TV meme day 5 ; book alphabet F
Day 05 - A show you hate
Well, you know, sane people don't watch shows they hate.
And as you all know, I'm not particularly sane, so this is a show I hate and that I've still watched fairly often. You might say that I love to hate it.
7th Heaven
Or in the words of some mot maker I've sadly lost the name of:
This show is so delightfully horrible. All problems can be solved in 42 minutes - but of course only ever by the Camdens. Other people only exist so that the Camdens can show how great they are. They are so squeaky clean and self-satisfied that one must wonder if Luke 18:14 has completely escaped them. (It has, admittedly, escaped me - I watch the show in thorough glee that I am not, nor do I know anyone who is, like them.)
Adding to the ambivalence is the wiiiiide range of acting skills. Simon and Steven are quite good; they occasionally rise above the material. Annie, Mary, and Matt are adequate - their ability to nauseate me depends on just how awful their lines are. Ruthie's a prime example of why cutesy child actors are made of evil. And Lucy... I have no idea who encouraged the delusion that this girl could act, but wow.
All in all, watching this show is like scratching a huge scab on your knee. You know you shouldn't do it, it makes you wince in pain, and yet you can't stop yourself.
Day 06 - Favorite episode of your favorite t.v show
Day 07 - Least favorite episode of your favorite t.v show
Day 08 - A show everyone should watch
Day 09 - Best scene ever
Day 10 - A show you thought you wouldn’t like but ended up loving
Day 11 - A show that disappointed you
Day 12 - An episode you’ve watched more than 5 times
Day 13 - Favorite childhood show
Day 14 - Favorite male character
Day 15 - Favorite female character
Day 16 - Your guilty pleasure show
Day 17 - Favorite mini series
Day 18 - Favorite title sequence
Day 19 - Best t.v show cast
Day 20 - Favorite kiss
Day 21 - Favorite ship
Day 22 - Favorite series finale
Day 23 - Most annoying character
Day 24 - Best quote
Day 25 - A show you plan on watching (old or new)
Day 26 - OMG WTF? Season finale
Day 27 - Best pilot episode
Day 28 - First t.v show obsession
Day 29 - Current t.v show obsession
Day 30 - Saddest character death
***
Book alphabet: F
1. Freedom is important, and the longing for this is a common theme in book. Tell us about a book you think is about freedom!
The Wind on the Moon by Eric Linklater. It's not only about freedom, but it's an important theme. Dinah and Dorinda need the freedom to escape from their boring lives, and later from their lives as kangaroos in the zoo. The falcon and the puma also need to escape from the zoo, and the puma later from the hunters. The girls' father of course need to escape from his dungeon, and the people of Bombardy need freedom from their tyrant, Hulagu Bloot. All in all creating a vivid, sprawling tale about two girls learning to take care of themselves without growing up too much.
The book was written in 1944, around the same time as Pippi Longstocking and The Moomins and the Great Flood. A certain level of absurdism and anarchy seems to have spread among children's authors at that time, with circles on the water spreading to this day. And thank God for that!
2. Books often become films. What do you do first, watch the film or read the book? Do you watch film adaptations of books you have read?
I do watch film adaptations of books I have read, but given a choice, I'll usually want to see the film first; it makes it easier to appreciate the film for what it is. "The book was better than the film" is a cliché, and not necessarily true - but the book is nearly always broader than the film; there's room for more in a novel than in two hours of screentime. Because of this, once you've read the book it's easy to watch the film and go, "Oh, this bit I really liked has been changed!" but this doesn't necessarily mean that the film is worse than the book, any more than Shakespeare's sonnets are worse than his plays.
3. Tell us of a really good film adaptation of a book!
Just like I prefer watching the film first, I also tend to prefer film adaptations that aren't too close to the book. As Neil Gaiman put it concerning Stardust, it'd be awful to have a film that was like the book only not as good. It has to be its own thing.
That said, there are good adaptations in every range from very faithful to not faithful at all. Tage Danielsson's adaptation of Ronia the Robber's Daughter is practically word-to-word in places (and where it's not, it feels like it could be), and yet it's a film with its own charm, not just checking off a list of Book Things To Include. On the other end of the scale, there's Amy Heckerling's Clueless, next to Lost in Austen the best Jane Austen adaptation I've ever seen, even though it's set in another part of the world, with other names and relationships to the characters, and a completely different type of dialogue. Because Heckerling gets it. Far too many modern filmmakers seem to be of the impression that Austen was a romantic who liked to write about people wearing Empire dresses and getting married, when Austen is anything but a romantic and it was perfectly normal for people to wear Empire dresses and get married back then.
A good in-between type of film is The Princess Bride, which is remarkable in that the author wrote the screenplay and was still able to kill his darlings and make the whole thing film-shaped rather than book-shaped. Of course, it probably helped that he'd written a bunch of films before that.
4. I want you to give some attention to a författare (author) you think isn't given enough note.
At first I was going to say Claque/Anna-Lisa Wärnlöf, but that would only be useful for the Swedes, so instead I'm going to say Kirsten Miller, author of the Kiki Strike books. I've mentioned her a bunch of times before, and probably should make a proper Kiki Strike pimping post at some point, but meanwhile this will have to do.
The Kiki Strike books are fun adventures set in (and below) New York, with a bunch of schoolgirls at its core. They remind me a bit of The Man From UNCLE in that they're firmly tongue-in-cheek yet very exciting at the same time. (And though morthel teased me that they're Nancy Drew books, they're really quite a lot better than that.) They're marketed as "Five delinquent Girl Scouts, a million hungry rats, one secret city beneath Manhattan, and a butt-kicking girl superspy- welcome to the world of Kiki Strike."
There are plenty of reasons to like the Kiki Strike books. Here's a good ten:
1. DELINQUENT GIRL SCOUTS
2. Helpful information on ways to be a good spy.
3. The narrator is the resident librarian-girl. The team HAS a librarian-girl!
4. The cover art is from the same person who made the cover for Thessaly: witch for hire, and I have a feeling Thessaly and this bunch would actually get along.
5. These teenagers are so competent they put the Sarah Jane team to shame.
6. It took me to the second book to realize that every important character is a girl - because it's treated as normal. Not to mention that most of them are of separate ethnicities. (Though granted, I haven't figured out what ethnicity Betty is yet. She's almost always in costume anyway.)
7. Butt-kicking girl superspies are a dime o dozen, but they're rarely 4´5-ish albinos who are allergic to everything. Kiki Strike make Mary Sues develop inferiority complexes with suicidal tendencies. And yet she's not mock-awesome. She's AWESOME awesome.
8. Librarian girl. It bears repeating.
9. Also hacker girl, engineer girl, disguise girl and chemistry girl. No, these aren't different aspects of the sexy nerd next door. They're DIFFERENT girls.
10. Fun facts about New York and its Shadow City!
Oh, and I plain forgot: Here's the Kiki Strike website for those of you who want to know more.
This entry was originally posted at http://katta.dreamwidth.org/494690.html and has
comments there.
Well, you know, sane people don't watch shows they hate.
And as you all know, I'm not particularly sane, so this is a show I hate and that I've still watched fairly often. You might say that I love to hate it.
7th Heaven
Or in the words of some mot maker I've sadly lost the name of:
This show is so delightfully horrible. All problems can be solved in 42 minutes - but of course only ever by the Camdens. Other people only exist so that the Camdens can show how great they are. They are so squeaky clean and self-satisfied that one must wonder if Luke 18:14 has completely escaped them. (It has, admittedly, escaped me - I watch the show in thorough glee that I am not, nor do I know anyone who is, like them.)
Adding to the ambivalence is the wiiiiide range of acting skills. Simon and Steven are quite good; they occasionally rise above the material. Annie, Mary, and Matt are adequate - their ability to nauseate me depends on just how awful their lines are. Ruthie's a prime example of why cutesy child actors are made of evil. And Lucy... I have no idea who encouraged the delusion that this girl could act, but wow.
All in all, watching this show is like scratching a huge scab on your knee. You know you shouldn't do it, it makes you wince in pain, and yet you can't stop yourself.
Day 06 - Favorite episode of your favorite t.v show
Day 07 - Least favorite episode of your favorite t.v show
Day 08 - A show everyone should watch
Day 09 - Best scene ever
Day 10 - A show you thought you wouldn’t like but ended up loving
Day 11 - A show that disappointed you
Day 12 - An episode you’ve watched more than 5 times
Day 13 - Favorite childhood show
Day 14 - Favorite male character
Day 15 - Favorite female character
Day 16 - Your guilty pleasure show
Day 17 - Favorite mini series
Day 18 - Favorite title sequence
Day 19 - Best t.v show cast
Day 20 - Favorite kiss
Day 21 - Favorite ship
Day 22 - Favorite series finale
Day 23 - Most annoying character
Day 24 - Best quote
Day 25 - A show you plan on watching (old or new)
Day 26 - OMG WTF? Season finale
Day 27 - Best pilot episode
Day 28 - First t.v show obsession
Day 29 - Current t.v show obsession
Day 30 - Saddest character death
***
Book alphabet: F
1. Freedom is important, and the longing for this is a common theme in book. Tell us about a book you think is about freedom!
The Wind on the Moon by Eric Linklater. It's not only about freedom, but it's an important theme. Dinah and Dorinda need the freedom to escape from their boring lives, and later from their lives as kangaroos in the zoo. The falcon and the puma also need to escape from the zoo, and the puma later from the hunters. The girls' father of course need to escape from his dungeon, and the people of Bombardy need freedom from their tyrant, Hulagu Bloot. All in all creating a vivid, sprawling tale about two girls learning to take care of themselves without growing up too much.
The book was written in 1944, around the same time as Pippi Longstocking and The Moomins and the Great Flood. A certain level of absurdism and anarchy seems to have spread among children's authors at that time, with circles on the water spreading to this day. And thank God for that!
2. Books often become films. What do you do first, watch the film or read the book? Do you watch film adaptations of books you have read?
I do watch film adaptations of books I have read, but given a choice, I'll usually want to see the film first; it makes it easier to appreciate the film for what it is. "The book was better than the film" is a cliché, and not necessarily true - but the book is nearly always broader than the film; there's room for more in a novel than in two hours of screentime. Because of this, once you've read the book it's easy to watch the film and go, "Oh, this bit I really liked has been changed!" but this doesn't necessarily mean that the film is worse than the book, any more than Shakespeare's sonnets are worse than his plays.
3. Tell us of a really good film adaptation of a book!
Just like I prefer watching the film first, I also tend to prefer film adaptations that aren't too close to the book. As Neil Gaiman put it concerning Stardust, it'd be awful to have a film that was like the book only not as good. It has to be its own thing.
That said, there are good adaptations in every range from very faithful to not faithful at all. Tage Danielsson's adaptation of Ronia the Robber's Daughter is practically word-to-word in places (and where it's not, it feels like it could be), and yet it's a film with its own charm, not just checking off a list of Book Things To Include. On the other end of the scale, there's Amy Heckerling's Clueless, next to Lost in Austen the best Jane Austen adaptation I've ever seen, even though it's set in another part of the world, with other names and relationships to the characters, and a completely different type of dialogue. Because Heckerling gets it. Far too many modern filmmakers seem to be of the impression that Austen was a romantic who liked to write about people wearing Empire dresses and getting married, when Austen is anything but a romantic and it was perfectly normal for people to wear Empire dresses and get married back then.
A good in-between type of film is The Princess Bride, which is remarkable in that the author wrote the screenplay and was still able to kill his darlings and make the whole thing film-shaped rather than book-shaped. Of course, it probably helped that he'd written a bunch of films before that.
4. I want you to give some attention to a författare (author) you think isn't given enough note.
At first I was going to say Claque/Anna-Lisa Wärnlöf, but that would only be useful for the Swedes, so instead I'm going to say Kirsten Miller, author of the Kiki Strike books. I've mentioned her a bunch of times before, and probably should make a proper Kiki Strike pimping post at some point, but meanwhile this will have to do.
The Kiki Strike books are fun adventures set in (and below) New York, with a bunch of schoolgirls at its core. They remind me a bit of The Man From UNCLE in that they're firmly tongue-in-cheek yet very exciting at the same time. (And though morthel teased me that they're Nancy Drew books, they're really quite a lot better than that.) They're marketed as "Five delinquent Girl Scouts, a million hungry rats, one secret city beneath Manhattan, and a butt-kicking girl superspy- welcome to the world of Kiki Strike."
There are plenty of reasons to like the Kiki Strike books. Here's a good ten:
1. DELINQUENT GIRL SCOUTS
2. Helpful information on ways to be a good spy.
3. The narrator is the resident librarian-girl. The team HAS a librarian-girl!
4. The cover art is from the same person who made the cover for Thessaly: witch for hire, and I have a feeling Thessaly and this bunch would actually get along.
5. These teenagers are so competent they put the Sarah Jane team to shame.
6. It took me to the second book to realize that every important character is a girl - because it's treated as normal. Not to mention that most of them are of separate ethnicities. (Though granted, I haven't figured out what ethnicity Betty is yet. She's almost always in costume anyway.)
7. Butt-kicking girl superspies are a dime o dozen, but they're rarely 4´5-ish albinos who are allergic to everything. Kiki Strike make Mary Sues develop inferiority complexes with suicidal tendencies. And yet she's not mock-awesome. She's AWESOME awesome.
8. Librarian girl. It bears repeating.
9. Also hacker girl, engineer girl, disguise girl and chemistry girl. No, these aren't different aspects of the sexy nerd next door. They're DIFFERENT girls.
10. Fun facts about New York and its Shadow City!
Oh, and I plain forgot: Here's the Kiki Strike website for those of you who want to know more.
This entry was originally posted at http://katta.dreamwidth.org/494690.html and has
comments there.