Weekly Update/30 Days of Who: Day 6
General News
First, let me plug The Terrible Zodin, a free online fanzine with goodies from reviews, articles, interviews with writers, art, paper dolls, fanfiction, and maybe if you look at the Rob Shearman interview in the latest issue you might even find a certain Sixth Doctor with an umbrella on a beach ball drawn by someone you might know...
At people's recommendation, I finally listened to the Arc of Infinity DVD commentary. It was good fun! And yes, Colin Baker was awesome. On top of the running gag with his chicken hat, I loved the one with Councilor Hedin and his coffee. Also, in his first couple minutes, he shot off a couple of good one-liners:
"Wow, Peter. Last time I saw you lying down like that, you turned into me."
and,
"Somebody named Colin is in trouble. I do not approve of this."
Upcoming Commentaries
The Web Planet FINALLY FINALLY came in, so I'll be picking that up later this week. In the meantime, I've got some freshly Bakered serials for you: I ran across The Hand of Fear in the library (in the TV Sitcoms section. Yes, really), so that'll be up next. Netflix-wise, I'm also expecting The Horns of Nimon sometime in the next few days, and then a very special treat: A classic amongst classics, Genesis of the Daleks.
Audio Dramas
Let's see, what have I covered since last week...
Minuet in Hell (Eight/Charley)
I spent most of the beginning of this going "OH MY GOD WHAT HAPPENED TO AMERICA?" This was made just after George W. Bush become president, so I wonder if Gary Russell was hypothesizing that (from a UNIT-future point of view) America was about to become overrun with Southern conservatives. Now, I'm rarely ever in the South, but I'm not sure anyone down there has a Southern accent quite like that. Regardless, I enjoyed the creepiness and the hammy demons and I wanted to give Eight a hug a lot. Also, BRIG: Awesome as always. I found it strangely adorable that he would read his e-mails to the minister out loud as he typed them (I know he had to do that because it's an audio and we can't read anything, but still). Also, nentari, I think understand what you meant about this story probably working better as a novel.
The Haunting of Thomas Brewster (Five/Nyssa)
Listened to mainly as preparation for the next audio. At first I thought that Brewster was a bit too much of a Victorian cut-out character to be interesting (orphaned as a child, sent to live in a parish, bought by a local salvager to join his pack of urchin boys in digging up useful junk from the banks of the Thames, obsessed with his mother, etc.), but he grew on me. For some reason, I really liked his leitmotif, even though it was WAY overused. Also, I liked how they were able to pull off alternating between the usual narrative structure and Brewster narrating. I think this might've been the first audio I've listened to that had a scene that actually made me freeze up (as in, I was sitting in drawing class with my pencil hovering over my paper for a few moments), near the end when Brewster's mother's ghost tells him that she still loves him. And I grinned to myself like a loon when they subtly revealed that Brewster's best friend was actually gay for him (so of course he had to be killed off :(). In the interviews at the end, they brought up a likeness of Brewster to Adric (both being orphaned-urchin-boys companions) and the conclusion they came to was basically "Adric was the nice one, you could rely on him. Brewster is much more sketchy."
And speaking of which...
The Boy That Time Forgot (Five/Nyssa/Adric)
This is a story I've been waiting to listen to for weeks, and it did not disappoint. Where do I even start...probably from the beginning. Five tries a sort of temporal seance to try and locate his stolen TARDIS which winds up whooshing him, Nyssa, and a Victorian gentleman and lady back to, what appears to be, prehistoric Earth. Then they learn that Adric is not only still alive thanks to accidental timey-wimey stuff that gets explained later, but he's managed to use mathematics, armies of giant insects, psychic frequencies, and Cybermen technology to achieve God Mode.
A large part of the plot is, naturally, Five's group trying to figure out a way back to the 19th century. But a good chunk is given over to examinations of the Five/Nyssa/Adric dynamic. Adric, needless to say, has changed. A LOT. He's become an old man who's been languishing without human, or humanoid, contact for a very long time and has become filled with bitterness, loneliness, egomania, a pretty hardcore sense of abandonment, and a desire for revenge against the Doctor for the aforementioned abandonment. In fact, I'd almost call him the story's tragic antagonist. Paul Magrs included quite a few nods to the anti-Adric masses with lines like "the more I hear about this Adric fellow, the less I like him!" and more poignantly "were you pleased when I was dead? Secretly? You can tell me. I was a brat, wasn't I? Were you happy when I was gone?" But something that really gripped me was the legitimizing of the Adric/Nyssa pairing. It started with a scene-ending line that literally made me jump off my bed and do a little dance:
Adric: "You never even kissed me goodbye."
And then it evolved into this scene:
Nyssa: "You build an empire at the far end of history, and for what? Survival? Power? Vanity?"
Adric: "I always thought...that you and I had much in common. We were both orphans, so young and so dependent on the Doctor. You...loved me then."
Nyssa: "The old Adric, yes! The awkward, frustrated, pig-headed boy!"
Adric: "I'm so lonely, Nyssa! My creatures here can give me almost everything and...and they try their best, but they don't really love me! They worship me, but..." *grab*
Nyssa: "Oww!"
Adric: "...it's not enough!"
Nyssa: "Stop touching me!
Adric: "Can't you see past this ruined body of mine?"
Nyssa: "Adric, I care for you a great deal!"
Adric: "THAT'S NOT ENOUGH! I need you to love me, Nyssa! Why else do you think I brought you here?"
Nyssa: "Brought me here?"
Adric: "That's why I created this world! To survive, yes, but also to lure you here! Don't you see? It is all meant...it is part of the calculations...we will be together at last, and you shall be my empress! My bride!"
Nyssa: "...Your WHAT?"
Andrew Sachs makes a deliciously hamtastic crazy-old-man!Adric, although I was repeatedly reminded that this was the same guy who played Skagra in the Shada remake. As the plot progresses there's more discussion between Adric and Five about everything that's happened to him, ranging from the Doctor screaming at him to grow up (which becomes beautifully ironic when it's revealed just how old Adric is now), to an admission that the Doctor blames himself for Adric's apparent death, to Adric forgiving the Doctor enough to perform one final Heroic Sacrifice (because did you really think they were bringing Adric back for good?) by singing a lock-transfer projection of himself into the stolen TARDIS so he can sent it back. Before he dies, he imparts one last moving token of advice to Brewster:
Adric: "Goodbye, Thomas Brewster. Stay with the Doctor, won't you? If you don't belong anywhere, in any time, if you're an orphan, then the best thing to do is to stay with the Doctor!"
Brewster: "Wait! Who...who are you?"
Adric: "Adric. Remember my name, and one day you can ask the Doctor what became of me. It's a good story, I can promise you that..."
And then in a beautiful contrast to the "now I'll never know if I was right" of Earthshock...
"I did it, Doctor! I managed to...find it!"
*wibble*
I'm thinking about writing an article/review and submitting it to The Terrible Zodin, but not for next issue because I don't want to overload them with more Adric stuff (they've already got 2 pending articles about him already, but I've also volunteered to do art for them).
Which brings me to...
Whatever tickles your fancy: Adric-spam
I apologize in advance for this. Some of these I already posted on ihasatardis.
The door is over this way. *runs*
But seriously, what is Matthew wearing?
Day 01 - Your Favourite Quote: Multiple
Day 02 - Your Favourite Classic Series Episode: The Mind Robber/Battlefield
Day 03 - Your Favourite New Series Episode: Girl in the Fireplace/Midnight/Vincent and the Doctor
Day 04 - Your Favourite Doctor: Ten (New), Three (Classic)
Day 05 - Your Favourite Companion: Donna (New), Romana/Leela/Ace/Jamie (Classic)
Day 06 - Whatever Tickles Your Fancy
Day 07 - Your Favourite Piece of Music
Day 08 - A Who-Related Photo That Makes You Happy
Day 09 - A Who-Related Photo That Makes You Angry/Sad
Day 10 - A Who-Related Photo That You Took
Day 11 - Your Favorite Season (Classic or New)
Day 12 - Whatever Tickles Your Fancy
Day 13 - Your Favorite Villain
Day 14 - The Villain Who Scared You the Most
Day 15 - Favorite Who-Related Tumblr
Day 16 - Your Favorite Who-Related FanFic
Day 17 - A Piece of Who-Related FanArt
Day 18 - Whatever Tickles Your Fancy
Day 19 - The Scene That Made Your Cry the Most
Day 20 - The Character Who Is Most Like You
Day 21 - Your Doctor Who OTP
Day 22 - A Who-Related Fan-Site
Day 23 - A Who-Related YouTube Video
Day 24 - Whatever Tickles Your Fancy
Day 25 - Favorite Who Actor
Day 26 - Favorite Who Actress
Day 27 - An Episode You Wish Hadn’t Been Made
Day 28 - An Episode Idea You Created Yourself
Day 29 - Who You Think Should Be the Next Doctor
Day 30 - Whatever Tickles Your Fancy
First, let me plug The Terrible Zodin, a free online fanzine with goodies from reviews, articles, interviews with writers, art, paper dolls, fanfiction, and maybe if you look at the Rob Shearman interview in the latest issue you might even find a certain Sixth Doctor with an umbrella on a beach ball drawn by someone you might know...
At people's recommendation, I finally listened to the Arc of Infinity DVD commentary. It was good fun! And yes, Colin Baker was awesome. On top of the running gag with his chicken hat, I loved the one with Councilor Hedin and his coffee. Also, in his first couple minutes, he shot off a couple of good one-liners:
"Wow, Peter. Last time I saw you lying down like that, you turned into me."
and,
"Somebody named Colin is in trouble. I do not approve of this."
Upcoming Commentaries
The Web Planet FINALLY FINALLY came in, so I'll be picking that up later this week. In the meantime, I've got some freshly Bakered serials for you: I ran across The Hand of Fear in the library (in the TV Sitcoms section. Yes, really), so that'll be up next. Netflix-wise, I'm also expecting The Horns of Nimon sometime in the next few days, and then a very special treat: A classic amongst classics, Genesis of the Daleks.
Audio Dramas
Let's see, what have I covered since last week...
Minuet in Hell (Eight/Charley)
I spent most of the beginning of this going "OH MY GOD WHAT HAPPENED TO AMERICA?" This was made just after George W. Bush become president, so I wonder if Gary Russell was hypothesizing that (from a UNIT-future point of view) America was about to become overrun with Southern conservatives. Now, I'm rarely ever in the South, but I'm not sure anyone down there has a Southern accent quite like that. Regardless, I enjoyed the creepiness and the hammy demons and I wanted to give Eight a hug a lot. Also, BRIG: Awesome as always. I found it strangely adorable that he would read his e-mails to the minister out loud as he typed them (I know he had to do that because it's an audio and we can't read anything, but still). Also, nentari, I think understand what you meant about this story probably working better as a novel.
The Haunting of Thomas Brewster (Five/Nyssa)
Listened to mainly as preparation for the next audio. At first I thought that Brewster was a bit too much of a Victorian cut-out character to be interesting (orphaned as a child, sent to live in a parish, bought by a local salvager to join his pack of urchin boys in digging up useful junk from the banks of the Thames, obsessed with his mother, etc.), but he grew on me. For some reason, I really liked his leitmotif, even though it was WAY overused. Also, I liked how they were able to pull off alternating between the usual narrative structure and Brewster narrating. I think this might've been the first audio I've listened to that had a scene that actually made me freeze up (as in, I was sitting in drawing class with my pencil hovering over my paper for a few moments), near the end when Brewster's mother's ghost tells him that she still loves him. And I grinned to myself like a loon when they subtly revealed that Brewster's best friend was actually gay for him (so of course he had to be killed off :(). In the interviews at the end, they brought up a likeness of Brewster to Adric (both being orphaned-urchin-boys companions) and the conclusion they came to was basically "Adric was the nice one, you could rely on him. Brewster is much more sketchy."
And speaking of which...
The Boy That Time Forgot (Five/Nyssa/Adric)
This is a story I've been waiting to listen to for weeks, and it did not disappoint. Where do I even start...probably from the beginning. Five tries a sort of temporal seance to try and locate his stolen TARDIS which winds up whooshing him, Nyssa, and a Victorian gentleman and lady back to, what appears to be, prehistoric Earth. Then they learn that Adric is not only still alive thanks to accidental timey-wimey stuff that gets explained later, but he's managed to use mathematics, armies of giant insects, psychic frequencies, and Cybermen technology to achieve God Mode.
A large part of the plot is, naturally, Five's group trying to figure out a way back to the 19th century. But a good chunk is given over to examinations of the Five/Nyssa/Adric dynamic. Adric, needless to say, has changed. A LOT. He's become an old man who's been languishing without human, or humanoid, contact for a very long time and has become filled with bitterness, loneliness, egomania, a pretty hardcore sense of abandonment, and a desire for revenge against the Doctor for the aforementioned abandonment. In fact, I'd almost call him the story's tragic antagonist. Paul Magrs included quite a few nods to the anti-Adric masses with lines like "the more I hear about this Adric fellow, the less I like him!" and more poignantly "were you pleased when I was dead? Secretly? You can tell me. I was a brat, wasn't I? Were you happy when I was gone?" But something that really gripped me was the legitimizing of the Adric/Nyssa pairing. It started with a scene-ending line that literally made me jump off my bed and do a little dance:
Adric: "You never even kissed me goodbye."
And then it evolved into this scene:
Nyssa: "You build an empire at the far end of history, and for what? Survival? Power? Vanity?"
Adric: "I always thought...that you and I had much in common. We were both orphans, so young and so dependent on the Doctor. You...loved me then."
Nyssa: "The old Adric, yes! The awkward, frustrated, pig-headed boy!"
Adric: "I'm so lonely, Nyssa! My creatures here can give me almost everything and...and they try their best, but they don't really love me! They worship me, but..." *grab*
Nyssa: "Oww!"
Adric: "...it's not enough!"
Nyssa: "Stop touching me!
Adric: "Can't you see past this ruined body of mine?"
Nyssa: "Adric, I care for you a great deal!"
Adric: "THAT'S NOT ENOUGH! I need you to love me, Nyssa! Why else do you think I brought you here?"
Nyssa: "Brought me here?"
Adric: "That's why I created this world! To survive, yes, but also to lure you here! Don't you see? It is all meant...it is part of the calculations...we will be together at last, and you shall be my empress! My bride!"
Nyssa: "...Your WHAT?"
Andrew Sachs makes a deliciously hamtastic crazy-old-man!Adric, although I was repeatedly reminded that this was the same guy who played Skagra in the Shada remake. As the plot progresses there's more discussion between Adric and Five about everything that's happened to him, ranging from the Doctor screaming at him to grow up (which becomes beautifully ironic when it's revealed just how old Adric is now), to an admission that the Doctor blames himself for Adric's apparent death, to Adric forgiving the Doctor enough to perform one final Heroic Sacrifice (because did you really think they were bringing Adric back for good?) by singing a lock-transfer projection of himself into the stolen TARDIS so he can sent it back. Before he dies, he imparts one last moving token of advice to Brewster:
Adric: "Goodbye, Thomas Brewster. Stay with the Doctor, won't you? If you don't belong anywhere, in any time, if you're an orphan, then the best thing to do is to stay with the Doctor!"
Brewster: "Wait! Who...who are you?"
Adric: "Adric. Remember my name, and one day you can ask the Doctor what became of me. It's a good story, I can promise you that..."
And then in a beautiful contrast to the "now I'll never know if I was right" of Earthshock...
"I did it, Doctor! I managed to...find it!"
*wibble*
I'm thinking about writing an article/review and submitting it to The Terrible Zodin, but not for next issue because I don't want to overload them with more Adric stuff (they've already got 2 pending articles about him already, but I've also volunteered to do art for them).
Which brings me to...
Whatever tickles your fancy: Adric-spam
I apologize in advance for this. Some of these I already posted on ihasatardis.
The door is over this way. *runs*
But seriously, what is Matthew wearing?
Day 01 - Your Favourite Quote: Multiple
Day 02 - Your Favourite Classic Series Episode: The Mind Robber/Battlefield
Day 03 - Your Favourite New Series Episode: Girl in the Fireplace/Midnight/Vincent and the Doctor
Day 04 - Your Favourite Doctor: Ten (New), Three (Classic)
Day 05 - Your Favourite Companion: Donna (New), Romana/Leela/Ace/Jamie (Classic)
Day 06 - Whatever Tickles Your Fancy
Day 07 - Your Favourite Piece of Music
Day 08 - A Who-Related Photo That Makes You Happy
Day 09 - A Who-Related Photo That Makes You Angry/Sad
Day 10 - A Who-Related Photo That You Took
Day 11 - Your Favorite Season (Classic or New)
Day 12 - Whatever Tickles Your Fancy
Day 13 - Your Favorite Villain
Day 14 - The Villain Who Scared You the Most
Day 15 - Favorite Who-Related Tumblr
Day 16 - Your Favorite Who-Related FanFic
Day 17 - A Piece of Who-Related FanArt
Day 18 - Whatever Tickles Your Fancy
Day 19 - The Scene That Made Your Cry the Most
Day 20 - The Character Who Is Most Like You
Day 21 - Your Doctor Who OTP
Day 22 - A Who-Related Fan-Site
Day 23 - A Who-Related YouTube Video
Day 24 - Whatever Tickles Your Fancy
Day 25 - Favorite Who Actor
Day 26 - Favorite Who Actress
Day 27 - An Episode You Wish Hadn’t Been Made
Day 28 - An Episode Idea You Created Yourself
Day 29 - Who You Think Should Be the Next Doctor
Day 30 - Whatever Tickles Your Fancy