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ravenOh, so tired. I had a lovely day yesterday, though; I did, as planned, go off to Manchester at some ridiculous hour of the morning, and was met by ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
purplerainbow at Oxford Road in the midst of swiftly falling snow. It didn't stick, of course. But it's good to know Manchester hasn't lost its talent for terrible, terrible weather. Clare said later that it's not really worth saying it's raining, hailing, sleeting or whatever - easier just to say it's precipitating again. I like that. Manchester precipitates. We went for a coffee and stared out at the snow, and really, that set the tone, because we didn't do much beyond chat, eat and wander around in the preciptation. They took me through Canal Street, which looks pretty even in the slushy morning, with the big flags everywhere to be seen - I like how one flag waves delicately over the street sign, for perfect photo opportunities - and the sense of, I don't know, culture. Actually, the whole trip was an exercise in culture for me; I was telling Pedar later that I have never been to, or visited, a real university. Oxford is different. It's ancient and weighed-down and different, and most of all, it's collegiate. A big university - and Manchester is very, very big - is an alien experience, and I rather think Balliol insulates me from the fact my university has eleven thousand undergraduates. Which is certainly not to say I don't love Oxford, because I do; I like that people know me, know my friends, are my friends, understand an underlying culture that is complex to such an extent that we have a specific vernacular and vaguely unusual way of life.
Oh, my, I am being boring again. What I am trying to say is that my day yesterday was interesting in more ways than one. I had a peek at Clare's flat, or at least her room, which is very much like I'd expect - that is, quirky, full of treasures and unwashed plates - and she gave me a birthday present! I am now the proud owner of three cast metal Daleks. They are adorable. One is black, one is grey and one is red, and they are sitting on the table as tiny squat laptop guardians. I don't know what I'm going to call them. Suggestions on apostcard comment please.
Following this, there was more wandering, a few segues into sights - we went to the Manchester Museum so Clare could see a penguin exhibit, and although I did in fact go to the Oxford Natural History Museum (and Pitt-Rivers, actually) during eighth week, it's been a long time since I had the time to do something like that. It was actually quite a lot of fun, peering at Egyptian artefacts and stuffed polar bears.
Hannah lives in Fallowfield, near Rusholme - Rusholme, I should add, is where the NRI population of the Northwest hang out (it serves the same purpose as Southall does in London), and as I was dragged there a lot as a small child, I'm not fond of the place. NRI culture seems to be a rule unto itself half the time. More on that another time. Anyway, Hannah's living arrangements are very different, but unexpectedly similar to the Jowett Walk flat I've got for next year, and her room, too, is a lot like her. I am also the proud owner of the Doctor Who Annual 2006! My birthday presents have a theme. It is joy, and I did enjoy myself thoroughly. The journey back was not so enjoyable, because first I had to hang about for half an hour in Salford, and then another twenty minutes in Southport, and it was freezing, freezing cold and my iPod had had some sort of spasm which mean it didn't want to play music at me, so all I could really do with myself was scribble fic notes in a reporter's notebook, which I usually try not to do because I find it makes people nervous, or read my Annual. So I read my Annual. It was terribly fun.
I got home, eventually, to be met by two pieces of good news. Firstly, Claire Curtis-Thomas (Labour MP for Crosby and Formby) has asked for a copy of my CV and for me to list my political interests. I'm hoping this is a good sign, because I would love this internship and I'd get so much out of it; I don't actually care if it was just licking House of Commons envelopes, because I want to see what this thing I'm working for is actually like.
Secondly, I got a very tongue-in-cheek email from the letters editor of Time. About a week ago, Pedar and I co-authored a letter about the political situation in India, which they are planning to publish. However, it's their policy to only attach one name to each letter. Therefore, they have looked through their records and found, as both Pedar and I have been published separately before, he gets his name on it as being the least recent! Pedar thinks this is hilarious. I'm not entirely sure why.
Sigh. I'm rambling as usual. I actually wanted to review the last two episodes of Life On Mars.
Firstly, episode seven. At the time I wasn't sure what to make of it, but I think it's grown on me. I liked a lot of things about it, and they outweigh my earlier doubts. I think. Anyway, more specifically, I liked:
-the very day-in-the-life, at-home feel of the first part of it. It really seems like just another day, what with the drug bust that goes perfectly to plan, the guy they shove into the cell - and I love the random detail that they keep picking him up for flashing! - and then, oh, the slash. Gene drags Sam out for dinner, not because he really wants to discuss procedure, but because he doesn't want to eat alone! It's sweet, and exemplifies the depth of the friendship they have at this point.
-the touches of reality throughout the scene. I was so impressed by the visual beauty of it as Sam touches the glass and sees the neon-light reflections of 2006 looking back at him. It's deliciously chilling. On a similar theme, I like the radio talking to him, the sudden urgency of the "real" world, and the revelation that somewhere out there is playing Pulp at him! Gene's reaction throughout this is interesting, too. Either he knows Sam's a nutcase and puts up with it, or - actually, no, that must be it. Gene is far too bright not to know there is something seriously unhinged in Sam's head, but he's choosing to ignore it.
-Sam's eyes open. I was surprised, because this is the first time this has happened, but I was a little disappointed we don't see this from his POV, so we don't see what he's seeing.
-the death. It's startling, on top of the almost-domestic scenes we've had until this point. Gene's attempts to hush up the truth seem a little too transparent, but I have to admit I didn't guess what was going on until the reveal.
-Sam choking on the tabasco sauce. He's so close to 2006 he can taste it. I think that this scene, along with the earlier scene out on the road, back up whoever suggested that Sam's coma hallucinations, or flashbacks or whatever they are, are going backwards. The sensory tests, the Glasgow tests, they should have been done first, and besides, the earlier bit suggests it's Sam being picked up off the road after the accident.
-the symbolism inherent in the bit where Sam is standing, screaming, in a deserted white room. I don't actually subscribe to the theory, but I think this is the strongest indication we've had to date that perhaps Sam really is just going insane, a high-functioning schizophrenic. I don't know much about it, but I think his symptoms - hallucinations, fear, persistent delusions - are in fact in accordance with schizophrenia.
-the tiny detail about Billy's sister telling Sam he has rubbish hair. I like her.
-the whole of Sam's enquiry into the death. It's something he would do, but it's underscored with this desperate belief that somehow, somehow, this is going to get him home, and you just know it's going to end badly. And it does.
-Gene set Sam up. I didn't see that coming at all - and I should have done, given it's another thing that happens in Discworld! - and it's a turning point for Gene. Most of all, it underlines the relationship they had at the beginning, which is friendship tied up with tension. I like it very much.
Overall, it's a good episode; what I didn't like was the lack of resolution for the coma hallucinations. Something is going on in the real world, and I wish we'd had more of a hint at what it is.
And, finally! The last episode, at least until next year. Just think, no more of my rambling! But before I go, episode eight:
Two things made this episode for me. Well, actually three. Firstly: Sam dialling the number they get from the porn film and freezing as little Sammy Tyler answers. It's chilling. So much is packed into that tiny moment: Sam's horror that his parents may be involved with the whole crime mastermind thing, the way he immediately has to lie about what he's heard, but I think most of all, he's just heard his own voice answer the phone. It's a tiny thing and it does so much.
Secondly: the fact that I don't, personally, slash Sam and Gene, but they slash themselves. The dialogue in this show is always good, but it reaches whole new levels of fantastic in this episode. I like the initial exchange where Gene is talking about fish climbing ladders and Sam answering, with almost physical pain, "This... is a very mixed metaphor."
Gene, later: "Am I still getting my wotsits mixed up, Gladys?"
"No, that was a simile, you're all right."
He calls him Gladys. Gladys. I ask you. And then there's Sam's wonderful, wonderful assessment of Gene's character: "An overweight, over-the-hill, nicotine-stained, borderline alcoholic homophobe with a superiority complex and an unhealthy obsession with male bonding."
"You made that sound like a bad thing!"
(Although, quibble: does Gene know what "homophobe" means? Was it in use in 1973?)
All the way through this, the relationship between Gene and Sam seems to have matured to a point where you could almost call them friends. There's still severe tension between them, not least because Sam doesn't want to be there and Gene thinks Sam is crazy, but I do wonder if Gene is a bit of a statistical outlier as far as the whole situation goes. He certainly knows more than he's letting on; for one thing, he really doesn't believe Sam's cover story. Witness the way Gene always says "Hyde" in inverted commas, with deep scepticism, and occasionally makes comments - "You want to be here!" - that seem as though they're hinting at Sam's real situation. I like it.
And, thirdly: there was the bit which had me thinking I refuse, I refuse categorically to do this, I am not going to cry at a British fantasy seventies cop show, I am not. And I didn't. But I sniffled. A lot. It's the bit where Vic Tyler holds a gun to Sam's head, and for the first time in the run of the show, he doesn't run, lash out or fight; he goes quiet, stands and closes his eyes, waiting for the end. Waaaaah. In a marked contrast to a whole series in which he has screamed, shouted, cried and cried, slammed people against walls and thrown chairs, Sam is almost preternaturally calm throughout all this. He's still crying but almost absent-mindedly. I think it works very effectively. And oh, Sam... his dad's a crook. Who plays him so, so easily. You can see the four-year-old in him with such clarity.
In fact, the biggest flaw I think it has, this episode, is, again, the lack of coma resolution! Something, anything, would have been good! Not more weird abortive attempts at his waking up. But barring that, I liked it, and the whole series, very much. The end, when they all skip off to the pub, is sweet. As is the bet Ray and Chris have on who out of Sam and Gene would turn a gun on the other first.
So, Sam is still in 1973. The second series had better be as good as this one was. It was bloody fantastic. And now I've seen them all, I can engage in rampant theorising, which is always good. And fic-writing, which I am trying at the moment with little success. I have had severe writers' block for four months. This is me attempting to write through it, although it's not really working. I also need to write my remix, still. I'm the tiniest bit screwed.
Ah. Fandom is good. And I was walking below the Mancunian Way yesterday, which amused me.
purplerainbow at Oxford Road in the midst of swiftly falling snow. It didn't stick, of course. But it's good to know Manchester hasn't lost its talent for terrible, terrible weather. Clare said later that it's not really worth saying it's raining, hailing, sleeting or whatever - easier just to say it's precipitating again. I like that. Manchester precipitates. We went for a coffee and stared out at the snow, and really, that set the tone, because we didn't do much beyond chat, eat and wander around in the preciptation. They took me through Canal Street, which looks pretty even in the slushy morning, with the big flags everywhere to be seen - I like how one flag waves delicately over the street sign, for perfect photo opportunities - and the sense of, I don't know, culture. Actually, the whole trip was an exercise in culture for me; I was telling Pedar later that I have never been to, or visited, a real university. Oxford is different. It's ancient and weighed-down and different, and most of all, it's collegiate. A big university - and Manchester is very, very big - is an alien experience, and I rather think Balliol insulates me from the fact my university has eleven thousand undergraduates. Which is certainly not to say I don't love Oxford, because I do; I like that people know me, know my friends, are my friends, understand an underlying culture that is complex to such an extent that we have a specific vernacular and vaguely unusual way of life.Oh, my, I am being boring again. What I am trying to say is that my day yesterday was interesting in more ways than one. I had a peek at Clare's flat, or at least her room, which is very much like I'd expect - that is, quirky, full of treasures and unwashed plates - and she gave me a birthday present! I am now the proud owner of three cast metal Daleks. They are adorable. One is black, one is grey and one is red, and they are sitting on the table as tiny squat laptop guardians. I don't know what I'm going to call them. Suggestions on a
Following this, there was more wandering, a few segues into sights - we went to the Manchester Museum so Clare could see a penguin exhibit, and although I did in fact go to the Oxford Natural History Museum (and Pitt-Rivers, actually) during eighth week, it's been a long time since I had the time to do something like that. It was actually quite a lot of fun, peering at Egyptian artefacts and stuffed polar bears.
Hannah lives in Fallowfield, near Rusholme - Rusholme, I should add, is where the NRI population of the Northwest hang out (it serves the same purpose as Southall does in London), and as I was dragged there a lot as a small child, I'm not fond of the place. NRI culture seems to be a rule unto itself half the time. More on that another time. Anyway, Hannah's living arrangements are very different, but unexpectedly similar to the Jowett Walk flat I've got for next year, and her room, too, is a lot like her. I am also the proud owner of the Doctor Who Annual 2006! My birthday presents have a theme. It is joy, and I did enjoy myself thoroughly. The journey back was not so enjoyable, because first I had to hang about for half an hour in Salford, and then another twenty minutes in Southport, and it was freezing, freezing cold and my iPod had had some sort of spasm which mean it didn't want to play music at me, so all I could really do with myself was scribble fic notes in a reporter's notebook, which I usually try not to do because I find it makes people nervous, or read my Annual. So I read my Annual. It was terribly fun.
I got home, eventually, to be met by two pieces of good news. Firstly, Claire Curtis-Thomas (Labour MP for Crosby and Formby) has asked for a copy of my CV and for me to list my political interests. I'm hoping this is a good sign, because I would love this internship and I'd get so much out of it; I don't actually care if it was just licking House of Commons envelopes, because I want to see what this thing I'm working for is actually like.
Secondly, I got a very tongue-in-cheek email from the letters editor of Time. About a week ago, Pedar and I co-authored a letter about the political situation in India, which they are planning to publish. However, it's their policy to only attach one name to each letter. Therefore, they have looked through their records and found, as both Pedar and I have been published separately before, he gets his name on it as being the least recent! Pedar thinks this is hilarious. I'm not entirely sure why.
Sigh. I'm rambling as usual. I actually wanted to review the last two episodes of Life On Mars.
Firstly, episode seven. At the time I wasn't sure what to make of it, but I think it's grown on me. I liked a lot of things about it, and they outweigh my earlier doubts. I think. Anyway, more specifically, I liked:
-the very day-in-the-life, at-home feel of the first part of it. It really seems like just another day, what with the drug bust that goes perfectly to plan, the guy they shove into the cell - and I love the random detail that they keep picking him up for flashing! - and then, oh, the slash. Gene drags Sam out for dinner, not because he really wants to discuss procedure, but because he doesn't want to eat alone! It's sweet, and exemplifies the depth of the friendship they have at this point.
-the touches of reality throughout the scene. I was so impressed by the visual beauty of it as Sam touches the glass and sees the neon-light reflections of 2006 looking back at him. It's deliciously chilling. On a similar theme, I like the radio talking to him, the sudden urgency of the "real" world, and the revelation that somewhere out there is playing Pulp at him! Gene's reaction throughout this is interesting, too. Either he knows Sam's a nutcase and puts up with it, or - actually, no, that must be it. Gene is far too bright not to know there is something seriously unhinged in Sam's head, but he's choosing to ignore it.
-Sam's eyes open. I was surprised, because this is the first time this has happened, but I was a little disappointed we don't see this from his POV, so we don't see what he's seeing.
-the death. It's startling, on top of the almost-domestic scenes we've had until this point. Gene's attempts to hush up the truth seem a little too transparent, but I have to admit I didn't guess what was going on until the reveal.
-Sam choking on the tabasco sauce. He's so close to 2006 he can taste it. I think that this scene, along with the earlier scene out on the road, back up whoever suggested that Sam's coma hallucinations, or flashbacks or whatever they are, are going backwards. The sensory tests, the Glasgow tests, they should have been done first, and besides, the earlier bit suggests it's Sam being picked up off the road after the accident.
-the symbolism inherent in the bit where Sam is standing, screaming, in a deserted white room. I don't actually subscribe to the theory, but I think this is the strongest indication we've had to date that perhaps Sam really is just going insane, a high-functioning schizophrenic. I don't know much about it, but I think his symptoms - hallucinations, fear, persistent delusions - are in fact in accordance with schizophrenia.
-the tiny detail about Billy's sister telling Sam he has rubbish hair. I like her.
-the whole of Sam's enquiry into the death. It's something he would do, but it's underscored with this desperate belief that somehow, somehow, this is going to get him home, and you just know it's going to end badly. And it does.
-Gene set Sam up. I didn't see that coming at all - and I should have done, given it's another thing that happens in Discworld! - and it's a turning point for Gene. Most of all, it underlines the relationship they had at the beginning, which is friendship tied up with tension. I like it very much.
Overall, it's a good episode; what I didn't like was the lack of resolution for the coma hallucinations. Something is going on in the real world, and I wish we'd had more of a hint at what it is.
And, finally! The last episode, at least until next year. Just think, no more of my rambling! But before I go, episode eight:
Two things made this episode for me. Well, actually three. Firstly: Sam dialling the number they get from the porn film and freezing as little Sammy Tyler answers. It's chilling. So much is packed into that tiny moment: Sam's horror that his parents may be involved with the whole crime mastermind thing, the way he immediately has to lie about what he's heard, but I think most of all, he's just heard his own voice answer the phone. It's a tiny thing and it does so much.
Secondly: the fact that I don't, personally, slash Sam and Gene, but they slash themselves. The dialogue in this show is always good, but it reaches whole new levels of fantastic in this episode. I like the initial exchange where Gene is talking about fish climbing ladders and Sam answering, with almost physical pain, "This... is a very mixed metaphor."
Gene, later: "Am I still getting my wotsits mixed up, Gladys?"
"No, that was a simile, you're all right."
He calls him Gladys. Gladys. I ask you. And then there's Sam's wonderful, wonderful assessment of Gene's character: "An overweight, over-the-hill, nicotine-stained, borderline alcoholic homophobe with a superiority complex and an unhealthy obsession with male bonding."
"You made that sound like a bad thing!"
(Although, quibble: does Gene know what "homophobe" means? Was it in use in 1973?)
All the way through this, the relationship between Gene and Sam seems to have matured to a point where you could almost call them friends. There's still severe tension between them, not least because Sam doesn't want to be there and Gene thinks Sam is crazy, but I do wonder if Gene is a bit of a statistical outlier as far as the whole situation goes. He certainly knows more than he's letting on; for one thing, he really doesn't believe Sam's cover story. Witness the way Gene always says "Hyde" in inverted commas, with deep scepticism, and occasionally makes comments - "You want to be here!" - that seem as though they're hinting at Sam's real situation. I like it.
And, thirdly: there was the bit which had me thinking I refuse, I refuse categorically to do this, I am not going to cry at a British fantasy seventies cop show, I am not. And I didn't. But I sniffled. A lot. It's the bit where Vic Tyler holds a gun to Sam's head, and for the first time in the run of the show, he doesn't run, lash out or fight; he goes quiet, stands and closes his eyes, waiting for the end. Waaaaah. In a marked contrast to a whole series in which he has screamed, shouted, cried and cried, slammed people against walls and thrown chairs, Sam is almost preternaturally calm throughout all this. He's still crying but almost absent-mindedly. I think it works very effectively. And oh, Sam... his dad's a crook. Who plays him so, so easily. You can see the four-year-old in him with such clarity.
In fact, the biggest flaw I think it has, this episode, is, again, the lack of coma resolution! Something, anything, would have been good! Not more weird abortive attempts at his waking up. But barring that, I liked it, and the whole series, very much. The end, when they all skip off to the pub, is sweet. As is the bet Ray and Chris have on who out of Sam and Gene would turn a gun on the other first.
So, Sam is still in 1973. The second series had better be as good as this one was. It was bloody fantastic. And now I've seen them all, I can engage in rampant theorising, which is always good. And fic-writing, which I am trying at the moment with little success. I have had severe writers' block for four months. This is me attempting to write through it, although it's not really working. I also need to write my remix, still. I'm the tiniest bit screwed.
Ah. Fandom is good. And I was walking below the Mancunian Way yesterday, which amused me.
