Loki: Journey into Mystery

 "Don't die isn't a plan. It's just a general demand of living."

Nice title. I love these subtle, or not so subtle, little nods.

Wow. This is a big, big episodes and I'm not even going to get started on all the hidden little artifacts around the void. We get loads of Lokis, one of which is Richard E. Grant in the original costime by King Kirby himself. The whole thing is enormous fun.

Then we get the simmering romance between Sylvie and Loki. More Miss Minutes, always a good thing. A frigging alligator Loki, one up on Walt Simonson's frog Thor. We get the revelation that the pruned aren't killed; they're sent to a bit of the far future beyond which we cannot see, and where a beast guards something beyond, something which may hold the secrets of the Time Keepers. Wow.

It's not just about the revelations, though, awesome though they are. The relationship between Loki and Sylvie is subtly and beautifully done, alongside the friendship between both of them and the relievingly not-dead Mobius, who will hopefully achieve what he sets out to do.

This is brilliant. So what lies behind the curtain...?

Logan (2017)

 "Don't be what they made you..."

I'm going to do my best to watch the few remaining X-Men films from Fox in order. It'll be Dark Phoenix next, fairly soon, but for now we have this rather unexpectedly styled and surprisingly good film based on a limited series featuring Wolverine in the future (2029!) well after my time.

My knowledge of Marvel comics is fairly comprehensive up to circa 1993, and fairly nonexistent after them. So I know of Caliban- played here (and rather well) by Stephen Merchant of all people, and of course of Donald Piercxe and the Reavers, from the late 1980s stories by Chris Claremont in a rather differrent context.

But the situation here is different. Logan- more than two centuries old in a fairly depressing life- is dying of a myserious ailment; Charles Xavier is dying and suffering from dementia, a terrifying outcome for someone with his mental powers, and something which led, a year ago, to the "Westchester Incident" in which several, including multiple X-<Men died. And this is a world in which, for reasons ultimately explained, no mutant has been born for a quarter of a century. Oh, and, unexpectedly, by means of a test tube baby and sperm theft, Logan has a daughter. With claws.

This is a superb film, with superb acting elevating a quite good script to somewhat more than that. Hugh Jackman is excellentt but Patrick Stewart is sublime. The best X-Men film yet and, I suspect, unlikely to be bettered.

Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992)

"See the amazing cinematograph- the wonder of modern civilisation."

Francis Ford Coppola gives us a lush, gorgeous Dracula. While the film doesn't entirely work- it's bloated and over-detailed- I'd actually blame the source material rather than this excellently made film which, in spite of what is often said and in spite of some obvious and welcome homages to James Whale's 1931 film, is if anything a little too faithful to the novel.

The casting is full of big names, although an oddity is that very few of the big names are using their own native accents in one way or another. Gary Oldman is a splendid Dracula, while Winona Ryder- who, it being the early '90s, had to appear in this film- is well cast as the sexually repressed and innocent Mina, whose repressed desires are soon teased out. Keanu Reeves as Jonathan Harker is, as ever, Ted, while Anthony Hopkins is a convincing and amusing Van Helsing.

The film makes explicit what is implicit in the novel: it's all a metaphor for sex and sexuality, as numerous scenes make clear with vampirism always portrayed in an obviously sexualised manner. Another nice touch is that all narration us epistolary in nature, paralleling the firm and structure of Stoker's novel. But Coppola also adds a prologue in which Vlad the Impaler turns against God and (in a process not entirely clear) towards vampirism after the Juliet-like suicide of his wife, who thought him dead. In lesser hands this would have been corny and embarrassing, but Coppola makes it work.

The direction is beautiful: I love the change in texture and camerawork during the cinematograph scenes. The only real criticism I can find is Richard E. grant phoning in his performance; the film is beautifully made and bloated only because Coppola is clearly such a huge Dracula fanboy, something I'm well prepared to indulge.

Doctor Who: The Name of the Doctor

“No way my wife is buried out here…”

“Your what?!”.

Nearly twenty-four hours on, and I’m still fangasming. I loved it, obviously, but don’t expect any serious critical engagement with this episode, or indeed reviewing, in this “review”. Instead, I shall flail about like a flaily thing and, uhm, squee incessantly.

At last we know the solution to the Clara conundrum, and it’s a neatly elegant one. She is indeed just an ordinary person, if a little more magnificent than usual, and it’s only when she sacrifices herself, and shards of her persona are scattered throughout space and time that she becomes extraordinary. The other Claras are the soufflés; the original Clara is the recipe. It is at the same time so gloriously complicated and so elegantly simple. And this is what leads to the cliff hanger, as the Doctor heads into his own timeline to save her.

We see River again, or rather a backup of her from after her death in The Silence in the Library two-parter. She is therefore at the latest part in her life, if you can call it that, than we have ever seen her. She has what seems to be her final goodbye to the Doctor and they share a passionate kiss such as has never quite seen before in Doctor Who. Intriguingly, we discover towards the end that River is solid and seems to have a physical existence. This added mystery implies we will be seeing her again. Spoilers, sweetie!

Vastra, Jenny and Strax are brilliantly used, as always. They are the glue that holds the story together. The concept of a séance across time is inspired, and also rather convenient, as this is the means by which Moffat assembles his cast of the Doctor’s friends, and thus allows the plot to happen. We get a touching glimpse into the kinky but loving relationship between Vastra and Jenny. Vastra is distraught when Jenny “dies”, and her comments to Strax are revealing: he remarks that the heart is a simple thing and she replies, simply “I have not found it so”.

Strax, of course, is at his comical best, but in this case this serves as a contrast with his radically different behaviour after the Great Intelligence has begun to erase the Doctor’s time stream, becoming hostile and humorous. And, yes, this is my cue to flail about wildly at all the old clips, old Doctors and such forth.

The continuity porn begins immediately, and has me jumping up and down like a kangaroo on a trampoline on speed, as we see the Doctor and Susan nicking the TARDIS all those years ago! At last, we have it confirmed that Susan was with him at the time and, oddly, he’s wearing the same Edwardian clothes that we see him wearing in An Unearthly Child, un-Gallifreyan though they are. Loads more clips follow, in which all the Doctors appear in varying levels of detail, including an interesting one in which footage of Patrick Troughton from The Five Doctors is inserted in to footage of modern California. Many of the clips look a little odd, as the picture quality does not match modern HD, but it is awesome to see them.

Almost as fangasmy is the fact that we finally get to see Trenzalore and the Doctor’s tomb. We do not, after all, hear the Doctor’s name spoken, but it is both the key to the Great Intelligence’s scheme and important to the final scene, of which more shortly. I expected to see the Silence in this episode, but they are, it is perhaps implied, the good guys in that they only intend to prevent the Doctor being erased from history and the great suffering that would cause. Instead, we get another great Moffat villain in the Whisper Men, who remind me of the Gentlemen from the Buffy episode Hush.

But the thing we’re all really hyper about, twenty-four hours later, is John Hurt’s previously unknown Doctor. Who is he, and why is he so beyond the pale to his subsequent incarnations? We face the challenging task of waiting a whole six months to find out. See you on the twenty-third of November. Excited much?!

Doctor Who: The Bells of Saint John

“Run, you clever boy, and remember!”

If you’re visiting my blog for the first time since the last episode of Doctor Who or you have never viewed my blog before, welcome. This is where I review TV, films and such like, but I use the word “review” in its loosest possible sense. Expect many digressions, especially when it comes to Doctor Who, and especially especially when it comes to wondering whatever the hell the Moff is up to.

In a sense, this is a typically light and fluffy opening episode, and a good jumping on point for new viewers, much as RTD used to do. This being the Moff, however, it is also at the same time a fast-paced modern thriller, a semi-romantic comedy worthy of the creator of Coupling in the interaction between the Doctor and Clara, and seeding an awful lot of stuff for the rest of the season and the fiftieth anniversary. This blog entry will be mainly bibbling on about the latter of these.

Basically, this is an excitingly excellent and well cool bit of entertainment with a great baddie in Celia Imrie, loads of action and fantastic usage of modern London as a setting. As my girlfriend remarked, this may be the first time that The Shard has been used like this as a landmark. But it’s also re-establishing the programme for new viewers, introducing Matt Smith as the Doctor in such a way as to gently ease the new viewer in to his habits and personality. It helps here that he needs to introduce himself, for the third time, to yet another version of Clara/Oswin/whatever name she has to be using. Jenna-Louise Coleman is bloody good here, again, this time using her native Lancashire accent and a modern idiom, but recognisably the same personality, plopped in to a different life.

The Moff, being the Moff, gives us an uber scary concept plucked from everyday life, in this case WiFi. In fact, this isn’t the only familiar Moffat motif we have here; the concept of human minds being uploaded on to a hard-drive harks back to Silence in the Library, while the TARDIS phone ringing is a nostalgic reminder of his first ever Who script, as well as an excuse for the rather cool title.

Let’s just get it out of the way: this was bloody good. Now we can get on with the speculation. I couldn’t help noticing that the Doctor rather tended to draw attention to the fact that he rather likes the phrase “Doctor Who?”, which is a rather obvious piece of foreshadowing. I also couldn’t help noticing a novel written by a certain Amy Williams! It was a nice subtle tribute to her. Similarly nice was the reference to the real life police box at Earls Court.

Other little things include Clara’s diary, in which she has changed her age every year except when she was twenty-three. This is most probably going to be significant later in the season. I also noticed that the script did not identify the “woman” who first got Clara to ring the Doctor about the internet. The villain, of course, is still The Great Intelligence, a nice subtle shout out to the Troughton years, with a certain actor returning after the Christmas special.

Oh, and the Spoonheads are a typically scary monster in a horribly imaginative way, while the concept of underlings being controlled by means of an equalizer for such things as obedience, intelligence, and the like it utter genius.

I mustn’t forget, of course, that the TARDIS interior has had a suitably nostalgic makeover, looking rather like it did in the 70’s mixed with the last version. I love the roundels and the retro yet modern console with grindstones above, decorated with Gallifreyan text. We also have a new theme tune and title sequence, which, for the first time since 1989, at last shows the Doctor’s face! The new, Hubble Space Telescope influenced starscapes look awesome! This is the greatest title sequence ever, except for the uber-weird Hartnell version, obviously.

Yeah, basically this rules. One interesting final point, though. The Moff may have done a bit of a Robert Holmes in including a rather unsubtle vegetarian message, comparing the baddies’ treatment of the free range humans to a humane abattoir.

Doctor Who: The Snowmen

“I said I’d feed you. I didn’t say who to…”

Gosh, there’s so much to talk about, isn’t there? 2010 aside, Christmas episodes are usually fluffy, light, and aimed at a larger and more drunk audience than usual. There’s an element of that, mind, but there’s also lots of other cool stuff that we’re obviously going to talk about. So I’ll just quickly get the actual “review” part of the review over with so we can do that.

This is a fun, exciting and magical piece of family Christmas entertainment, with a mix of scares (the Snowmen, with their sharp, pointy teeth- bloody scary), wonderment (the TARDIS is on top of a cloud, reached via an invisible staircase: the Doctor gets more and more like a good wizard all the time), good villains (Richard E. Grant and the voice of Ian McKellen) and laughs (Strax: Moffat is his usual comedy genius self and Dan Starkey is a bloody good comic actor). It’s exceedingly good. There. Let’s move on to the geeky stuff, shall we?

There’s a shiny new theme tune, which seems ok so far: I need time to get used to it and make a proper judgement. There are new and brilliant opening titles,which look to be 3-D ready and, in a nicely retro touch, feature a glimpse of Matt Smith’s face. Best of all is the retooled TARDIS interior, which kicks arse.

The Doctor is far from over losing Amy, moping in Victorian England ostentatiously refusing to do Doctorish things while his supporting cast Madame Vastra, Jenny, and their rather funny Sontaran butler Strax keep him company. According to Vastra he “prefers isolation to the possibility of pain’s return”, and is doing sod all. Of course, all this leaves a suspiciously large gap for a massive retcon; I won’t be surprised if Moffat later reveals that the Doctor has been up to something important in the London of 1892.

Moffat, being the co-creator of Sherlock, gives us a bit of metatextual fun, establishing that Sherlock Holmes is a fictional character in the Doctor Who continuity, probably based by Conan Doyle on the exploits of Madame Vastra and her lady wife. This also functions as a nice little shorthand as to what sort of adventures they’re getting up to while the Doctor, apparently, isn’t having any.

But let’s get to the point: Jenna-Louise Coleman making her debut (again) as Clara, as a dress rehearsal until she presumably debuts for good at the start of the next series. I like her. She’s ingenious, resourceful and, as my girlfriend remarked, similar to Alice off of Alice in Wonderland in the way she just accepts all these wonders and investigates them. I still reckon there’s a germ of truth in the charge that Moffat tends to write his women in a certain way, with River Song being as good a template as any, but much of that is down to the demands of the genre: the female lead in an adventure series is bound to possess certain traits.

Clara / Oswin so beguiles the Doctor that he invites her to travel with him after a ridiculously short period of time, until Moffat goes and does his misdirection thing and (eventually) kills her. Again. But by now the Doctor has realised: she’s the same person, twice. What is going on? He needs to “find” her, and seems possessed with a rejuvenated urge to adventure.

Some last uber-geeky things: The baddie is the Great Intelligence, making this a prequel to TheAbominable Snowmen, which aired back in 1967. The 1967 London Underground map rather tends to indicate that The Web of Fear was set in this year, which buggers up UNIT dating delightfully. And the origin story for the Great Intelligence here rules out the Lovecraftian theories as promoted in the Virgin novels back in the ‘90s.