a little doctor who, a little book begging
1. So, Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell: convince me, o my flist. I have started reading this book twice now, and each time I've gone along quite happily for 200, 300 pages--until we hit the Napoleonic Wars. And then my brain just gives up. (Last time I made it to page 405, the very end of chapter 30, which had Stephen Black in it, and then I saw that there was another war chapter ahead, and I...think I got up to eat a bowl of cereal or something, and never came back.) So--convince me. Why should I keep reading? (And also, can I skim the war bits?)
2. Had an interesting conversation with a friend the other day about Doctor Who. He is of the opinion that, although the emo of Ten got annoying, now the Doctor has no interiority at all; he's just "a guy, reacting to things." I am not convinced by this, largely because I'm not convinced that if you took away Ten's emo, you would find vast reserves of interiority there that Eleven doesn't have. I think the Doctor is unknowable. That's kind of how he rolls. And there's so much going on with Eleven, all at one time...
3. "The Hungry Earth":
--I sort of love everyone. None of you better die, okay, or I will be most put out.
--future!Amy and Rory! In Wales! Weird. I wonder where that's going.
--Amy trying to pass off her short shorts as Rio-specific amuses me muchly.
--Also, she does that thing again, where she needs to know, right now, what it is she's facing: "Doctor, what is it? Why is it doing this?" Me, if a creature from the depths of the earth were grabbing my legs, I'd be more immediately concerned with trying to get away from it than finding out what it wanted, but that's Amy for you.
--Aw, that look Tony has, when the Doctor says "good lad," all, "Who is this young whippersnapper?" Hee.
--The Doctor goes all threatening about the weapons, which gave me a bit of a chill: "I'm asking nicely. Put them away." Bit of foreshadowing there? The...er, cricket bat needing to go off in the fourth act?
--Rory called the sonic screwdriver rubbish. Oh, snap. Also, he checks up on people, making sure no one's hurt. Good on you, Rory.
--The Doctor wears his sunglasses at night. I'm just saying.
--Nasreen snapping the braces! Awesome. And the Doctor's smile--ooh, he liked that.
--Amy threatening to kick alien backside, while in Snow White's discarded coffin: love. "Did you just shush me?" Heh.
--The thing about the Doctor (this Doctor)--when his attention is on you, he's kind and dear, and it's brilliant. As we see with the little boy, Elliott. I love Eleven and children: "That's all right, I can't make a decent meringue." (Aw, his face, and the easy warmth in it.) But then he starts thinking about some other one of the million things going through his mind at any moment, and it's like you don't even exist. And he gets called to account for that, by Ambrose: how could you let a child go off on his own, in the middle of an attack, for headphones? He's gutted to realize that he was the last person to see Elliott, and didn't even notice. Just like he lost Amy earlier, he's lost that little boy, and he keeps having to spin out promises to their loved ones, knowing that there are days when he can't keep them.
--(I wonder if that little boy's name is an ET reference?)
--Once again, as with "Vampires," I really like the scene with the Doctor and the alien of the week. The writers have been very good about letting him be alien, too, in those scenes; humans are very much a "they" and not a "we," whereas Ten came out quoting from The Lion King--trying to be a native, at least when it suited him. Eleven handles those scenes differently; there's still babble, but of a different key. Ten was trying to distract; Eleven just seems to be having seven or eight conversations at once. I loved the quiet anger, too, at the Silurian's "last of my species" gambit, in part because it wasn't immediate; he gave her a chance to start over, before "I am the last of my species, and I know how it sits in a heart. So don't insult me." And ARGH, that little sad smile at "I’ll gladly die for my cause. What will you sacrifice for yours?" Oh, show.
2. Had an interesting conversation with a friend the other day about Doctor Who. He is of the opinion that, although the emo of Ten got annoying, now the Doctor has no interiority at all; he's just "a guy, reacting to things." I am not convinced by this, largely because I'm not convinced that if you took away Ten's emo, you would find vast reserves of interiority there that Eleven doesn't have. I think the Doctor is unknowable. That's kind of how he rolls. And there's so much going on with Eleven, all at one time...
3. "The Hungry Earth":
--I sort of love everyone. None of you better die, okay, or I will be most put out.
--future!Amy and Rory! In Wales! Weird. I wonder where that's going.
--Amy trying to pass off her short shorts as Rio-specific amuses me muchly.
--Also, she does that thing again, where she needs to know, right now, what it is she's facing: "Doctor, what is it? Why is it doing this?" Me, if a creature from the depths of the earth were grabbing my legs, I'd be more immediately concerned with trying to get away from it than finding out what it wanted, but that's Amy for you.
--Aw, that look Tony has, when the Doctor says "good lad," all, "Who is this young whippersnapper?" Hee.
--The Doctor goes all threatening about the weapons, which gave me a bit of a chill: "I'm asking nicely. Put them away." Bit of foreshadowing there? The...er, cricket bat needing to go off in the fourth act?
--Rory called the sonic screwdriver rubbish. Oh, snap. Also, he checks up on people, making sure no one's hurt. Good on you, Rory.
--The Doctor wears his sunglasses at night. I'm just saying.
--Nasreen snapping the braces! Awesome. And the Doctor's smile--ooh, he liked that.
--Amy threatening to kick alien backside, while in Snow White's discarded coffin: love. "Did you just shush me?" Heh.
--The thing about the Doctor (this Doctor)--when his attention is on you, he's kind and dear, and it's brilliant. As we see with the little boy, Elliott. I love Eleven and children: "That's all right, I can't make a decent meringue." (Aw, his face, and the easy warmth in it.) But then he starts thinking about some other one of the million things going through his mind at any moment, and it's like you don't even exist. And he gets called to account for that, by Ambrose: how could you let a child go off on his own, in the middle of an attack, for headphones? He's gutted to realize that he was the last person to see Elliott, and didn't even notice. Just like he lost Amy earlier, he's lost that little boy, and he keeps having to spin out promises to their loved ones, knowing that there are days when he can't keep them.
--(I wonder if that little boy's name is an ET reference?)
--Once again, as with "Vampires," I really like the scene with the Doctor and the alien of the week. The writers have been very good about letting him be alien, too, in those scenes; humans are very much a "they" and not a "we," whereas Ten came out quoting from The Lion King--trying to be a native, at least when it suited him. Eleven handles those scenes differently; there's still babble, but of a different key. Ten was trying to distract; Eleven just seems to be having seven or eight conversations at once. I loved the quiet anger, too, at the Silurian's "last of my species" gambit, in part because it wasn't immediate; he gave her a chance to start over, before "I am the last of my species, and I know how it sits in a heart. So don't insult me." And ARGH, that little sad smile at "I’ll gladly die for my cause. What will you sacrifice for yours?" Oh, show.