The Rabbit Hole

So, I finally got to see Torchwood: Children of Earth. If this is how they work it when they're not doing full seasons, then, shit, yo, never let them write 13-episode seasons again. It was easily the most compelling Torchwood ever. They tackled big issues, and they--gosh!--dealt with them. Not in that "everyone is forgiven 'cause everyone messes up" way either, which was most shocking of all. I really enjoyed it...

...up until Day Three when I, looking for icons for a totally unrelated fandom, got spoiled for MAJOR PLOT DEVELOPMENTS by someone not putting a spoiler warning on their icon dump and I saw spoiler icons for the series. THANKS A LOT, ICON MAKER.

Seriously, I managed to go a few weeks without being spoiled through vigilance and courtesy of those who'd seen and did everything in their power to give away nothing. The second I let my guard down, boom, spoiled. SIGH.

I did still enjoy the series. I liked how weighty it felt and how it even made me sympathize with some fairly evil folk here and there. (Except that one lady. No spoilers to say that, just, yeah, if you've seen it, you know who I mean.) Over at ivy03's post, I mentioned how very Who it seemed at parts--where perfectly ordinary people got to be amazing, and I really liked that counter-balance to the people who were inherently extraordinary or just powerful who were complete dicks a lot of the time.

I think ivy03 gets into it in more and better detail than I'll ever manage, so go read and comment on her post if you like. (Spoilers, naturally.) The one thing someone brought up that I held onto so I could address it after I'd seen it all was this question raised over at io9: Was Children of Earth homophobic? (Spoilers!)

My short answer is no, but that doesn't mean they didn't slip up a bit. ( Spoilers everywhere! )

I have other thoughts on the abuses of power and the ugliness of the ethical choices, but they've been covered by most other people. I might get around to posting them, I might not.

I can't believe that on a show where one of the stars has the weirdest duck-tail haircut, the thing that bothers me most is not knowing where on Earth he got a cast from. So, Supernatural fans, how did Sam get a cast, and why, after several months, does he still have one? (Warning: I'm only halfway through season two, so references to events later probably won't make sense to me.)

I feel pretty good about catching up on TV, but I'm still so far behind it's ridiculous. I mean, LOST is over and I've not seen half the episodes (or more). Ditto Torchwood. Sooooo far behind on Doctor Who that I'm at risk for spoiling whenever I turn on BSG on Fridays because the American broadcast is ahead of me. SHAMEFUL.

And all of those are going to continue to be neglected as I should have not one but two discs of Tales from the Crypt coming to me from Netflix today. Damn EC Comics reprints being so expensive! I shall have to watch the wonderfully gruesome horror on the tele-vision-machine!

In addition to consuming two hours of Carnivale, I managed to squeeze in the last two episodes of this latest season of Doctor Who.

Check out the icon on this post. That is almost exactly my reaction.

Let me be clear upfront: saying this is the worst season of the new Who so far isn't saying much. They've only had three seasons anyway, and besides old-skool Doctor Who is littered with its own bad episodes and seasons (and Doctors, apparently). Still? WORST SEASON.

( Spoilers and ranting beneath the cut. )

As I was telling viridian last night, seeing posters for Torchwood (there's one on my way to work! I see Captain Jack every day!) makes me realize how truly awful that show was. And, combined with my overall negative attitude towards this season of Doctor Who, I have zero interest in picking up with Torchwood's second season. The only reason I'm even interested in next year's Doctor Who is for who I've heard will be on it. I think taking a break from new Who is the best thing I can do, and I don't mind a jot waiting for the Christmas special. The Christmas specials are usually fun, and it might just do to shake me of the new Who blues. I think, or thought, that was a good plan.

And then this happened:
viridian: Skip the Christmas special. It's got Kylie Minogue.
Me: ...
Me: Okay, new plan: I will forget about Doctor Who until its new season and will watch the second season of Robin Hood up through Christmas to get my BBC-fix. Yes.

I don't have anything pithy to say about Torchwood now that I've seen all of it, but I will say one thing: John Barrowman is creepy good at pretending to be dead. Like, whoa. He keeps really, really still, and just goes totally slack. Scares the pants off me. People pretending to be dead who are actually good at it when they're being looked at, close-up, are few and far between. One of the best was Kevin Spacey in L.A. Confidential. I add John Barrowman to that freaky-awesome play-dead list.

More coherent thoughts than that are unavailable at this time. My thoughts about how indecently attractive Gareth David-Lloyd is are not anything approaching coherent at this time. He is really cute, and he looks good with jacket on or off. And he's literally a biscuit older than me, which means I'm losing my Elektra complex a little! Woo!

viridian's story is third out of the gate. It's a post Doctor Who, new series season 2, set-in-the-world of Torchwood story featuring Jack Harkness, an AU-Torchwood-employed Rose Tyler, and the prompt was "mirror." That last one makes a cameo instead of being central the way prompts ought to be, but hey, it's in there!



The Tension Between Mortality and Morbidity
by trinityvixen

*( 'You want I should shag you to death?' 'No one's ever tried.' )

Another one that simply ate my brain (see, I can say that now because there are no zombies in this story) and ended up being way too long. Hope you've a good while to digest your fic, trakkie, 'cause this one's for you. She requested a Torchwood fic featuring Ianto/Rose and Ianto's stopwatch. What she didn't say was that she had wanted some Ianto/Jack but didn't request it because she thought I didn't do slash. I don't. This story is the exception that proves the rule. I don't think she'll mind that I added it in.

Spoilers for the second season of the new series of Doctor Who and Torchwood through episode eight.


Veritum dies aperit
by trinityvixen

*( Thirty-seven seconds, aught-nine )

Latest Torchwood is awesome. Hi-lariously so. Jack's ramblings about his past lovers v.cute instead of in-your-face-look-this-guy-is-a-slut obvious. Jack v.cute in general, even when being a right bastard. So many funny lines besides. I friggin love Ianto more than ever.

( I wonder if the other part of the pair is the 'Love Glove' (woo spoilers!) )

And then there's this for the ABSOLUTE WINNINGEST WIN EVER!
"I had a boyfriend who used to walk into rooms like that--a 'grand' entrance. Got kind of boring. Though, he was one of twins, so I put up with it. Twin acrobats. Man, I gotta write that book. Maybe even illustrate it."

:: massive stampede as all of fandom runs to Amazon to await its release::

Heroes last night deserves this icon. Because, seriously? Dude.

( Spoilers! )

Watched the latest Torchwood, too. I'm not sure what I think. It's definitely better than the week before, but I still don't buy what they're trying to do with Jack's character. If I hadn't seen Doctor Who before this (which, to be fair, you don't need to at all to understand everything going on), I would probably be okay with it. As is, it contradicts the Jack Harkness they introduced on that show first and makes him into some schizo Jack. It does not help that I don't think John Barrowman does dark very well. You can be tough and not dark, as Jack was originally, and he excels at being shamelessly flirty and falsely shallow, suggesting self-respect and -knowledge that run a lot deeper than the characterizations being flung at him in Torchwood that just aren't sticking. Whatever happened for however long Jack was on Earth after leaving at the end of Doctor Who had better be something incredible or this is going to piss me off royally.

I had a dream that was possibly the most horrible one ever last night. My mother and I were sitting in a booth at Friendly's (no, that's not the horrible part), and she casually told me my youngest sister was dead. I started to freak out and cry, and she couldn't work out why I was so upset. "Oh, I must have forgotten to call you. I was making a lot of phone calls to let people know when it happened." I couldn't figure out if she was like in shock or what, but I was a mess. I woke up to find the blanket had gotten twisted around my neck, nearly killing me. Ugh, not cool.

*

Torchwood continues to be just fine. The second episode was a hoot but a cruel, cruel tease as it featured the entire rest of the cast pondering (instead of getting off--or, on, as the case might be--their asses and finding out) Jack's sexuality. Look, people, you can sit around and wonder all day, but you're telling me that none of you would just run up and try to jump his bones after watching him bliss-out an alien with only kiss? Please. No, that's not a spoiler, either, don't worry.

( These are spoilers. )

*

I finally watched the first disc I had from Netflix of Rome. It's quite good, for all that there seems to be random sex scenes and nudity flung about. I'm not a prude by any measure, I just don't see why making it that graphic adds to the story. Except for Octavian's mother, whatever her name was. Her screwing people is her screwing people over for the most part, which is fun to watch. This isn't a series I'm going to be able to watch without bile in my throat over the women represented in it, but it's not like I can change that era to make it less sexist.

I find the details and the intrigue well worth it, even from the very beginning where we meet the two soldiers. I loved watched the Roman formation in action--how unstoppable that tactic was! Never get to see that outside of a History Channel reinactment, and they don't have half so much money to do their mockups with as HBO does. And all the political stuff is fascinatingly complex and not stupidly spelled out nor muddled so I couldn't follow. It's a keeper, which is a first for an HBO series (I've never liked anything they've done--not The Sopranos, not Sex and the City, didn't even care for Six Feet Under too well).

*

Oh, and Smallville. Yeah, you know why last week was so enjoyable? LANA LANG WAS NOWHERE TO BE FOUND. She was there for two minutes, and gone with her umpteenth concussion. Would that she'd stayed in it, but they have hard heads in Kansas. JImmy Olsen got a serious laugh off of me with how stupid he is (no wonder he's still at the same position by the time Clark and Lois are supposed to get there--he may have rivaled Clark for stupidity last night), Raya was smoking hot, Chloe scarcely less so for what little action she got, and the plot line with the, ugh, "Zoners" was average. But Lana Lang and Lex Luthor's relationship troubles interest me about as much as the mold on my shower curtain (as in I want to take bleach to it and scrub it from existence). Had another moment of "[SPOILER] dies, and LANA LANG is still here. Freakin' great."

Bring back Oliver Queen, even if he is--and I cannot believe how dumb this is or how badly it could ruin a character who was awesome last week--shooting up and going crazy. At least I can distract myself with his pretty and go "La la la" through the rest.