Monday Therapy: Literature Hath Charms ...

It's not just music that hath charms to soothe a savage breast!  Literature can too.  Since Mondays are by nature savage, let's see if we can get some literary therapy to take the edge off the day.

I think a whole lot of people would be much more interested in lit if we got more wonderful people to do more poetry readings.  I don't even really LIKE e.e. cummings, subject of the first reading, but the reading is remarkable.  Reading is a performing art, all right.  Let's start, shall we?

Mini-Movie Review: "Fright Night"

"Let's kill something."

Finally, a proper vampire flick that doesn't have idiotic girls named Bella or self-loathing (and infinitely loathe-able) sparkly pseudo-monsters whose heart I want to cut out with a spoon!  Nope, you'll get none of that here even though the protagonist Charley Brewster (Anton Yelchin) is a teenager. "Fright Night" is sheer campy horror fun.  With plenty of rip-roaring suspense and action -- not to mention rousing turns by Colin Farrell as Jerry the unapologetically and delightfully creepy vampire and David Tennant as Peter Vincent the hilariously overdone Vegas personality who hunts him -- "Fright Night" delivers some stylish, sassy genre entertainment in a genre that desperately needed an intervention to kick it out of its brain-dead Twilight stupor.  "Fright Night" better deliver that jolt -- Marti Noxon the Buffy alum wrote the screenplay!  This horror-action-comedy remake of the 1985 cult classic is a great way to end the summer.  (Yes, I used the UK poster because it has David on it.  So sue me.)

MM gives "Fright Night" a  solid grade of B.

Rotten Tomatoes gives this movie a Fresh rating of 77%.

"Fright Night" runs 101 minutes and is rated R for language, violence, and gore (though, frankly, I thought it barely deserved this ... Then again, I usually laugh at horror-schlocky violence!).

Mother's Day Shakespeare

Here's an encore of last year's shoutout to the Bard.

Nerd Journal: One More Present for My Posse

For La Parisienne, who just might need a little midday pick-me-up amid all the day's entertaining ... and because it's not quite time yet for the 2010 Doctor Who Christmas Special ... Here's a blast from the Christmas 2009 past.

Nerd Journal: A Present For Good Girls

For La Parisienne and California Dreamer since they've been good girls this year!  Merry Christmas, dahlings!  It's the BBC ident from Christmas 2009.  I had forgotten all about it until now.  The current 2010 holiday ident features a Dalek, and that's cute and all, but there's something magically delightful about the old one:

Nerd Journal: MM and Her Posse Love the TARDIS

Yes! I have successfully fled Nerdworld and am finally with my peeps, and we are having fun hanging out, running errands, getting ready for Thanksgiving, and trying to forget work and school.  We're also indulging our love of "Doctor Who."  But even as we like the new Doctor and loved the way the most recent season ended and are very much looking forward to the Christmas special, there is always the lingering memory of David Tennant as Ten.  "I miss him," even the famously stoic Alessandra said, and I do too.  Oh, Ten.  You'll always be my Doctor.  So let's just indulge this for about 7 gloriously musical minutes, shall we?  (Then it's back to holiday errands/preparation/fun.)

Couch Potato Chronicles: David Tennant Returns to British TV

It's Tennant's first TV appearance since he handed over the role of the Doctor to Matt Smith (a fact that plenty of us still find upsetting).  Still, Tennant's in a new drama series called "Single Father" which airs tonight in the UK on BBC One.  It's going to be a little while before I can get my eager eyeballs on it here Stateside, but I can't wait!  Here are a few promotional photos from it for La Parisienne and California Dreamer.

A sight for sore eyes.

Prescription for MM's Posse

Here's something for what ails ya, darlin'.  (And for all my peeps who could use a smile and who are, alas, too far away for me to visit!)

He makes house calls.

2010 Hugo Awards Recognize Sci Fi Achievements: Congrats to "Moon" and the Doctor

The winners of the 2010 Hugo Awards have been announced, and I am delighted that two of my favorite sci fi productions of 2009 were among them: "Moon" for Best Dramatic Presentation (Long Form) and the Doctor Who episode "The Waters of Mars" for Best Dramatic Presentation (Short Form).   Yes indeedy -- Hugo and I have excellent taste!

I raved about "Moon" last summer, and I also told you about how emotionally effective "Waters of Mars" was. Both of these productions go beyond fluffy fun to consider some Big Ideas such as the meaning and worth of an individual human being ("Moon") and the temptation to power that acknowledges no limit ("Waters of Mars").  Both of them are riveting examples of writing and storytelling, even as they will probably twist your insides as they did mine.  They will give you chills.  Kudos too to the actors who made the stories work -- Sam Rockwell as Sam Bell and David Tennant as the Doctor.

Did you just pitch up from Mars?

Monday Therapy: British Crime Drama + "The Gambler" = Hilarity

This is the opening of part 2 of the quirky six-part musical crime drama "Blackpool" (2004).  Yes, you read that right.  A musical crime drama.  The sequence is a montage of the different members of the ensemble cast in their interwoven plotlines.  Now be sure to watch all the way to the end, where Elvis shows up and says ... Well, you'll find out.  As for Kenny Rogers's "The Gambler," well, that's applicable for life in general and especially for Mondays -- "the secret to survivin'!"  (I might as well add that to the Nerdworld Soundtrack.)  And YES, in "Blackpool" characters do randomly burst into song (and dance, sometimes).  The result is darn engaging.

Cop Rock.

Nerd Journal: Fleeing from Nerdworld

Mind you, I can't really afford to leave, either in terms of time or money, but I'm going to do it anyway.  I'm escaping from the Library of Doom to go visit the Cinema-Mad Sibling and some dear old friends for a couple of days.  Don't tell the Nerd Lords!  I give you a line from "Doctor Who" that seems to sum up what I'm thinking and feeling in the middle of my current summer nerd research hell.  The Doctor is facing down his old nemesis Davros and the Daleks, and then in response to Davros' taunting, the Time Lord says this around 1:20:

(Below the fold since alien guts are involved.)

Nerd Journal: Paper Given to Nerd Lord Today!

24 pages double-spaced, baby. Comparatively speaking, it's not that big or bad a nerd paper, but the Nerd Lord I gave it to is no ordinary Nerd Lord.  He's The Big Kahuna, the Object of My Nerd Idolatry, the reason I went to my particular Nerdworld.  Now to wait with bated breath until said mighty Nerd Lord gets back to me!  Now, gentle reader, keep your fingers crossed that his response isn't this.

I can't rest much, though.  I have more massive research obligations to do before fall classes start, but I'm fast running out of summer!

Still, I'm going to slack off for a little while because hey, I did just turn in 24 pages, all carefully footnoted and everything.  Tomorrow I'm going to pick blueberries with a friend at a farm not too far away, and I just baked a big evil chocolate cake for myself!  Oh, the whole apartment smells like fresh warm chocolate cake, and it is HEAVEN.

For now, though, I'll amuse you with something that fellow literature fan La Parisienne and I have been amusing ourselves with.  Personally, I don't like Tennessee Williams, but I might have found the only thing that will make me look twice at a certain famous play of his.  Oh, identify the play -- but it's basically a gimme.

Geek News: Life Imitates Sci Fi with Time Travel and Quantum Mechanics

Via a cool little post at io9, here is a recent actual abstract for research on the topic.  The paper is here in PDF.  The physicists involved hail from MIT, the Scuola Normale Superiore (in Pisa, Italy), and the Tokyo Institute of Technology.  Upshot: paradox-free time travel? Or at least (gratuitous "Doctor Who" reference in 3... 2... 1...), WIBBLY-WOBBLY TIMEY-WIMEY!

Nerdworld Soundtrack: The Fratellis

This is for La Parisienne for a Friday afternoon treat.  Look who else likes the Fratellis... !  It's adorkable, all right.  Oh, and if you, gentle reader, don't know this Scottish alternative rock band from Glasgow, you can have a listen at Pandora or Rhapsody or on their MySpace page.

Look Out Sunshine!

Nerd Journal: Evil Enablers Gonna Enable!

Haters gonna hate; enablers gonna ... enable.  La Parisienne and I don't believe in keeping our personal obsessions to ourselves.  We believe in SHARING.  Besides, we only obsess about things worth obsessing about, right?

So recently I got a conspiratorial text from the lovely lady (fresh from a previous triumph) saying that she was going to inflict "Farscape" on Count Chocula.  That same day, I got a text from Count Chockula telling me that he had gotten sucked into "Farscape."  That Parisienne doesn't waste any time!  Dang, girl!  And "Farscape" was a great sci-fi TV show -- and gone before its time, much like the late, lamented "Firefly."

As for me, yesterday I was busy enabling Foxtrot and Ladybird and Alessandra to watch "Doctor Who" (before and after the World Cup match -- a roomful of friends with HDTV and premium ice cream and a soccer championship and the TARDIS ... Do Sunday afternoons get much better?).  So, yeah, I'd been catching some flak from Alessandra for my Who obsession, but I had them all watch the two-parter "Silence in the Library" and "Forest of the Dead," and that did it for these neophytes to the Whoniverse!

The tipping point: The furious Ten confronting the alien predator Vashta Nerada:  "Don't play games with me! You just killed someone I like; that is not a safe place to stand!  I'm the Doctor, and you're in the biggest library in the Universe. Look me up."

Don't mess with Texas  Ten.

And then the murderous monster retreats.

Me: "Admit it.  That's hot."
Alessandra, grudgingly: "All right, that IS hot."
Me: *dance of triumph*

Well, then!  Besides that, the narrative is fun, and watching the ladies respond to it was even more fun.  You could nearly have heard the gears whirring in their heads as they were processing it.  It's a thinking woman's show. We all had a great time.  (And more fun, I dare say, than we had watching the Netherlands-Spain game, which was mostly -- as one of my soccer-loving Nerd Lords said -- "lousy.")

Then we did a selection of different episode intros, and to finish it off with a comedy chaser, we watched the delightful episode from the latest season, "The Lodger."  Yes, I'm the Typhoid Mary of Who obsession, and so is La Parisienne.  We share our obsessions because we want you to have as much sci-fi fun with them as we do!  

Nerd Journal: This One's For the Girls

For La Parisienne and California Dreamer.  Because you deserve it.  Because we're all wishing to escape in the TARDIS.  Because it stinks that we're all in different parts of the country and can't watch "Doctor Who" together.  Because we love it when the Doctor is kicking @$$ and taking names.  And because, deep down, we're all River Song.  Note River quote below too.  Enjoy, my darlings!

Couch Potato Chronicles: Part 2 of the "Doctor Who" Finale: "The Big Bang"

Part 1 had me absolutely screaming for more.  It did.  Best cliffhanger I've seen in a very long time.

Part 2 was -- unbelievably -- even more of a roller coaster that made my head explode, and I will now give Steven Moffat all the credit he deserves and say he's reached Joss Whedoneque levels of MM's idolatry.  I'll try to do a full review soon, but I really do need to see the entire two-part finale again so I can think about it.  For now, though, here is a lovely review to tide you over (spoilers if you haven't seen the episode yet!).  UPDATE: This too (also spoiler-y).

For now, though, I'll say that the show and Matt Smith have done it.  They've done what I was so very much hoping they would do: balance the clever mind games with some serious character development and a visceral connection to the audience.  I wanted it to be about the gut and heart as well as the head.

And, at long last, I got it.  (Spoiler-ish photos below the fold.)

Monday Therapy: Geek Fun With "I Am A Scientist"

The song is "I Am A Scientist" by the endearingly named Dandy Warhols. I'm posting it as a shout-out to my/our fondness for science, science fiction, tech toys, and geeky pleasures. (Too bad there's not a similar song called "I Am A History Nerd.")

BONUS for La Parisienne and California Dreamer: some video footage of one our favorite science maniacs to go along with the song on this, June 21, the first official day of summer.

Anyway, as the name of one useful and geek-tastic website does remind us, Geeks Are Sexy. (Well, some geeks, anyway!)

Couch Potato Chronicles: OK, Eleventh Doctor, You Win (Part 2: "The Lodger")

Episode 10, "Vincent and the Doctor" paved the way, but it was really this 11th episode, "The Lodger" that got me.

It was in many ways the show at its most charming and most fun. It was a celebration of the ordinary and of the pleasures and value of "an ordinary life." It was a story of how the Doctor can make a difference in the particular lives of ordinary people and that this is just as legitimate and worthy a cause as abstractly saving the planet/galaxy/universe. It was, at its heart, a story about people (Time Lords are people too, right?), people living their everyday lives. After all, the whole point to saving the universe/galaxy/planet is so ordinary people can live their lives, right? (Ignore Peter Singer on this one. Trust me.) Besides, you don't have to do something massively spectacular in order to make a difference or a good story (take note, Russell T. Davies, who sometimes forgot this).

"The Lodger" was also a Time Lord version of "The Odd Couple," and there is something simply, inherently appealing about the idea of the Doctor masquerading as a human and having a flatmate (Craig, beautifully and winningly played by James Corden). Danger aside (there's a creepy room upstairs that apparently eats people), the entire setup is geared for laughs as poor Craig finds his new flatmate rather ... odd and as the Doctor flails about trying to fit in.

Then, because the show is apparently out to get me, it threw in all sorts of details and developments that were basically guaranteed to push my buttons. Take a look at a few examples:

1. Craig's refrigerator. Do you notice a clever little detail?

Bonus: the magnetic letters spelling "Craig Rocks." Besides, I love the messy fridge door. It's so ... realistic. My fridge door is a mess of magnets and pictures and postcards and papers too.


2. Technophiliac fiddling. Just look at this loopy machine that the Doctor jury-rigged in his room! He MacGyvered it out of junk and spare parts. And that's pretty awesome.

3. The sonic toothbrush ... I mean, screwdriver.

I'm back to obsessing happily over attention to detail. The Doctor's in the shower and he reaches blindly for ... Hey, look!

What's even better is that he rushes out of the bath in an attempt to sonic a perceived threat ...

... but, much to Craig's amusement (just look at Corden's expression!), the Doctor's actually grabbed the electric toothbrush instead. I laughed out loud, and I'll never look at my Sonicare toothbrush in quite the same way again. The entire little interlude was a great shout-out to ordinary objects in everyday life (and how they can slam up against the Doctor).

You're the DOCTOR, not the DENTIST.

4. Cooking. You know I love cooking. This darn episode! Must it appeal to the cooking fan in me too? Apparently, YES. The Doctor makes an omelet for Craig and mentions along the way that he learned how to cook in Paris in the 19th century. Did he go to the Cordon Bleu? Did he learn from Escoffier? We don't know. But what a thought!

5. Soccer. I mean, FOOTBALL. Oh, and right during the World Cup, so you know this is no accident! Craig recruits the Doctor for his pub league team, and we get a whole wagonload of goodies out of it. For one thing, in terms of sporting tie-ins, this works SO MUCH BETTER than Season 2's "Fear Her" and its horrible London Olympics plot device.

Anyway, the Doctor changes into his kit, and right from the start it made me smile. He's put the jersey on backwards at first, yes, but notice the number on it. Also: when was the last time we saw a Doctor in shorts? Never, that's when. Nine and Ten never did (and, I have to say, Ciao Bello opined with crushing candor that nobody should ever have to see Tennant in shorts, and even lovely California Dreamer couldn't help poking fun at his legs after they saw this "Doctor Who Confidential" segment, *giggle*). But somehow shorts seem to dovetail perfectly well with Eleven's goofy -- and, let's be honest, dorky -- charm. The hair just adds to the effect.

Hilariously, at first the Doctor doesn't quite understand football -- and isn't even clear on which sport it is. In an earpiece exchange with the absent, TARDIS-bound Amy, he says, "Football ... I'm good at football, I think ... Football, all outdoorsy ... that's the one with the sticks, isn't it?"

And of course he's good at it. (I heard a tale that before he went into acting, Matt Smith did want to play football before an injury ended that.)

You'd have to have a heart of stone not be moved by this face when he scored. GOOOOOOAL! The other team's goalie isn't too happy, but there is something really sweet about Eleven right here.

"Yesssss!"

"What?!" *

* = OK, so I was just kidding around. The image from "Fear Her" was too perfect not to use! Come on, it's Ten in front of a goal net, for goodness sake, with that look of dismayed, annoyed surprise. It could belong to any goalie caught off-guard!

Sophie (an adorable Daisy Haggard, whom you may recognize from the delightful "Man Flu" comedy video) approves. She's Craig's friend, and he fancies her but can't quite communicate that. "The Odd Couple" vibe takes on a rom-com vibe too.

6. You just had to, didn't you, show? You just had to bring in a montage of past Doctors and hurl David Tennant's face all over my TV, didn't you? Maybe it was meant as an homage, but I caught by surprise and it was like someone jammed an icicle into my heart. But it hurt so good to see Ten, darling dearly departed Ten, so I guess Aristotle was right about catharsis and whatnot. Darn it, show, for manipulating my apparently easily manipulated emotions.

7. Remember what I said at the beginning of this post about how the story is about people? I've banged on before (and at terrible length) about characters, and the episode ended delightfully on the human level. We resolved the issue about the mysterious people-eating upstairs room, but what brought the resolution wasn't the sonic screwdriver or some tech toy or something that only the Doctor could do. Actually, it was Craig and Sophie who ended up turning the tide ... by taking the leap and confessing their love for each other. In the end, they and the Doctor emerge as friends having shared an adventure.

Three's company.

So in the end, Craig and Sophie and I can say with happy honesty ... Well, why don't I just let Craig's fridge do the talking as it appears at the end of the episode?

He does indeed.

Bonus: Look at what reappears at the end, in the wall beside Craig's refrigerator? The crack is back, a reminder now that next week and the week after will be the oh-so-important finale of the season. What's going to happen when the Pandorica opens next week?

Screencap credit to Sonic Biro. Also, you can catch the episode (and all of the current season's episodes) here.

BONUS: Take a look at this absolutely fabulous bit from this episode's "Doctor Who Confidential."

Programming Note: Yes, I Know I've Been a Negligent Flake Lately

Chalk it up to Nerdworld and start-of-summer exhausted silliness PLUS the World Cup, maybe, and add an unexpected (and ludicrous) case of sci fi and Shakespeare addiction after an mostly entertainment-less spring semester.

I haven't posted anything thoughtful and intelligently analytical in days, have I? Well, it doesn't feel as if I have. And La Parisienne had to wait three weeks for the"Iron Man 2" review that I'd promised. I'm horrible. (On the plus side, I did just turn in two massive writing/research assignments for various Nerd Lords. Whew! On the minus side, I have a million more massive assignments left to do!)

Anyway, I'll try to get us back to our regularly scheduled bloggage. Don't expect anything too substantive, though, until the World Cup is over, all right? I'll probably be frivolous and distracted until it's all over. Let's add one more track to the Nerdworld Soundtrack ... "Train Wreck" by Sarah McLachlan. Bonus track: "Beautiful Disaster" by Kelly Clarkson, ha!

For now, perhaps you'll take this, darlings!



Yes, that really was 120 instances of the word "sorry."