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charameiThe closer we get to Easter, the more Doctor Who withdrawal kicks in (curiously, it wasn't a problem at all during 2009). So it's just as well that I've got so much of it hanging around.
Also, The Adamantine Palace by Stephen Deas and Alice.
SPOILERS for The Adamantine Palace.
The Adamantine Palace by Stephen Deas
A question for anyone else who's read this: do you know who the heroes are meant to be? Who am I meant to be rooting for? Is the last line meant to be triumphant or threatening?
If you can answer any of these questions, you got more out of Deas's writing than I.
So, let's see. Dragons used to be highly intelligent scourges of humanity until the alchemists worked out how to keep them sedated and stupid. Now they're used as mounts for royalty, and a few select knights.
Why? Why not kill them all, rather than taming them? They were utterly terrifying and made it more or less impossible for humanity to survive, by the look of the flashbacks.
Anyway, one of them's escaped and detoxed, and is now becoming an ever greater threat.
Am I meant to be rooting for the dragon? Her entire species has been enslaved for centuries, so you'd think I was. Except that mostly what she does is to kill humans: she's bloodthirsty and unwilling to listen to reason,and while this is perfectly sensible in a gigantic man-eating lizard that's dedicated to freeing its fellows from slavery, it does not make me inclined to like her. I am human: I am genetically and culturally predisposed to feel sorry for them when they are being eaten alive by giant fire-breathing lizards. Besides, most of the humans it eats are complete innocents.
Meanwhile, the local royals are doing that whole scheming, poisoning and power-grabbing thing that they do in these fantasy novels, and... we're mostly following the villain. I know he's the villain because he keeps poisoning people. And he kind of wins.
I looked it up on Amazon once I was done, and it turns out that The Adamantine Palace is the first book in a series: the second is due out this year. That at least explains why Prince Jehal wins - plot fodder. However, it does not really justify my complete confusion over the dragon subplot. It seems to me that, when beginning a fantasy series, the single most important thing to make clear to the reader is whose side they should be on. I'm not saying you should designate a hero regardless of his actions (Eragon) or throw the 'Good/Evil' divide in our faces (so many others) - or even that there has to be a clear Good/Evil divide (because, let's face it, there shouldn't). Just that it's nice to have a character somewhere who we like and can relate to, and that it's important to have a character who we care about. Ultimately, I didn't care for the dragon enough to come down on her side, nor the humans enough to come down on theirs. And that's a problem.
Aside from that... I don't read much sword and sorcery, but even I could see the cliches mounting up here. We have royals grabbing power for no obvious reason (Jehal), a sociopath who looks about to be 'saved' by his new young wife (Jehal again: I am not reading Book 2 to find out if I'm right, but the Amazon blurb suggests I might be), a tomboyish princess who, when the chips are down, turns out to be useless (Jaslyn, and hooray for the anti-feminists), a near-madman who is rightly suspicious of the sociopath for no apparent reason, who nobody listens to until it's too late (Cassandra Hyram), people riding dragons, people worshipping dragons, dragons everywhere... as ever, there are some nice semi-original ideas, but the tide of cliches drowns them out.
Alas, a nothing book.
Doctor Who: Survival of the Fittest (Sylvester McCoy, Tracey Childs)
I meant to review A Thousand Tiny Wings, but found I had relatively little to say about it; it was enjoyable, except when McCoy spat into the microphone, but not astounding. And, of course, I was on the back foot because the companion being introduced - Klein - first turned up in Colditz, which I haven't heard.
Klein didn't grab me in ATTW, either, so it was with increasing delight that I listened to Survival of the Fittest.
It's only a three-parter: the first episode on the CD is basically a recap episode, in which Klein explains Colditz for those of us who are just coming in. It was a good decision, and one that should be made more often in Doctor Who: though it would have been slightly better in this instance if the story hadn't involved a time looped regeneration that never happened and was a tad badly explained. Took me the next hour to work that one out.
Then Survival of the Fittest started properly. McCoy thankfully did not spit into the microphone again, and although I had some reservations about the way Klein's character seemed to be developing, I was extremely gratified to find that every single one of them was played out by the end: no, Doctor, you can't redeem a Nazi that quickly.
What you can do, though, is to save a colony of alien not-bees. It's so common in SF/F to see an Earth animal used as a shortcut ('They're sentient dogs! Get it?') that having a situation where the analogy worked up to a point and then broke was really refreshing, and very nicely done. I was a little disappointed that humanity turned out to be the root cause of the events again: however, the imperialist subplot tied into Klein's character arc well enough that it didn't grate too much.
The idea that the TARDIS can even translate completely alien languages, such as scent-markers, was cleverly executed without becoming too invasive, and the use of the TARDIS translator to resolve a major communication problem between two species was one of those subplots that should really happen more often.
And Klein... I don't like Klein as a person, but that's not the point of her character. She's intelligent, sneaky, morally dubious and looking about to become extremely complex, and that's exactly what the Seventh Doctor needs - someone who can not only stand up to him, but occasionally thwart him. The manipulation games that will be going on in that TARDIS soon would make anyone's head spin, I'm sure.
The ending caught me completely off-guard, and as a result had me on the edge of my seat and gagging for Architects of History - the CD for which will hopefully arrive soon? The MP3 version is up on the website, so my hard copy should arrive within the next week or so...
Alice in Wonderland (Tim Burton et al)
Lastly, Alice. Due to a bad memory for appointments, I've seen it twice in one week.
I still don't like the 3D glasses. They're heavy, cumbersome and the need to balance my own glasses on top of them basically means that I can't move my head for three hours. (And before anyone suggests the obvious, putting the 3D glasses on over my own makes me feel nauseous when I look at the screen.)
Meanwhile, the film... confounds my ability to analyse and review.
Technically, it's flawless. The historical research, where necessary (the Hatter) is perfect, the interpretations of the characters - except the dormouse - are wonderful, the acting is top-notch and the CG is even better. The dialogue apes Carroll's style with panache and accuracy, it's made absolutely clear that it was not a dream, and the animals all act like real animals - at one point, the Cheshire Cat is even kneading the Hatter's hat when he sits on it.
I never got emotionally invested in it, and it left me feeling empty.
I don't really know why, but I have some theories. The film is a little slow to start, and the 'down the rabbit-hole' scene suffers badly from Already-Seen-It Syndrome: while Alice is trying to work out how to get through the tiny door, the audience - or this part of it, anyway - has nothing to really keep them entertained save a mental checklist of 'Drink, Shrink, Lose Key, Cake, Grow, Get Key, Drink, Shrink'.
The problem is, we all know this part. That scene is probably one of the most iconic parts of Alice in Wonderland, and yet it's kept extremely bare-bones here: none of the animals falling into the room from Pandemonium, or Alice's wondering about how to stay in contact with her feet, or even the trademark attempt to remember the superlative of 'curious' (they get the line in, but massively out of context). Because it's so barebones, it really is nothing more than a checklist, and the audience hasn't much to keep them entertained.
Once the film does start, there's a prophecy. We've all heard of Limyaael, right?
Third, Alice is extremely reactive. I know this is the case in the books as well, but for some reason it bored me here in a way it never did in Carroll's writing. I found it hard to invest in most of the other characters, as well, and ended up rooting for the Red Queen because she was the only person who seemed to be actually doing anything. (Incidentally, I remain convinced that the White Queen is far more evil than her sister, albeit with more subtlety. Never trust any magic user who uses body parts in their potions.)
A minor nitpick: the dormouse is (a) not a dormouse, and (b) not asleep?! What kind of rip-off is this?
I think my best summation for this film is 'flawless, but bleh'. It's witty, beautiful and well acted, but I just didn't care.
Lastly, look who gained a sister!
Also, The Adamantine Palace by Stephen Deas and Alice.
SPOILERS for The Adamantine Palace.
The Adamantine Palace by Stephen Deas
A question for anyone else who's read this: do you know who the heroes are meant to be? Who am I meant to be rooting for? Is the last line meant to be triumphant or threatening?
If you can answer any of these questions, you got more out of Deas's writing than I.
So, let's see. Dragons used to be highly intelligent scourges of humanity until the alchemists worked out how to keep them sedated and stupid. Now they're used as mounts for royalty, and a few select knights.
Why? Why not kill them all, rather than taming them? They were utterly terrifying and made it more or less impossible for humanity to survive, by the look of the flashbacks.
Anyway, one of them's escaped and detoxed, and is now becoming an ever greater threat.
Am I meant to be rooting for the dragon? Her entire species has been enslaved for centuries, so you'd think I was. Except that mostly what she does is to kill humans: she's bloodthirsty and unwilling to listen to reason,and while this is perfectly sensible in a gigantic man-eating lizard that's dedicated to freeing its fellows from slavery, it does not make me inclined to like her. I am human: I am genetically and culturally predisposed to feel sorry for them when they are being eaten alive by giant fire-breathing lizards. Besides, most of the humans it eats are complete innocents.
Meanwhile, the local royals are doing that whole scheming, poisoning and power-grabbing thing that they do in these fantasy novels, and... we're mostly following the villain. I know he's the villain because he keeps poisoning people. And he kind of wins.
I looked it up on Amazon once I was done, and it turns out that The Adamantine Palace is the first book in a series: the second is due out this year. That at least explains why Prince Jehal wins - plot fodder. However, it does not really justify my complete confusion over the dragon subplot. It seems to me that, when beginning a fantasy series, the single most important thing to make clear to the reader is whose side they should be on. I'm not saying you should designate a hero regardless of his actions (Eragon) or throw the 'Good/Evil' divide in our faces (so many others) - or even that there has to be a clear Good/Evil divide (because, let's face it, there shouldn't). Just that it's nice to have a character somewhere who we like and can relate to, and that it's important to have a character who we care about. Ultimately, I didn't care for the dragon enough to come down on her side, nor the humans enough to come down on theirs. And that's a problem.
Aside from that... I don't read much sword and sorcery, but even I could see the cliches mounting up here. We have royals grabbing power for no obvious reason (Jehal), a sociopath who looks about to be 'saved' by his new young wife (Jehal again: I am not reading Book 2 to find out if I'm right, but the Amazon blurb suggests I might be), a tomboyish princess who, when the chips are down, turns out to be useless (Jaslyn, and hooray for the anti-feminists), a near-madman who is rightly suspicious of the sociopath for no apparent reason, who nobody listens to until it's too late (
Alas, a nothing book.
Doctor Who: Survival of the Fittest (Sylvester McCoy, Tracey Childs)
I meant to review A Thousand Tiny Wings, but found I had relatively little to say about it; it was enjoyable, except when McCoy spat into the microphone, but not astounding. And, of course, I was on the back foot because the companion being introduced - Klein - first turned up in Colditz, which I haven't heard.
Klein didn't grab me in ATTW, either, so it was with increasing delight that I listened to Survival of the Fittest.
It's only a three-parter: the first episode on the CD is basically a recap episode, in which Klein explains Colditz for those of us who are just coming in. It was a good decision, and one that should be made more often in Doctor Who: though it would have been slightly better in this instance if the story hadn't involved a time looped regeneration that never happened and was a tad badly explained. Took me the next hour to work that one out.
Then Survival of the Fittest started properly. McCoy thankfully did not spit into the microphone again, and although I had some reservations about the way Klein's character seemed to be developing, I was extremely gratified to find that every single one of them was played out by the end: no, Doctor, you can't redeem a Nazi that quickly.
What you can do, though, is to save a colony of alien not-bees. It's so common in SF/F to see an Earth animal used as a shortcut ('They're sentient dogs! Get it?') that having a situation where the analogy worked up to a point and then broke was really refreshing, and very nicely done. I was a little disappointed that humanity turned out to be the root cause of the events again: however, the imperialist subplot tied into Klein's character arc well enough that it didn't grate too much.
The idea that the TARDIS can even translate completely alien languages, such as scent-markers, was cleverly executed without becoming too invasive, and the use of the TARDIS translator to resolve a major communication problem between two species was one of those subplots that should really happen more often.
And Klein... I don't like Klein as a person, but that's not the point of her character. She's intelligent, sneaky, morally dubious and looking about to become extremely complex, and that's exactly what the Seventh Doctor needs - someone who can not only stand up to him, but occasionally thwart him. The manipulation games that will be going on in that TARDIS soon would make anyone's head spin, I'm sure.
The ending caught me completely off-guard, and as a result had me on the edge of my seat and gagging for Architects of History - the CD for which will hopefully arrive soon? The MP3 version is up on the website, so my hard copy should arrive within the next week or so...
Alice in Wonderland (Tim Burton et al)
Lastly, Alice. Due to a bad memory for appointments, I've seen it twice in one week.
I still don't like the 3D glasses. They're heavy, cumbersome and the need to balance my own glasses on top of them basically means that I can't move my head for three hours. (And before anyone suggests the obvious, putting the 3D glasses on over my own makes me feel nauseous when I look at the screen.)
Meanwhile, the film... confounds my ability to analyse and review.
Technically, it's flawless. The historical research, where necessary (the Hatter) is perfect, the interpretations of the characters - except the dormouse - are wonderful, the acting is top-notch and the CG is even better. The dialogue apes Carroll's style with panache and accuracy, it's made absolutely clear that it was not a dream, and the animals all act like real animals - at one point, the Cheshire Cat is even kneading the Hatter's hat when he sits on it.
I never got emotionally invested in it, and it left me feeling empty.
I don't really know why, but I have some theories. The film is a little slow to start, and the 'down the rabbit-hole' scene suffers badly from Already-Seen-It Syndrome: while Alice is trying to work out how to get through the tiny door, the audience - or this part of it, anyway - has nothing to really keep them entertained save a mental checklist of 'Drink, Shrink, Lose Key, Cake, Grow, Get Key, Drink, Shrink'.
The problem is, we all know this part. That scene is probably one of the most iconic parts of Alice in Wonderland, and yet it's kept extremely bare-bones here: none of the animals falling into the room from Pandemonium, or Alice's wondering about how to stay in contact with her feet, or even the trademark attempt to remember the superlative of 'curious' (they get the line in, but massively out of context). Because it's so barebones, it really is nothing more than a checklist, and the audience hasn't much to keep them entertained.
Once the film does start, there's a prophecy. We've all heard of Limyaael, right?
Having a long and clear prophecy destroys all the suspense, since rare indeed are the authors who introduce the idea that destiny could be wrong. Most of all, I feel when I read a prophecy like this that I'm being forced into agreeing that of course everything in the prophecy needs to happen, when I'm much happier figuring that out on my own.That's it: all suspense in the story is gone. We know exactly where and when Alice will fulfil her destiny, because it's referred to repeatedly throughout the plot. I can go home now, right?
Third, Alice is extremely reactive. I know this is the case in the books as well, but for some reason it bored me here in a way it never did in Carroll's writing. I found it hard to invest in most of the other characters, as well, and ended up rooting for the Red Queen because she was the only person who seemed to be actually doing anything. (Incidentally, I remain convinced that the White Queen is far more evil than her sister, albeit with more subtlety. Never trust any magic user who uses body parts in their potions.)
A minor nitpick: the dormouse is (a) not a dormouse, and (b) not asleep?! What kind of rip-off is this?
I think my best summation for this film is 'flawless, but bleh'. It's witty, beautiful and well acted, but I just didn't care.
Lastly, look who gained a sister!