things while the third just stands around. For now, the dynamic seems to be working. Yaz and Ryan have that youthful determination, while Graham is going to be that guy who asks "Why are we doing this?" and "Is this safe?" It's been a long time since we had a Companion who doesn't exactly love travelling with the Doctor. Though, it absolutely sucks that they killed off Ryan's nan in the first episode. It was obvious it was going to happen, since Grace wasn't featured in any of the trailers, but did she really have to die?

The plot was all right. It was mainly a problem to show how the Doctor works and thinks. Was it a great plot to grab new viewers? Like, do you start off with a huge alien invasion for the Doctor to thwart? Or do you do something a little smaller? I think it was a decent in-between option, at least. Menacing alien who kills people, but there's no potential invasion. The teeth face thing was gross, but that's the point. I just love that the Doctor kept calling the alien "Tim Shaw". While it's so something the Doctor would do, you could also chalk it up to a post-regeneration thing where her hearing is still wonky.

And did I detect some lines in there that could also be interpreted as advice about embracing all of this new change? ;-)

Random: So, they apparently changed the aspect ratio and update the lighting and some other stuff to make the show look more cinematic. The lighting did look a bit more dramatic, but of course, it's hard to say when most of the episode was set a night. I guess we'll see more of a difference with future episodes. Something tells me we won't see the new TARDIS interior until the end of next episode. The Doctor's new sonic screwdriver is made from melted spoons! But where did she get the light from? Is it an Earth light or something grabbed from "Tim Shaw"'s pod? So the Doctor's new outfit was a thrift store find. My only gripe is the earring. When did the Doctor have time to pierce her ear? How old is Yaz? If Ryan is 19, does that make Yaz the same age? Or was she a few grades ahead of him in school? I guess if this is a smaller city, then you would know the people in the other grades.

You know, airing Doctor Who on Sundays isn't so bad. I hardly ever go out on Sundays, so I'll always be home to watch it. Hopefully this doesn't affect the ratings in a negative way.

OMG!!

locker_monster — Thu, 09 Aug 2018 01:19:52 GMT

ECEE just announced David Tennant as a guest!!!! Naturally all of the Whovians in the province have lost their minds. I don't think any of us expected this would ever happen.

But, of course, I actually have plans that weekend. :-P Why couldn't it be on any other weekend when I don't have plans? Sigh... David is doing just the Sunday, so the option to drive up there for one day is there, but I don't think I know anyone who would be willing to go for just the day. My lack of driving skills is finally biting me in the ass.

This would be the perfect con to meet David, though. It's a smaller con, so the crowds wouldn't be as bad. I'm sure the wait to see David would still take a while, but that's a given of any convention. Man, I am so tempted to bug my con buddy into going. I can shrug off not seeing Jenna Coleman or Alex Kingston, but this is David Tennant!! It's the Tenth Doctor!!! I have no idea if they can get him back for the CCEE, so this may be the closest he'll ever be to me. Plus, John Barrowman is also a guest that weekend. You know the two of them would have amazing photo ops together.

I can only hope that David is free next April and he can come back as a guest for CCEE. I would die of geeky happiness if that happened.

Maybe the movie should have been called The Wasp and Ant-Man...

locker_monster — Sun, 08 Jul 2018 22:15:54 GMT

Saw Ant-Man and The Wasp this weekend. The theatre was not packed, but I think that had more to do with the fact that it was a nice day outside rather than a lack of interest in the movie. With the way Infinity War ended, I'm sure there were some people who went to this movie just to see if there were any hints about what's to come.

But more on that later. I have to say, I liked the first Ant-Man movie more than this one. The plot was tighter in the first one. You knew what the objective was and what the bad guy wanted and the resolution made sense within the rules they established for Scott's little slice of the MCU. Ant-Man and the Wasp is a little less focused. The main thrust of the plot is trying to find Janet and rescue her from the Quantum Realm, but there's a lot of back and forth before anyone enters the Quantum Realm. There are some awesome set pieces along the way - the ways they do the growing and shrinking in this movie is incredibly fun - but the narrative isn't always the greatest at linking everything. The villain is a bit ho-hum, as well. They try to tie in Ghost's backstory with mistakes Hank made in the past, but the emotional impact isn't as strong as it could have been. Ghost just looks cool when she's phasing through stuff. Burch is the secondary villain, but he's more a crook who causes additional complications than a big bad.

And then there's the whole thing with Janet and the Quantum Realm. The Quantum Realm is the place past sub atomic when you shrink down, but the rules of how things work down there are kind of slap dash. I get that the Quantum Realm also exists in a universe with aliens and gods and magic, so there is some suspension of disbelief, but I still don't understand how Janet survived there for thirty years and how the energy from there can cure Ghost of her condition or how siphoning off the energy would tear Janet apart. I guess you need to just go with it, but the heist plot from the first movie was much more precise.

It's the characters who are the best part of the movie. Civil War threw everyone for a loop. We knew that Scott was caught and thrown into the Raft, but I never stopped to think how that would affect Hope and Hank. Having the team at odds with each other was interesting place to start from. Scott has to work hard to get into Hope and Hank's good graces again, but he also doesn't want to risk his chance of freedom, too. That's the thing that's different about Scott. He's a dad. He has Cassie to worry about, as well. I liked that she's the one to encourage him to help his friends, even if it might mean her dad gets thrown into jail forever. There's also the family dynamic with Hank and Hope. They're a lot closer in this movie, so they're this great father-daughter team. And it's no brainer that Hope is a bad ass as Wasp. Her wings make her more mobile than Scott, so she can do things he's not able. Though, are they still playing her as Scott's love interest? I would really prefer it if they just stayed crimefighting partners and not romantic partners. I also like that they kept Luis, Kurt, and Dave, Scott's ex-con friends. They don't add much to the story, but they are amusing characters to have around. And with Janet in the mix now, it will be cool to see the Pym-Van Dynes working all together.

But oh wait. A certain someone snapped their fingers, so the happy family unit barely has five minutes together before they're all ash. The mid-credit scene is just a killer. You think it's about some weird science with team Ant-Man/Wasp, but nope. Hope, Hank, and Janet get wiped out and Scott is stuck in the Quantum Realm. Even the end credit scene is a downer. Sure, you have a giant ant playing the drums, but in the background, you have the ominous emergency messaging tone. I guess there was no way around it. You can't have a fun scene, not when half of the world is gone. At least you find out why Scott and Hope didn't show up in Infinity War; they were too busy dealing with Ghost. This does leave an opening for Scott to show up in Avengers 4, though (amusing he finds a way out of the Quantum Realm). Janet mentions a Time Vortex or Funnel or something that exists in the Quantum Realm, so maybe some time travel is in the Avengers' future?

Random: Thank you, Marvel, for continuing to have superfluous shots of the male superheroes with their shirts off. :-D Hank's past with S.H.I.E.L.D. comes up a few times in the movie. I wish we could see more of his early adventures, though that might mean more de-ageing CGI effects and I don't know if you could sustain that for more than a short flashback. If Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. weren't always telling such a tight arc each season, that would be a perfect place to drop in one of Hank's Ant-Man exploits. They found a moment to work in Luis' voice over gag from the first movie, but it was definitely shoehorned in because fans loved those elaborate sequences from last time. Are they setting up Cassie to be a superhero? She was part of the Young Avengers in the comics. She definitely has a moment when she sees Scott as Giant Man and you can tell she's thinking, "I could do that." The actress is still young, but it'd be neat if, later down the line when Paul Rudd's contract is up, she could replace him. I'm glad they haven't run out of shrinking gags. The cars in the Hot Wheels case and the ants in the breath mint tin was pretty smart, kind of like the tank from the last movie. The shrunken building was fun, too, if only because you had characters running around with it in their arms. And I normally don't care about the design of the end credits, but they were really clever this time around. Instead of animated end credits, they used miniature sets and figures to recreate scenes. It totally makes sense for Ant-Man.

Oh man, I can't wait for next year. Captain Marvel and the conclusion to Infinity War.

Finale thoughts for Supergirl and The Expanse

locker_monster — Fri, 29 Jun 2018 03:37:00 GMT

- Well, Supergirl is done for the season. I was actually able to watch the last three episodes while on vacation. Since I was in Europe, I had access to European Netflix and all of the CW shows are available to watch on there.

I felt like season three was really uneven, especially towards the end. It was like the writers changed their minds about the Worldkillers. They had all three, but then they killed off two. Then they seemed to cure Sam, but suddenly Reign was a separate entity. And I totally did not understand how the Valley of Juru worked in terms of killing off Reign. The science sort of veered into the fantastical and that didn't really work. Yes, this is a superhero show and accurate science is not a thing that happens often, but you can keep things somewhat plausible instead of introducing some weird Kryptonian alternative reality and a fix-it-all black rock. I think they should have kept all three Worldkillers. Kara fighting all three of them would have been a suitable challenge instead of the whole terraforming Earth into New Krypton thing that happened.

There was also that big time travel cheat they had at the end. Ugh. I get that the abrupt death of three characters was needed so Kara could embrace her humanity again, but then, why even have it if the consequences only lasted for like 30 seconds. It was just too fast and sloppy as a resolution. Plus, time travel should never be the answer (unless you're Legends of Tomorrow, then that's just your wheelhouse). Sure, ending the season on three character deaths would have been super depressing, but you have to admit it would have cleared up lingering plot threads. No more Kara/Mon-El relationship angst, no temptation for Kara to head back to Argo City, and if Sam had died, Alex could have adopted Ruby. Now, Sam and Ruby will probably never show up again because they're not needed for the plot.

And they wrote out Winn! :-( He'll be a recurring character next year, rather than a series regular. I don't get it. Did the writers not know what to do with Winn? Well, maybe you should have given him more to do than just sitting at a computer. Swapping him around with Brainiac 5 won't change much. Brainy will still be the technical support and he'll still be stuck in front of a computer monitor. You can do some fish out of water stuff, since Brainy will have to spend more of his time in the 21st century, but they covered some of that territory when Mon-El first showed up. My only hope is that Kara and Co. will get to visit the 31st century next season because Mon-El and Winn need help. Just think; they could have more members of the Legion of Superheroes!

More hopes for next season: Actually seeing Kara doing Kara Danvers things, like, you know, working at CatCo. I swear, Kara stopped showing up for work. When Lena bought CatCo., I thought the show would actually spend time in the office and have more clashes between Lena and Kara because of the whole secret identity thing, but it never became a huge issue. All we really got were a few scenes of Kara mulling over the idea of telling Lena that she's Supergirl. I do hope this comes up again. Lena is the last character on the show who doesn't know about Kara's alter ego. It'd be interesting to see how she would react if she learned the truth. Would Lena be angry because Kara was lying all this time? It might push Lena into full on villain. It'd be better if Lena figured out that Kara is Supergirl on her own, though. The character comes out looking smarter that way.

I'm not sure where they're going with season four. It looks like the writers are going to adapt "Red Son", which re-imagined Superman's origins with him landing in the old Soviet Union rather than Kansas. Are we going to end up with an evil Supergirl for Kara to fight? We've seen a Nazi Supergirl from Earth-X, so is this one going to be a Communist Supergirl? Whatever they decide on, Kara will end up fighting someone who is powered like her, which seems par for the course. At least the show didn't reveal that yet another pod was launched before Krypton was destroyed.

Random: It was kind of funny seeing Erica Durance in a House of El outfit and flying around with superpowers, if only because she was on Smallville and that show filmed in Vancouver as well. Finally, she had the chance to be Superman, in a way. The reveal that Argo City survived the destruction of Krypton wasn't that out there. Argo originally survived in the comics, too, and they too had to deal with living on a hunk of Kryptonite (though their solution involved rolling out lead sheeting over the ground). Will Kara visit Argo from time to time? I hope she told Clark that some of their people survived the destruction of Krypton. The karaoke scene at the start of "Schott Through the Heart" was the best. We didn't get a lot of scenes of the team just hanging out as friends. I don't know where they're going with James, now that he's revealed himself as Guardian. I suppose this means even less time at CatCo. if James has to deal with the fallout. But this would be a good way to have Cat come back. She can show up and have words with James. So, J'onn's just going to wander the globe, helping people? It's like The Littlest Hobo! Actually, they did a similar storyline on Justice League Unlimited; J'onn disappeared for a time to live among humans. I'm sure he'll come back to the DEO, though. But what was the point in introducing J'onn's father only to kill him off later in the season? Can't J'onn be happy? I hope they resist the urge to give Kara and Alex new love interests, but it seems inevitable that they'll introduce new characters for them.

And now that all of the Arrowverse shows have finished, whose finale came out on top? Yeah, it's still Legends of Tomorrow. I suppose after that, it's Arrow and then a tie for last place between The Flash and Supergirl.

- Oh, and The Expanse finished its last season on SyFy. I hope Amazon gives the show a bit more money for the budget; they'll definitely need it when adapting the next book.

I was pleasantly surprised they crammed in all of Abaddon's Gate into the rest of the season three. The writers dropped some plot points and got rid of some characters in the process, but at least now the rest of the seasons will be a book per season. With the way it was before, the end of a book came in the middle of a season and you had weird tonal shifts. And truthfully, there wasn't much to Abaddon's Gate. It's all ship bound so there's not a lot of back and forth in regards to setting. I think it's the one book you could cut down. The rest here on out are pretty dense and need all of their plots intact.

I also have to admire how they managed to find a way to work Bobbie into the plot. Her character doesn't figure heavily in the books again until later in the series, but she's a fan favourite, so it would have been a real shame if the show had dropped her completely. Making her part of the Martian team that apprehends Holden on the station was smart thinking. The end of the episode seems to imply that Bobbie has joined the Roci crew, but maybe she's just hitching a ride with them on the way back to the Sol system. Not that I would be against Bobbie joining the crew now, but Cibola Burn is set on an isolated planet with a certain amount of characters. To throw Bobbie in would mess up some of the story points. It's also a good thing they didn't kill off Drummer, as she's a POV character in book seven. I assume the authors let the writers know who they can and can't kill ahead of time.

I wonder how season four will play out. The actor for one of the POV characters in the book is busy with another TV show, so I don't know how the writers will handle that. I guess it would be simple enough to replace that character with a different character. Cibola Burn is also set on a planet, with only some of the action taking place on spaceships. So far, The Expanse has been set on spaceships and stations; it'll be weird to see the characters in outdoor locations. There's some crazy stuff later on in the book, too; I guess that's where most of the budget will go.

Oh, and I have to praise the science on this show. While it's hard to do accurate zero G scenes on a TV budget, they did do one thing spot on: you can't cry normally when there's no gravity. They had a character crying in one scene when the thrust gravity was off and instead of the tears running down her face, the water remained pooled around her eyes. The attention to detail on this show is amazing sometimes.

- That seems to be it in regards to my TV shows. Luke Cage is back, but that's on Netflix, and thus, outside of the usual TV season. I guess now I have time to do more knitting...

Countdown to vacation begins!

locker_monster — Sat, 02 Jun 2018 01:39:35 GMT

- I finally had a chance to watch the animated reconstruction of "Shada" and I have to say that the animated bits were better than I was expecting. I think the animators had more time and money this time around (as opposed to the very little time and money they got for "The Power of the Daleks" animated reconstruction). Is reconstruction the right term when it's an unfinished episode? How can you reconstruct something that was never constructed? Remounting? Anyway...

What made it work, I think, was Tom Baker's performance. He sounds exactly the same; you can almost forget that the dialogue was recorded recently rather than 30 odd years ago. Also, as an animator, I think you'd have to up your game if you're animating Four. His face is just so expressive. Makes me wonder if the animators filmed Tom while he was delivering lines and integrated that performance into the animation. The other character designs weren't bad, either, though I felt like Romana was a bit plain; she could have used some more definition to her face.

Of course, the best part was the end. I was spoiled on the surprise, since the news was everywhere when the Blu-Ray/DVD was released, but just imagine if you were watching the episode without that knowledge. Here's the last scene in the TARDIS, filmed in live action, though isn't that odd since none of the interior TARDIS scenes were filmed before the strike. There's some dialogue with Four and Romana and there's K9 tinkering with the console. And then, Four gets up from underneath the console and OMG!!!! It's actually Tom Baker back in the scarf! It's in that moment that I like to think that reviewers of the Blu-Ray/DVD had great big grins on their faces.

I was inclined to think that it might not work, having an older looking Four, but it totally worked with the dialogue. Was it always the intention to have the episode end like this? I didn't have access to any of the special features so maybe they answer that question, but regardless, it was fun to have Tom Baker back in costume. And I just loved that the footage was made to match the quality of the rest of the live action footage. It doesn't pull you out of the moment. You don't even think about how the scene was probably filmed on the replica console set that was in the Doctor Who Experience and that Tom is probably wearing the replica Four costume that was also at the Experience (and hey, K9 is probably the prop that was at the Experience as well). Damn, I really want to watch the special features on the Blu-Ray/DVD now. Stupid release date delay in North America...

"Shada" is also an interesting examination of how filming blocks worked back in the day. All of the location stuff was filmed first since it seems to be all there (barring a scene or two of Chris biking). The next filming block was clearly all of the stuff in Chronotis' room since that also seems to be all there. The block that got interrupted was all of the ship stuff; you have some scenes on Skagra's ship and two scenes at the Think Tank. Everything on Shada and the remaining ship stuff was hit by the strike. In my mind, the Earth stuff is easy to do so that gets filmed at the front, and then the space stuff, with monsters and electronic effects, are tackled after since they would take more time. Thank goodness so much was on location.

- Speaking of Doctor Who, I'm watching the live stream that Twitch is doing for the next several weeks. Even though I've seen every Classic Who episode that a person can watch, it's still nice to turn on my TV and have an episode right there. It's also a bit like roulette, since you don't know which episode the stream is on when you join, so it's kind of fun trying to figure out which serial it is. It also helps that there's a contest going on. Weekly prizes and a grand prize of tickets to London Film and Comic Con in October. That's the one Christopher Eccleston is doing (along with five other Doctors!). I highly doubt I have any chance of winning, but it's still nice to dream.

- I also finally finished Horizon Zero Dawn, the video game I got for Christmas. I was going along at a steady clip but then I think I got distracted by some knitting so I was away from the game for a while. Usually it's the other way around (knitting distracted by video game). I think I also got to a point where I was reluctant to finish the game. It's just so much fun, running around in that world. You learn a lot of the lore as you progress further into the game and you don't want those discoveries to end. My version of the game also included the DLC, so I have some more content to get through, but once that's done, no more game. Thankfully, the main plot ends such that they could do a sequel, and I don't doubt that the game developer already has some ideas in mind.

- Vacation in a couple of days! I can't wait to have some time off. It sounds like it might be busy at work while I'm gone, but what are you going to do?