Dream Theatre

Battlestar Galactica Day Break

Possibly one of the most provocative and innovative shows of modern times ended this weekend. Here was a show that explored the human condition from all facets, delivered allegory and analogy about modern times, explored realistically human frailties, delved deep into religious concepts and delivered, at times some high adventure and the most plausible space combat ever shown on TV. I could go on and on listing its pantheon of achievements. It's hard to believe that six  years earlier when the show was first announced that everyone and his brother derided the idea of a re imagining of the classic seventies version. I have to admit I was skeptical myself, I'd loved the original series as a kid and had the same Clone War-esque desire to see the final part of that version's voyage executed properly. Who didn't want to see Dirk Benedict slip into the role that made him famous? Nonetheless the show runner, Ron Moore, delivered as promised; a cutting edge take on TV Sci-Fi that's mission statement was to redefine the genre. That he did, and on a budget far less than most major network shows. Somehow he managed to deliver both character based drama and epic Sci-Fi adventure - one hell of an achievement.

So how is the last episode? Well, the second half of season four has been somewhat schizophrenic in tone and style. After the trauma of finding the Earth of the Thirteenth Tribe had been a nuclear waste land and that everyone there had actually been Cylons, humanity - what was left of it, turned in on itself. We had a series of kick ass Mutiny on the Bounty episodes, plenty of grand character moments and some close quarters action sequences to keep the juices flowing. Then we got a great episode of revelations as the backstory of the final five Cylons became clear, joining the dots in some wonderfully unexpected ways. Then we got - well, nothing really, just a bit of soap opera-esque episodes that felt far too self aware of the show's demise. Sure the Boomer plot development was compelling, but watching Adama getting drunk every episode and spilling white paint and tears everywhere, was just, well embarrassing really. Once, twice maybe I can understand, but every episode? Com'on this guy is supposed to bad ass not New Man, you know what I'm saying?

Fortunately part 2 of Daybreak delivered the action in bucket loads. Adama decides to take Galactica on one last desperate mission to save Hera who is the only hybrid child of human and Cylon. It's feature movie set up, and the writers and production team deliver an hour of seat-of-your-pants action which surprisingly and organically allow them to tie up a lot of outstanding questions that the series has asked.

Spoilers below - beware if you haven't watched it yet.

First off, the In head Baltar and Six. Who are they?

Well, it's quite obvious now that they are super advanced beings, angels or even demons if you like. But whatever you want to call them, the scene with Six and Baltar both seeing them together for the first time proved beyond all doubt that they are real and not figments of their subconscious guilt. Not naming exactly what they are is fine with me as what are you going to call them? Seraphs? Guardians? Whatever - they are a sweet homage and re-imagining of the original Super-beings of the 70s show, except with healthy does of ambiguity and post modernism thrown in to boot. They hint at a God force subtly or not quite so subtly influencing events in the universe - it raises all sorts of questions of course; is the show anti or pro religion? Do the writers really want us to firmly believe in some kind of force or is it more elegant than that? Well, more about that later.

The secret of the Opera House.

I liked this. It turns out that the Opera House scenes that have been a part of the show's visual vocabulary since season one had been flash forward projection images all along designed to nudge the key players into a Crucible sequence in the CIC of Galactica. Very stagy in practice but worked beautifully as a piece of drama. In fact, it reminded me of the end of the Shadow War in Babylon 5, which in turn, negatively so, reminded me of Star Trek proselytizing. However, this being Galactica, we were given a wonderfully dark twist and satisfyingly bloody resolution to the war with Cavil's Cylons. This was executed brilliantly by the deft slight of hand of bringing both Baltar's character arc and Tyrol's together at the same time.

 In the case of Baltar, he gave the closest to a Captain Kirk speech as we're ever going to get on this show. As his realization of his better nature, and his embracing of his spiritual side allowed him to articulate an epiphany, which he actually managed to convey to Cavil's machine sensibilities. This being Galactica, the peace lasts all of three minutes as the resolution of the conflict involves the Final Five doing a melding of minds in order to deliver the secrets of resurrection to Cavil's cylon faction. This means that Tyrol will discover that Tory killed his wife, Cally. Following all this? I'm assuming you already know who these people are. Well, despite Tory asking for clemency before the fact, the Chief totally loses it and fucks everything up again, by strangling the life out of Tory and wrecking the fragile trust between  Galactica and Cavil. It's a superb bit of drama and ends with a juicy Ok Corral shoot out where the bad guys get what they deserve. The execution is faultless as far as I'm concerned and totally subverted expectations of the usual resolution for this type of scene. You're going to love Dean Stockwell's exit from the show - totally in keeping with his character.

It gets better though, because, somewhere above the Cylon base a Raptor flying dead in space accidentally launches its nukes. Adama screams at Starbuck - get us out of here! But where can they go? What co ordinates should they use? Well, Starbuck, a few episodes ago was given a sequence of notes by Hera which turned out to play All Along The Watchtower. In subsequent episodes she then translated the notes in to co-ordinates, and it's these numbers that she inputs into the jump computer. Where do they end up?

Earth, not the real Earth of course, but our Earth.  That's right, the slight of hand at the season's midpoint begins to crystallize. Landing on this new world, the crew discover a primitive species of humanoids who they're genetically compatible with. Somehow Moore actually delivers an ending which is almost kind and upbeat. Not exactly the bleak Blake's 7 ending - they all die scenario, that everyone had been expecting. It gets worse though, the route he takes is even more controversial. Read on.

It's obvious to the audience at this point that the Ragtag fleet have arrived somewhere in Earth's distant past. Thus if this is our past then why don't we know that Galactica arrived? Well you've got Lee Adama to thank for that one, with his Luddite anti-technology speech condemning the entire fleet of survivors to a Lost-esque future of subsistence farming and staring out at the beautiful unspoiled vistas of pre-history Earth, oh and possibly being wiped out by our primitive forebears. Poetically it sounds good, but it's a controversial, questionable way to end things. Lee goes on about teaching the natives how to talk - yeah right, lets give them civilization. Dare I say it? Okay I will, its an extremely American view of the natural order that after all they've been through, somehow their mastery of linguistics is a superior way of living than the content tribesman method - hadn't anyone of them heard about the Prime Directive?

To be honest I feel uneasy at how pat this resolution felt. It would have been more plausible in my view, humble as it is, to have built a city in the manner of Atlantis thereby delivering an ending which tied in with our own myths about an advanced civilization existing in pre-history. Furthermore, considering how much Galactica owes to The Chariot of The Gods theories, it would have been a fitting tribute. In addition, it was odd that everyone agreed to do this. Think about it, this whole series has been about no one ever agreeing with what anyone says or thinks, we're suddenly lead to believe that in the thrill of the moment, all 38 000 survivors decided that they didn't want hospitals, central heating and entertainment anymore, but would rather ek out an existence where the possibility of making it past the first winter are fifty fifty at best. It's a lot to swallow quite frankly. They could have done another series of episodes where there is a further civil war between the colonists - those who want a technological society against those who want an Amish existence. The resolution could have been that they decimated each other and were then picked off by primitive man. Much more in keeping with the series tone, don't you think?

Moving on - the mystery of Starbuck.

Starbuck found her dead body on the nuked Earth, Baltar ran tests on the necrotic blood she found, proving the body had been her. So who the hell was this Starbuck, the one who lead them to both Earths? Well, we're never going to know for certain as in her final scene with Lee she literally disappears saying that her journey had been completed. So what was she? Some bloggers have mentioned the Holy Trinity analogy going on here with Bill Adama as the Father, Lee Adama as the Son, and Starbuck as the Holy Ghost. It's a nice concept and fits neatly into the mold here. Yet Kara Thrace is so much more than just Ghost, she is essentially the show's messiah figure, before transformation she was a flurry of contradictions and fucked up decision making, yet somehow she was deeply religious and driven by ghosts. After her return she was still fucked up, yet her drive now had direction and purpose, despite being misunderstood continuously, she was tenacious enough to get people to notice her and follow her lead. Whereas Baltar turned into somewhat of a John The Baptist like figure, Thrace became a true messiah by delivering on her promise. She brought them to salvation on Earth, but to do so she had to take them on a journey into the darkest part of themselves and show them how the cycle could so easily be repeated again and again as it happened on Earth 1.

In the end I didn't really feel a need to have Starbuck's return explained to me. What could Moore say or show anyway? A ship of light captures her spirit, white glowing figures in robes talk to her, give her the details of Earth, then build her a new ship and send her on her way, explaining how they'd once been like the humans and were trying to guide them to a better future. See I explained it, but now it sounds like 70 s Galactica and all the mystery's gone - what's the point? Good decision in my view.

The last thirty minutes of the show turn into one long extended good bye for the characters on a par with Return of the King with the number of endings it shows. From a pacing point of view it could be considered clumsy, yet it felt deserved. The characters and the audience had been through hell and back, we needed this release of darkness - what I'm saying is that this extended epilogue was earnt and thus necessary and not superfluous to the story. I liked how Baltar and Six found love once again and resolution with their Angelic demonic guides, I was touched by the passing of Roslin, and the post mortem marriage with Adama as he slid his old wedding ring onto her finger. Most affectingly the passing of the Rag tag fleet set against the original theme music was satisfying and just so perfect in every way you could imagine.

Finally, we race through 150 000 years to modern times, and watch the In Heads read about the remains of Hera in National Geographic in the show's coda. All along this show has repeated the line - All this has happened before and will happen again. In their final conversation Six and Baltar look around New York with an edge of disappointment at all the decadence and corruption around them. Images of new primitive robots flash across screens, and they speculate that could another uprising similar to Kobol, Earth, and Caprica happen here? Six is optimistic, believing that mathematically speaking, at some point the cycle has got to break. Just to piss off more atheists, Baltar refers to God as not liking that name and then we go to credits.

So in the end, the series that had bordered on the Nihilistic in tone and attitude delivers a message that there is a God after all, and we need to watch our backs or our Asimos are going to rise up and wipe us all out. That's if they get there first, what about those other centurions roaming around the Cosmos? Sequel series anyone? 

In some ways Moore and his crew delivered a conservative and almost old fashioned view of Sci-Fi, which could almost be called underwhelming. In the end the fleet still hadn't reconciled themselves with technology and the idea of living in communities turns out to be less attractive than living out the rest of our days in solitude on top of mountains. Its an oddly contradictory message for a show which kept on asking hard questions about how we should live together. Still, loved the space combat this time around, and we're always have the extended DVD releases to look forward to.

Battlestar Galactica: Season Four musings

This is supposed to be the last season of Galactica where all of the plot threads and character arcs of the previous three seasons should begin to pay off. Yet whereas a series like Babylon Five, which had been in a similar position in its fourth year, managed to remain breakneck and breathless with its story telling and action, BSG somehow actually managed to stall its engine. When you only have a limited number of episodes to tell your story, well this can be potentially fatal. Fortunately a big save in the last two episodes brought it back from the brink.

Please be aware this is spoiler heavy, don’t continue if you haven’t seen the last episode.

The season opened well enough with Starbuck’s return and a beautifully realized space battle. I’ll admit this is one of the reasons I’ve always loved the concept of BSG, compelling storylines sprinkled with hardcore combat eye candy. It's a simple guilty pleasure and I for one am unashamed to admit it.

We also began to see the fall out of the revelation about the identities of the final five and Baltar’s new status in the fleet as a religious leader. All well and good, but then what happened? Well a lot of really talky repetitive character stuff, which quite frankly in many cases was both tedious and had been there seen it and done before in countless previous episodes. There were some highlights like the spacing of the interminably irritating Cally, seriously what on earth did Tyrol ever see in her in the first place? A question he even asks himself at one point.

Starbuck’s Ahab like drive to find Earth aboard the Demetrius also had potential to really fly – yet we had to suffer a whole episode of the crew squabbling and shooting each other because even after 3 years of saving each others' butts they still can’t trust each other. This is precisely my beef with a lot of the storylines, the level of paranoia around Starbuck just felt forced and unrealistic. Okay for an episode I can understand the level of suspicion around her mysterious return, yet the Starbuck we see is exactly the same as always, utterly fucked-up and as lovable as ever. Had Kara’s character changed into a more serene more together personality, then yeah, okay I can understand, but she was the same. So why so many wasted episodes on this?

What was much more successful and a great piece of plotting was the effect the activation of four of the Final Five had on the Cylons. In what was an extremely organic unforced turn of events they headed into a civil war that would have far reaching consequences for the search of Earth and brought to the fore the mythology’s key phrase – All this has happened before and will happen again.

It was a great direction to take the series in, and began to deal head on once more with the big questions that the show has always been successful in tackling. What does it mean to be alive? Why is the risk of death so important for living? How do you stop the cycle of revenge and retribution and evolve?

Then there’s the ending. I half expected them to do this because just finding Earth in the last episode would have been a cheap finale and would always have come across as a gimmick or just plain naff. With the tone and the direction that this show has always taken, we always knew that Earth would never be the paradise that everyone longed for. Many of the actors had always joked that when they found Earth eventually then it would either be filled with Cylons or be a nuclear wasteland.

They weren’t joking – we get the deserted wasteland version of Earth. Seriously how depressing is that? We’re also informed quite categorically that this is The Earth as the calculations and star maps all match up. We can also see some familiar structures making this Earth look like a future devastated one. I’m sure there was collective sigh of relief from older viewers who feared that Ron Moore would have a final joke on everyone and have a go at re-imagining Galactica 80 with the Colonials landing in present day LA.

What a way to finish the first half,eh? Where can they go from here? More importantly who has been orchestrating their journey? This is where it can get potentially really interesting. We know that out there somewhere there is a third party. The series has been increasingly mystical of late, not just with visions but also with hard facts such as Starbuck’s miracle return and the new viper she came back in. Who rebuilt it? Who are the in-head sixes, Baltar’s and Leobens? Who is the final cylon? Are they the Cylon God?

So what is Moore’s master plan for his version of this space epic? I made a previous entry on this sometime ago and I expounded on how Earth suffered either a man made or environmental disaster forcing the survivors to leave for the stars. They went to Kobol where over several thousand years they forgot their origins from Earth and repeated the same cycle. They then left for the colony worlds where after another two thousand years the same thing happens again.

The concept of the Final Five dovetails into this idea with them appearing to be the continuing racial memory of both humans and the new cylon models. With the revelation of this last episode it looks like this is the route Moore has opted for, and it's a wise one. In the best tradition of sci-fi epic the last ten episodes might show that there’s been something orchestrating a ten thousand year plan to break the cycle. Just as Lee Adam said – All this has happened before lets not make it happen again.

The End of The Sopranos

Last night I watched the eagerly awaited conclusion to the Sopranos. This series needs little introduction from me, its been heralded in some quarters as the next great American novel, by others still, the series that reinvented the TV genre. Whatever people say about it there is no doubt that it will have a lasting legacy in TV Heaven and it'll be unlikely that the series will ever end up in the bargain basement DVD section on Amazon. Just checked - for six seasons worth of Marrone! will set you back nearly 500 bucks, not a small investment.

Anyway -  the last episode, a turd or a winner? Well, really neither, as others had suspected all the drama and fun that we all guiltily enjoy happened in the previous two episodes, namely AJ's attempted suicide ,Phil's crew wacking Bobby and Sil in true Goodfellas style,and of course Tony performning his brand of Euthanasia on Chis-tu-fur a few weeks before. What everyone wanted to know was how on earth was David Chase (show-runner) going to finish his magnum opus? Would Tony get wacked, go to prison, or something else? Friends of mine had speculated for months about how things were going to play out. We all had our theories - Pat over at Lost in Translation reckoned it would be prison or death for Tony, possiby witness protection, simply because those are the three certainties for a mafioso. My own theory  had been at one point that Carmela would  have pulled the trigger after learning the truth about what happened to Adriana. Others thought we'd see Tony make a return trip to purgatory and meet all the dead people he was responsible for. Some speculated that he'd lose AJ or Meadow. Yet all of these especially the last two were just too obvious, too conventional for Chase. It goes against the whole ethos of the show. This is not supposed to The Godfather, or even Goodfellas. Chase has been quoted saying that he doesn't do messages, and the idea of Tony going over to the FBI goes against Chase's dislike/distrust of the Bureau. No, he had something much more dramatic up his sleeve. He was going to give somthing we'd never seen before . . .

So what did we get? Well not much really - life as usual- life goes on, there is no redemption and there certainly isn't much in the way of retribution, well apart from Phil who was thanked for his attempted decapitation of the New Jersey family by being shot in the head in front of his grand daughters and then having said head crushed like a mashed jelly doughnut all over a gas station tarmac - nice! For all the blood tirsty viewers out there, that was pretty much all the gore Chase would allow us.

We did get some fun with Paulie Walnuts fretting over a sinister ginger cat staring at a poster of Chris. We did nearly get to see AJ bone the hot model he met in the nut house. We did get to learn how much Meadow would make as a lawyer. We did get to learn that Tony might have to do a spell in the joint, but really nothing that would have looked out of place in season one, two or three or four. In fact its quite apparent that Chase wants us to know that this family would continue going on living. They'd grow older and change but as someone once said, the more things change the more they stay the same.

Now on to the episode's controversial bit.

The final scene. Some Diner.

It was packed with tension thanks to Chase's deft slight of hand, as the cameras rolled over the final Soprano family scene, its the audience not the creators who drive the tension in the scene, we're all expecting another does of ketchup and all we get is our own paranoia staring back at us through an empty blank screen. That's all folks. Nothing. After months of waiting that's it. Meadow walks in the screen goes blank. Tons of speculation of course, one popular ideas is that Tony got wacked and when you get wacked the lights go out, plain and simple. Ambigious? Yeah fairly, but really I've a better idea.The creators couldn't end it. They don't want to end it because you only have one ending in life - and thats death, and well death, its kind of old hat in literature, everyone always dies at some point if you continue living with them long enough. Much more original to leave the story in the middle - right? After all all great post modern literary fare talks about media-res - that is all we really perceive is the middel parts of our lives. There is no beginning or end. We come in to this world with no long term memory, and certainly when we leave it none of us will ever remember the end, just ask Junior.

Battlestar Galactica: How does it end?

Part 1: Jumping the shark

When should a good TV series end? Well, that’s what I want to consider here. Jumping the shark  was coined from the old seventies show Happy Days. Its generally considered that the series went into a decline after Fonz drove his motor bike over a jump with a shark in the middle. Actually I could believe Fonzie doing that, what I couldn’t believe was Ralph Mouth with two California beach bunnies in both arms.

This isn’t about Happy Days though, this about Galactica, one of the best things on TV right now. At the end of season 2.5 Galactica had parked its orbit around a newly discovered planet that could support human life, the survivors of the twelve colonies had elected to give up the search for Earth and set up a new civilization on New Caprica as it came to be called. There was a time shift of year, enough time for Adama to grow a silly moustache, and Apollo a beer gut that looked like the remains of Athena’s pregnancy suit. Oh and Kara (Starbuck) was happily married and now –gasp-friends with Colonel Tigh, who she’s hated since the first episode. Then the cylons show up, and my mate John rolls his eyes up, puffs on a cigar and takes a swig of a James Bond Martini and pronounces that its turned into a royal load of crap. Why? Well the show is obviously using more padding than Apollo to keep it going, that's why. Why lose the focus to reach Earth? It doesn’t make sense that everyone would think it safe enough to settle on a rock with the cylons chasing their tailpipe. John has a theory that a good series has legs for three seasons by American HBO standards, go beyond that and the main focus of the show is stretched thin and is risking death from anorexic obesity. Point in case - The Sopranos which according to many is well past its sell-by date. Really a gay gangster, and Tony discovering the doors to Heaven? Alright the series has always liked its surreal moments, but seriously focus, focus focus.

The three series theory is solid though, if you take all the best mythology episodes of say something like Babylon 5 no doubt they would complete a tidy three season arc, in fact, looking back at that ground breaking series, if you cut off the dull first season and the limp final season then you have a classic three series arc. Why must American TV drag shows beyond the grave of Arthur Fonzarelli? Well, no brainer money through syndication.

Part 2: How to end Galactica.

Anyway all that talk of how to end the series had got me thinking, well just how would you end the thing?  Lets face it even the original series couldn't do it properly. Endings are tough thing to write anyhow. Look at the X-files, after nine years the ending was an incoherent mess because they really didn't have any idea what the series was about beyond a load of pretentious wank.

Speaking with Pat from Lost In Translation Blog, he confesses that he hadn't given it much thought but supposed given budgetary restrictions it would have to end in present day. I'm not convinced that would be the best way to go though. This is because it would cause some major timeline issues that would need a new theory of relativity to solve it. Lets examine how the humans got to the Colony worlds in the first place.

First off this series is not science fantasy along the lines of the original. It likes to keep some level of reality involved. We know for a fact that Earth has been and always was the mother of humanity. The question is how did humans end up originally on Kobol and why did they forget their origins? Who were the 13th Tribe?

That's actually a fun question, its the kind of question where your imagination can really run wild with different theories.

Theories

1. Colony ships that ventured out into the galaxy, seeding the universe. Of course we obviously didn't do a very good job, as there are only 40 000 humans left in the 'verse, and no other settlements have become apparent. Why was Kobol the only success?

2. Alien Abduction. Unlikely they will go down this route, its been done before on Star Trek: Voyager, and I'm sure Moore wants to stay away from recycled Trek plot lines. Also he's established no alien life forms in this series as a rule.

3. All this has happened before and will happen again. This is an important line of Colonial scripture, and tells us several things. No doubt Earth Civilisation created AI thousands of years before the cylons no doubt there was some kind of Machine War, could Kobol have been an experiment for the co-existence of man and machine? How many times has this conflict now happened? Could it be that the cylons discovered an important artifact during their 40 year absence that taught them more about the collective origins of the colonies than the Colonials know themselves, hence their belief in a one god.

I think we can safely say that by following logic the choice has to be either 1 or 3 it would explain alot about the map room on Kobol and the scriptures of Pythia. So what state would Earth be in some tens of thousands of years in our own future?

1. Its unlikely to be good going by the tone of the series up to now. Just look at how they handled the Pegasus story arc. Earth could be a mausoleum with humanity gone. This idea has been explored before in the Image Comics version of the series. It could become repetitious mind you, and extremely anti-climatic.

2. Earth and its inhabitants are bigger bastards than the cylons. Ironically the fleet has to ally with the cylons to take down an Evil Empire Earth. Probably not, way too repetitive and generic.

3. Earth is actually inhabited by a race of living machines similiar to the cylons, except they are much older as a race, and see the humans in a different light - their children coming home. This would create a perfect symmetry with the pilot episode line, when Six tells Baltar that Humanity's children are coming home.

I like that idea alot, lets take it further and examine the origins a bit more.

Earth became unsustainable at some point. Chosen groups were sent on a great Ark to Kobol while a newly created race of machines were created to rebuild Earth. The earth bound humans died out and passed into legend. The new race of machines came to revere the lost humans (slightly like AI ) The symmetry here is clear, the humans have become the key to the next step in evolution for life in the universe. The earthbound machines, the humans and the cylons must form a trinity to continue the survival of life itself. Where does the 13th tribe fit into all of this? Well that's a good question. You also have to consider the real reasons why the humans left Kobol. It could be that once Kobol was set up and running. The 13th tribe ironically were made up of machines who were going back to Earth to say job done. In case the humans ever ran into trouble they set up a series of markers to show them the path home.

For me three is starting to sound the most plausible as a positive twist ending which could be satisfying. I like the idea that the humans are still the only ones in the universe, for me that still leaves an edge of uncertainty as to what could happen to them once the filming stops.

Jacksonless Hobbit and TV updates.

As I write this post weird things are happening in the world. Reality is playing spy movie again with the death of an ex-KGB agent caused by radiation poisoning. For some reason Sony still hasn't learnt its lesson from Betamax's ghost, being the obvious fact that the most expensive format will never allow you to win the next generation format war. Nor has Bill Gates yet learnt that  re-mods of an inferior Toshiba media player with a naff name (Gigabeat) that isn't even market leader in its own country will hardly impress the bastion of Ipoders in the States to make the switch to Zune. Seriously its like he wants it to fail - brown a fashionable tech color, really? Who's bright idea was that? Must have been an Apple double agent - yeah lets make an Ipod clone the color of poo, that will sell, honest.

However none of these strange events can quite live up to one utterly insane business decision by New Line Cinemas - telling Peter Jackson that his services will not be required to make the Hobbit and the Lord of the RIngs prequel movies. For some reason a man who made them a gazillion dollars is  considered expendable. I can just imagine the board room meeting when those suits came up with that brain wave. It must have looked like Business studies seminar 101 on South Park. I mean really, firing Jackson? That's like firing Lucas from Star Wars or Donner from Superman II (actually that did happen, bad example) but you know what I mean. I mean why? Simply because they're in a huff about Jackson's lawsuit against them for a few mill over Fellowship of the Ring? They're in danger of fulfilling the Speed 2 legacy - replacing your bankable lead star with, will a non-bankable no-star, you may as well get Homer Simpson to direct it.

Well naturally the internet is alive with righteous indignation over this mess, however I doubt it will have much affect. Snakes on a Plane showed that hard core fans of movies don't always transfer over to blockbuster movies receipts. There are rumors that Sam Rami has been offered the part, and while he's a great director, somehow a movie without a script by the people who know the story best is always going to be found wanting. I mean you're always gonna wonder, aren't you, what would the Jackson version have been like?

Anyone who reads this site will know I'm a bit of TV Junkie sometimes and well that hasn't changed. Recently, in-between body painting models I've been digesting a steady diet of British and American original content. Here's a run down of some of them.

Battlestar Galactica

Seriously not just a sci-fi show, don't believe me go to Pat Mccoy's blog, that guy hates anything to do with Sci Fi  but even he admits this stuff rocks. If you don't watch it for the story scenes with Grace Park and Tricia Helfter.  Now into its third season, has so far covered uncontroversial topics such as, suicide bombings by insurgents, Sophie's Choice - kill an entire race in order for your own to survive, and whether or not poisoning your own wife is the right thing to do when she just screwed that hologram from Quantum Leap to get you out of jail. And, oh yeah, the space battles rock too.

Heroes

Would actually be first place, but this has been a major hit in the states and therefore doesn't need much more promotion from me. Heroes does what Studios in Hollywood have been trying to film for decades but still haven't - that is make a believable live action version of Alan Moore's Watchmen novel. Confused? Okay the conceit of the series is this: What if real people had super powers? How would they react, how would they continue to live their lives forced to deal with such extraordinary phenomena? Its a cross between The X-Men and Willis's Unbreakable, using a Lost style format. The story follows multiple perspectives as theses seemingly ordinary, real humans try and cope with their predicaments. Naturally as with all modern series these days their is a huge story arc involving the destruction of New York (again) by a nuclear bomb. Standout characters are a Japanese salaryman named Hiro who can bend time and space and the high school cheerleader who heals whenever she injured which has lead to some critics conjecturing how on earth can she ever lose her virginity if her hymen keeps healing up? Seriously some people have way too much free time. 

Torchwood

The Adult themed Doctor Who spin off. Following the further adventures of a now immortal Jack Harkness, (the omnisexual who made out with Doctor Who in the first season). Jack is now set up in the Torchwood institute an ultra secret organization founded by Queen Victoria (no really, you think I could make that up?) after she was bitten by an alien werewolf (again, no, really). Each week Jack and his team investigate alien and supernatural activity around Cardiff. This is Russell Davies with the kid gloves off, its filled with sex and violence -often at the same time. It bares the hall marks of Angel, right down to its sexy immortal lead, only the overabundance of Welsh accents tend to detract from the Hollywood glamour it might have had. So far we've had sexy a Cyberwoman running amok in their secret base, fairies that aren't particularly fond of sex offenders (well who is?) and Welsh eating cannibals. Sounds naff, right? Somehow the classy production values and the well written scripts have managed to elevate this risky spin off from an embarrassing mess to a respectable venture in expanding the Who universe to a more adult audience.

Robin Hood

Really the BBC should be ashamed of themselves for this pile of steaming garbage. If this makes it to season 2, well, there's just as much justice as there was in in 12th century England, i.e. none. Worth watching only for the curiosity value of seeing Keith Allen camp it up as the sheriff, and the horrible truth that if the Americans had made this it would have been a whole lot better. My advice buy the superior Robin Of Sherwood series, much better.

My Name is Earl

This series is just plain funny. Jason Lee plays the title character, Earl Hickey, who's pretty much the epitome of white trailer park trash in the US. A small time crook who got married while he was drunk to a six month pregnant firebrand blonde called Joy (who's anything but). He thinks his life can't get any worse, but it does. Joy becomes pregnant again and gives birth to a black baby. Some years later he buys a lottery ticket and discovers he's won 100 000 dollars, only his joy is short lived when in his rush of excitement he gets run over by a car and loses the winning ticket. Waking up in hospital he discovers that his wife is leaving him for the man who makes crab cakes in the local bar and who's the real father of his second son. After watching a TV show he learns that everything that has gone wrong in his life is because of bad karma. This gets him thinking that maybe he should try and do something about it. So when he's discharged from hospital he decides to write a list of all the bad things that he's done in his life and try and fix them one by one. Along with his good for nothing cuddly brother who's two screws short a brain he sets about righting his wrongs. Well written with snappy dialogue and well drawn characters this series keeps going from strength to strength. Well into its second season it has been attracting several famous guest stars to the fold. Watch out for Giovanni Ribisi in Season One, and Christian Slater in season 2 - although I'll understand if the latter isn't much of an inticement for you.

Buffy The Vampire Slayer

Okay I know what you’re thinking, why on earth would I waste my time watching such brainless garbage? Well, you know something, we all need to let our brains have a bit of rest on occasion and allow the grey matter to enjoy some candy of its own. I'd always given the series a miss in the past, mainly because I'd had a gutful of vampires after writing my own modern take on the genre. I persuaded to give this a try by a colleague who'd bought the entire series on DVD. Yes its true some people really have too much time and money.

Back to the candy. Buffy is all about candy. Originally it was a real crap movie from the early nineties whose lead actress has been forgotten in the mists of scream queen heaven. The writer though, Jose Whedon, was fortunate enough to give his idea another chance, and this time he didn’t mess up. He casted Sarah Michelle Gellar in the title role, and gave her a great supporting cast of characters who help her defend her town, Sunnydale, from an array of vampires and demons who threaten to depopulate the human inhabitants.

The premise, if you can’t guess, is about a teenaged girl with a dumb name who is apparently the chosen one of her generation to defend the world from hordes of evil that like to lurk around garbage cans and graveyards at night. It’s a thankless task for someone who’d rather be partying and meeting boys than trying to save the world every evening. She’s guided by her watcher, (a member of a secret society who is supposed to train the vampire slayer) Giles, a seemingly uptight Brit played with understated joy by Anthony Herald Head, ( if you’re a Brit, he’s the bloke who did the original Gold Blend ads, remember it took him like five years before he managed to get a kiss off the lady in the ad.)

The first season was a short twelve episodes and were obviously filmed on a fairly tight budget, however what it had in cheesy effects it made up for in strong characterizations and a comic book writer’s zeal for cast iron continuity. Even the smallest of plot points were never forgotten and often laid the ground for greater stories in the future. The first season concerns with Buffy’s meeting with Angel, a vampire who doesn’t drink human blood and has a human soul, played with a delightfully awkward broodiness by David Boreanaz, he delivers the series’ much needed angst and ambiguity about what is evil. Through the course of the season they deal with the traditional threat of an ancient vampire master who is prophesized to rule the earth in darkness. Along the way Buffy has to deal with fitting in at her new school, making friends and finding time to have a personal life.

Buffy owes a lot to Scream for its post-modernist take on the horror/slasher movie genre. The body count is high, so is the sarcasm and constant indulgement of metafiction. Whedon loves screwing around with characters, putting them in some seriously screwed up situations, he’s not afraid to kill them off either, and then bring them back again later in true comic book fashion. What separates this from being just a light weight fantasy series though is that Whedon constantly brings the characters back into real reality to remind them of the consequences of their actions. He uses traditional fantasy devices as metaphors for drug addiction, sexual abuse, murder, and racism. He’s never afraid to experiment with the formula and pretty much every season there are some interesting experimental episodes. My favourite is definitely the musical in season 6, its sounds naff, but somehow it comes off as one of the best.

If you haven’t given it the time of day before, I say go ahead, indulge yourself, trust me you won’t be disappointed.

Doctor Who: The Christmas Invasion

Christmas TV specials are a bit of tradition in the UK, most of them normally follow the Queen's speech, and are designed to help digest the vast quantities of turkey and stuffing. Over the years, on the Beeb anyways, Only Fools and Horses and Eastenders have been the most eagerly anticipated specials, both have, in the past, achieved stratospheric ratings. On one occasion over twenty four million tuned in to watch Del and Rodney become millionaires after sixteen years of ducking and diving in London street markets. Similar viewing figures were recorded for Dirty Den giving the divorce papers to Angi in Eastenders. This year one of the most eagerly awaited specials was the very first Doctor Who Christmas day episode. Enjoying a huge Renaissance under the auspicies of Russell Davies (writer and producer), the Timelord has finally found himself hip again and relevant to modern audiences. I caught this episode a day after on video, here's my review.

At the end of the last series of Doctor Who, Eccleston's Doctor was dying from exposure to the Time Vortex, forcing him to regenerate, following a battle with the Dalek. Following all that are you? Replacing your lead man after one series is never an easy thing to do it and can quite possibly wreck the chemistry that makes a series a success. For every failure there are successes mind you. William Shatner, for example, replaced Jeffery Hunter as Captain of the Enterprise. Jason Connery replaced Michael Praed in Robin of Sherwood, ditto for Bruce Boxlieter who replaced Michael O'hare in Babylon Five. Doctor Who of course wrote the book on replacing the lead man in a TV show, this is the tenth time its been done. The new doctor is David Tennant, a thirty-four year old actor from Scotland, if you've never heard of him before, you can catch him in the new Harry Potter movie. Over the last few years he's built up quite a reputation as one of England's new generation of leading men, and has graced several high profile TV productions.

Regeneration episodes are notoriously crap affairs, as writer and actor struggle to find their footing with a new Doctor, even the great Tom Baker's first appearance was less than memorable. So how does Davies cope? Well his answer is not to have Tennant really take center stage until well into the third act. Normally a suicidal act in classic Who as no one else was a strong enough character to carry the show. Fortunately this is new Who, and Davies has Rose played by Billie Piper who is as integral to this version of Who as the man himself. The plot is standard Doctor Who fare, aliens invading earth in ID4 fashion, who look like a bunch of rejects from an episode of Buffy, in fact later the Doctor engages in some Buffy dramatics in a sword fight with the big bad. Quite frankly the plot with Davies is usually besides the point, his interest is primarily character studies. He wants to explore what its like to lose a loved one, or to see them change after a major accident. Whereas in the past we'd get the Doctor acting like a complete tosser we actually get some real drama with real human emotions pouring out from Rose. Davies teases us with glimpses of the Doctor, making us hungry for his grand entrance.

Since the first series it feels Davies has listened to some of the criticism; for one no farting aliens, and the threat this time feels much more real. There is a really cool bit when a third of the population of earth are taken control of by the alien Sycorax and made to stand on roof tops awaiting the command to jump. Very spooky, very British Sci-fi, definitely a few cues taken from John Wyndam there. We also get the good Doc in his dressing gown a self referential nod to Hitchhikers Guide, and Arthur Dent. We also see the regenerative powers of a good cup of English tea. This is what Davies excels at making a quintessionally English series and a character, well, English.

Tennant's doctor is a cocktail of eccentric, funny, caring, with a twist of menace and dark. He manages to multi task all these things at once and does it with out effort, in fact he seems much more comfortable here than Eccleston. Tennant clearly seems to be relishing this opportunity to play Who, and has confessed to being a life long fan who grew up watching Tom Baker. Quite frankly its eerie at times watching him, I grew up watching Baker too, and there are moments where you can feel time warping through to TV heaven making you feel the connection between the two performances.

What makes Davies's who different from other writers is his emphasis on making who directly relevent to the world we live in. This is one of his most overtly political episodes to date, amongst the fantasy and weirdness, Davies confronts the moral and ethical ambiguities that surround the characters. Towards the end of the special The Prime Minister commits an act that the Doctor condemns as murder, and yet we've seen him do the same, who is right? Furthermore who has the right to judge?

The production values on this episode are amazing, highlights are the Tardis crash landing at the beginning, the alien space ship, and a remarkable rift from Star Wars that will having you calling Davies a cheeky git for such an obvious rip off, and yet it works so well. We also get a new room in the Tardis for Who geeks to wank over, and the reappearance of UNIT which was a mainstay in the classic series. Everything feel right; the pace is snappy, the dialogue is razor sharp, everyone acting their pants off. It actually feels like that license money is actually worth it again.

If you're not English you're probably wondering what am I going on about if all of this intrigues you I'd advise checking out the DVD set of the first series of Doctor Who, its in the vein of Buffy The Vampire Slayer with the eccentricity of Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. Follow the link.

The Bloody British

Just found this article on the Guardian website. Its an interview with Ricky Gervais who co-wrote and starred in The Office. He takes a few pot shots at so called comidians who cash in on their fame by merchandising themselves as plastic dolls and appearing in the third rate movies, can't imagine who he's talking about, can you?

If you are planning to stock up on Lou and Andy dolls as stocking fillers this Christmas, do not expect to see a David Brent dancing model or an Andy Millman board game stacked alongside them on the shelf. And if you're one of the thousands trooping along to see Matt Lucas and David Walliams take Dafydd and the rest to the stage this autumn, you are equally unlikely to see Ricky Gervais ahead of you in the queue.

For the creator of The Office and Extras, these accoutrements are symptomatic of a malaise that takes hold of successful British comedians once they have a hit. While he does not mention Little Britain by name, his scathing assessment of some of his peers leaves you in no doubt that he feels little kinship with the British comedy fraternity.

"If you look at it as a career, it's foolish to go all out. You've got to hold out. We resisted putting out loads of rubbish from The Office for years and years. There was a dancing toy they wanted us to put out," he laughs. "It might be funny to have a tacky Brent doll and it'll probably sell well. But it's a con. It's a piece of tat that you don't need," he says passionately

Follow the link for the rest of the article

Comedy Series Review: Spaced

I bought this boxed set while I was back in the UK during the summer break.

Its written and acted by Simon Pegg and Jessica Stevenson who play two twentysomething flatmates in London, Tim and Daisy who are going nowhere very fast. The story follows Tim as he's mercilessly dumped by his girlfriend and finds himself practically homeless, without much money due to his aspirations to be a comic book artist, and his unwillingness to face reality and get a real job, a chance encounter with wannabe writer Daisy in a coffeeshop sends their lives in a new unexpected direction. Quickly realising that it would make financial sense to become flatmates they pose as a couple to secure a flat from the middle aged, alcoholic landlady, Marsha. Who has tortured artist, Brian, as a lodger.

I was first attracted to this series after watching Shaun of the Dead which I thought was bloody hilarious, Pegg has a very original approach both visually and from a writing point of view when tackling movie cliches and well worn genres.

Having lived in Japan for nearly eight years sometimes cult Channel Four comedies can slip past your radar and dissappear into TV heaven with other unsung heroes. What really appeals about this series, which is split into forteen episodes; is the clever use of movie pastiche, practically every major genre flick from the last twenty years is given  a good ribbing courtsey of the show's stars. My favorite is definitely Simon Pegg burning his Star Wars collection in a direct lift of Luke Skywalker burning the remains of his father in Return of the Jedi, the reason - The Phantom Menace was crap.  Beautifully played out.

Saying that I don't think this series is for everyone, he required a geek level knowledge of modern movies to appreciate all the skits that occur through the series. At the same time though I think anyone with a modicum of sophistication and taste will appreciate the surrealistic touches and visual flair that treats every episode.

Battlestar Galactica

If you were a kid in the late seventies who quite liked Star Wars, then Battlestar Galactica would have been something you tuned into religiously, never mind the cheesy effects and seventies TV mentality, the story was epic and the effects reminded you of Star Wars which couldn’t be a bad thing and, oh yeah it also had Dirk Benedict chewing up the scenery as well as his signature stogie. It lasted only a season and managed to make a human holocaust seem like jolly good fun, which when you think about it is a little sick if you ask me.

Twenty five years later its back, but as the marketing says, this ain’t your daddy’s Galactica, god knows what that’s supposed to mean, my dad would never have watched the original because he was never a big fan of cheese, and the original had plenty. This new version, well, if you’ve got kids now, you’ll probably won’t sit down with them and watch it, not unless you think series like Twenty Four and The Sopranos is healthy TV for child development that is.

This re-imagining by Ron Moore is a sophisticated, realistic drama, yes I’m saying this without any irony here, this series is grown up sci-fi of the best kind it has more in common with Frank Herbert, Asimov and Phillip K Dick than its pulp fantasy roots. So what’s it about? Well, imagine a sister civilization which although is space faring, socially speaking, is at the same stage of human development that we are in other words this isn’t Star Trek, humans are not evolved enlightened beings. Now imagine that this society’s version of AI, called the cylons, rebelled and nearly destroyed them. Sounds all very Terminator and Matrix doesn’t it? Well that’s where the similarities end. There is little black and white here, its all grey, no-one twirls moustaches, and no-one whips on seventies disco cloak, and there are absolutely no daft robot dogs or cute kids.

In the first mini series the cylons after a mysterious forty-year absence from the colonies come back and wipe them out in an all too real nuclear attack, that clearly sign posted as a parallel to 9/11. Before the humans can fight back they are reduced in number to 49 000 people and only have one military ship to protect them, and that’s old and out of date. The Commander played by James Olmos Jones decides its better to run than fight, thus beginning the biblical journey to a mysterious lost colony called Earth.

It all sounds rather simple doesn’t it? Well no, not really, this series is about relationships and is existential in its nature; the cylons have found monothestic religion while the humans believe in a polytheistic pantheon, which is modeled on the Greek gods. The cylons believe that by wiping out humanity they are doing God’s will (recognize anything familiar here?). The humans consider the cylons sub human and call them toasters, and think nothing of spacing prisoners and using torture and rape to find information about the enemy.

This show does not presuppose that a holocaust will bring out the best in humanity in fact it shows how it can bring out the worst in us too, where some characters do show self sacrifice, on the whole a lot of people in this universe are more about saving their own skin, which is beautifully rendered in a multilayered performance by Bridget Jones’s metrosexual James Callis who has to bear the guilt that even though he wasn’t consciously aware of doing so, he was the one who betrayed humanity through his infatuation with a cylon agent who is every man’s fantasy, a tall sexy blonde who loves sex. Its through their relationship that we learn about the cylons and their motivation, Moore employs some clever story devices to keep the two characters interacting regularly, and results in some of the series most intense scenes.

The storylines are rarely episodic in nature and generally blend in with each other to form a rich tapestry, its rarely predictable, and never flinches or drops the ball with its resolutions. The human survivors make tough choices, for example in season one the Commander orders his son, Apollo, to destroy a ship with over 1000 people on board because it might have an enemy agent on board. Later on in the series the President, played affectingly by Mary McDonald, (Donnie Darko’s mum btw) agrees effectively to the use of slave labour to harvest ice from an asteroid. Richard Hatch from the original series is a semi regular and plays a Nelson Mandela/Arafat character who many in the fleet consider to be a terrorist.

The new Galactica is sci-fi at its best, it’s a product and a commentary of the times we are living in, its compelling, rarely boring and never insults the viewer. If you’ve never given genre TV much consideration then I advise you to make a change with this, trust me you will not be disappointed.