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gogmagogHey, Doctor Who made fandom_wank! And not even for shipping wank either, but for full-on batshit BNF/semi-official crazy!
Short version: Lawrence Miles, co-author of the admittedly awesome About Time series of Who encyclopedias and a few spin-off novels, dislikes NuWho (possibly in part because he has not been asked to write for it?). As a challenge to himself, he wrote a NuWho spec script set in a space library. Yesterday an episode set in a space library aired, written by Steven Moffatt (he of the "are you my mummy" gasmask-people and the hella creepy Weeping Angels). Having seen the one and read the other, I think Moffatt's is ultimately better, though Miles' has its good points. Anyway, Miles feels the need to spew vitriol all over Moffatt, the episode, and for some reason Neil Gaiman, and basically Miles blames Moffatt for making him an alcoholic and for throwing his arm around him in a clearly manipulative alpha-male kind of way. It's completely tl;dr, but nevertheless worth reading, if just for the sheer unbalancedness of it all.
A sample of his vitriol against Moffatt, with bonus Gaiman-hate:
To an extent, he's the Doctor Who version of Neil Gaiman, a writer who's prepared to contrive his storylines with near-clinical precision to make sure that (a) the right demographic groups are interested and (b) he gets to look like a rock star. This is probably the harshest thing I've said so far, since Gaiman is a stinking parasite who'll sink to any depths in his quest to make goth-girls cop off with him, and even Moffat isn't that desperate.
...wow, that is some quality bile, huh? (Especially since, as far as I know, Neil Gaiman is a very happily married man who does not go around copping off with goth-girl groupies. However, I also hear there are rumblings of Gaiman writing an episode for s5 of NuWho, which I imagine rankles Miles.)
Anyway, my thoughts on yesterday's episode...
Doctor Who, 04x08, "Silence in the Library"
Wow, Moffatt does it again. It's not up to the par of "Blink," or even "The Empty Child"/"The Doctor Dances," but it's still hella entertaining. And the concept of the Data Ghost, and specifically the scene of Miss Evangelista's, ended up being deeply chilling (and sad, because everyone had treated her kind of like crap except for Donna).
Speaking of Donna, it seems pretty clear that all indicators are pointing to her end-of-season fate as "doomed." This week's indicator: River Song, who apparently knows the Doctor in his future but her past, looks stricken when Donna asks where she is in that future. (Still, the fact that she knows about Donna makes me happy; it means that the Doctor will continue to talk about her in the future, even if she does bite the dust.) In contrast, Donna's fate in this two-parter seems ominous, but you know she's not gonna spend the next four episodes as a head on a stick, so I imagine she'll get out of it somehow (spoilery filming stuff seems to paint an interesting picture of how that'll happen).
Speaking of River, I kind of like her. Okay, the hints are less-than-subtle - OH HAY DO YOU KNOW THAT SHE KNOWS THE DOCTOR, BUT HE HAS NO IDEA WHO SHE IS? - but I like her calling him "pretty boy" (and his subsequent misunderstanding: "...what? ...oh, I'M 'pretty boy'..."), and she is doing a good job of selling the whole shared past, if only on her side, thing. I am thinking she's gonna die, though...after all, "your song must end," the Ood said to the Doctor. And if she dies now, that won't impact the Doctor being able to go back and meet her...I kind of see it as being not unlike the Doctor and Sally in "Blink," where he knew her but she didn't know him, and when she meets him in person he doesn't know her but she knows him. I'm imagining River will die saving the Doctor or Donna, the Doctor will find her book, discover she was whatever she turns out to be to him, and then go back and live through all the stuff described at some point, knowing that she's doomed to die at that place and time.
Speaking of anvilicious, yes, Moff, we get it...you hate spoilers.
Also, I'm mildly horrified that I stayed up until 2:30 a.m. last night reading Twilight. It's SO CHEESILY BAD...on the cheestastic scale, it's cheesier than early Laurell K. Hamilton or Mercedes Lackey, but not as cheesy as, say, The Da Vinci Code. Bella is a horrific Mary Sue, the writing is lackluster, THE VAMPIRES LITERALLY SPARKLE IN THE SUNLIGHT, and the relationship between Bella and Edward is horrifying to my feminist tendencies. They're highly codependent: she says things to him like (actual quote) "You ARE my life. You're the only thing it would hurt me to lose." Also when he kisses her, sometimes she passes out, because her HEART STOPS BEATING, LITERALLY.
...and yet I could not stop reading. (Sometimes I hate my weakness for cheese.)
My favorite scene was probably the ridiculous vampire baseball, which has to be played in a thunderstorm, so that when they hit the ball with their super-strength and speed, the resulting thunderous crack can be passed off as thunder. If I'm lyin', I'm dyin'.
Edit: I was talking to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
sergiekins about Twilight, and came up with a description that I feel perfectly describes the books as a whole:
sergiekins:God, this is like. XDD Every teenage girl who's read some vampire piece of fiction's wankfest ever. XDD
yoshitsune: Yes, it's like Anne Rice filtered through Lisa Frank. XD
Short version: Lawrence Miles, co-author of the admittedly awesome About Time series of Who encyclopedias and a few spin-off novels, dislikes NuWho (possibly in part because he has not been asked to write for it?). As a challenge to himself, he wrote a NuWho spec script set in a space library. Yesterday an episode set in a space library aired, written by Steven Moffatt (he of the "are you my mummy" gasmask-people and the hella creepy Weeping Angels). Having seen the one and read the other, I think Moffatt's is ultimately better, though Miles' has its good points. Anyway, Miles feels the need to spew vitriol all over Moffatt, the episode, and for some reason Neil Gaiman, and basically Miles blames Moffatt for making him an alcoholic and for throwing his arm around him in a clearly manipulative alpha-male kind of way. It's completely tl;dr, but nevertheless worth reading, if just for the sheer unbalancedness of it all.
A sample of his vitriol against Moffatt, with bonus Gaiman-hate:
To an extent, he's the Doctor Who version of Neil Gaiman, a writer who's prepared to contrive his storylines with near-clinical precision to make sure that (a) the right demographic groups are interested and (b) he gets to look like a rock star. This is probably the harshest thing I've said so far, since Gaiman is a stinking parasite who'll sink to any depths in his quest to make goth-girls cop off with him, and even Moffat isn't that desperate.
...wow, that is some quality bile, huh? (Especially since, as far as I know, Neil Gaiman is a very happily married man who does not go around copping off with goth-girl groupies. However, I also hear there are rumblings of Gaiman writing an episode for s5 of NuWho, which I imagine rankles Miles.)
Anyway, my thoughts on yesterday's episode...
Doctor Who, 04x08, "Silence in the Library"
Wow, Moffatt does it again. It's not up to the par of "Blink," or even "The Empty Child"/"The Doctor Dances," but it's still hella entertaining. And the concept of the Data Ghost, and specifically the scene of Miss Evangelista's, ended up being deeply chilling (and sad, because everyone had treated her kind of like crap except for Donna).
Speaking of Donna, it seems pretty clear that all indicators are pointing to her end-of-season fate as "doomed." This week's indicator: River Song, who apparently knows the Doctor in his future but her past, looks stricken when Donna asks where she is in that future. (Still, the fact that she knows about Donna makes me happy; it means that the Doctor will continue to talk about her in the future, even if she does bite the dust.) In contrast, Donna's fate in this two-parter seems ominous, but you know she's not gonna spend the next four episodes as a head on a stick, so I imagine she'll get out of it somehow (spoilery filming stuff seems to paint an interesting picture of how that'll happen).
Speaking of River, I kind of like her. Okay, the hints are less-than-subtle - OH HAY DO YOU KNOW THAT SHE KNOWS THE DOCTOR, BUT HE HAS NO IDEA WHO SHE IS? - but I like her calling him "pretty boy" (and his subsequent misunderstanding: "...what? ...oh, I'M 'pretty boy'..."), and she is doing a good job of selling the whole shared past, if only on her side, thing. I am thinking she's gonna die, though...after all, "your song must end," the Ood said to the Doctor. And if she dies now, that won't impact the Doctor being able to go back and meet her...I kind of see it as being not unlike the Doctor and Sally in "Blink," where he knew her but she didn't know him, and when she meets him in person he doesn't know her but she knows him. I'm imagining River will die saving the Doctor or Donna, the Doctor will find her book, discover she was whatever she turns out to be to him, and then go back and live through all the stuff described at some point, knowing that she's doomed to die at that place and time.
Speaking of anvilicious, yes, Moff, we get it...you hate spoilers.
Also, I'm mildly horrified that I stayed up until 2:30 a.m. last night reading Twilight. It's SO CHEESILY BAD...on the cheestastic scale, it's cheesier than early Laurell K. Hamilton or Mercedes Lackey, but not as cheesy as, say, The Da Vinci Code. Bella is a horrific Mary Sue, the writing is lackluster, THE VAMPIRES LITERALLY SPARKLE IN THE SUNLIGHT, and the relationship between Bella and Edward is horrifying to my feminist tendencies. They're highly codependent: she says things to him like (actual quote) "You ARE my life. You're the only thing it would hurt me to lose." Also when he kisses her, sometimes she passes out, because her HEART STOPS BEATING, LITERALLY.
...and yet I could not stop reading. (Sometimes I hate my weakness for cheese.)
My favorite scene was probably the ridiculous vampire baseball, which has to be played in a thunderstorm, so that when they hit the ball with their super-strength and speed, the resulting thunderous crack can be passed off as thunder. If I'm lyin', I'm dyin'.
Edit: I was talking to
sergiekins about Twilight, and came up with a description that I feel perfectly describes the books as a whole:sergiekins:God, this is like. XDD Every teenage girl who's read some vampire piece of fiction's wankfest ever. XDDyoshitsune: Yes, it's like Anne Rice filtered through Lisa Frank. XD
