(no subject)

[sebastienne]

Tomorrow I knuckle down and Get Some Work Done, but today I've a few reflections on the stuff I've been chilling out & watching since the end of term:

Doctor Who

It's not Matt Smith's fault. He's a great actor who's done some stellar work on the show; but because of the scripts he's been given, he'll be remembered most for being a creep. For being a mouthpiece for Moffatt's problems with women.

To be honest, this bothers me to the extent that I'm hoping for fan-edits before I'll want to go back and re-watch the Clara episodes. And I always re-watch New Who, often marathoning it for full immersiveness. But I can't face doing that after "hell in high heels" and "the legs" and "don't let him see you age" and "a woman" and touching Clara while she sleeps and "naked!" and all the other things that I've probably forgotten in self-defence.

There is so much I've loved about Eleven's era! The Ponds (whether that's just Amy and Rory, a glorious OT3, or the whole family unit). Jenny and Vastra ("I'm a lizard woman from the dawn of time and this is my wife"). Gaiman's episodes. The way the plots all tie up, even though sometimes the cleverness is too smug or too thrown-away. But I can't ignore the misogyny any more; it's no longer a few OOC Moffatisms that I can circumlegate, it's become integral to Eleven's characterisation. And that makes me very sad.

Tipping the Velvet

Oh, now, this takes me back! It's so much more melodramatic than I remember, probably due to the fact that I was a teenager when I first watched it. It's a pantomime, really, the whole thing; in the oldest and bawdiest sense of the word. (The media were obsessed with this show when it first aired - with a particular focus on the fact that we (*gasp*!) see a strap-on dildo.)

It's a little discomfiting to watch through the episodes - episode one, the theatre! episode two, kink! episode three, socialism! - and realise how much this show is me. I first saw it so long ago that today when shortcipher called it "Emma-bait" I had to question which came first, the Emma or the bait! Because really, this is one of the things that built my queer identity, along with But, I'm a Cheerleader and Velvet Goldmine and Rocky Horror.

(It's also perturbing to remember that I used to think Nan's choice at the end was hard to make, and to question if she'd even made the right decision. Teenagers, eh?)

Well worth a re-watch, though, I'd say. Once I'd managed to stop cringing at the use of camera effects and voiceover repetition to convey emotional turmoil, I still found it as moving - as joyful and as tragic - as it ever was. And the queer family unit stuff at the end: I feel like I really get that, for the first time, perhaps.

Comments

[parrot-knight.livejournal.com]

I hope Capaldi marks a break with all this. Whatever Moffat intends, too many people are being offended. I missed some of the offending physical actions, but the nudity joke was cheap and unnecessarily protracted.

[sebastienne.livejournal.com]

I hope the same. Maybe Capaldi's long history as a fan will mean that - even if he can't stop Moffat writing the OOC lines - he'll bring something to the delivery that will make this character feel like the Doctor again.

[parrot-knight.livejournal.com]

Moffat has indicated that he wants to change the tone and content of the programme again, so there will be a relaunch to some degree anyway; but Peter Capaldi is bound to have a different relationship with the role of the Doctor to Matt Smith, given his longer professional and antique fan backgrounds, so I have hopes of positive developments.

I'm quite torn by The Time of the Doctor - a lot of people whose views I respect love it, but an equal number loathe it for good reasons. I think the underlying idea was very strong, but I think it was defeated by the execution. I lean towards the belief that River was to be in charge of the papal mainframe, as Alex Kingston provides the voice for it in A Good Man Goes to War, but Kingston was committed elsewhere; and goodness knows what nonsense Moffat has to deal with from the various forces at the BBC with an interest in the show. I don't know if you have seen the deleted scene which BBC America released, but given it involved another badly handled physicality/nakedness gag I'm glad it went.

[sebastienne.livejournal.com]

Ah, that River should have been in charge of the mainframe does make a lot of sense; as it was, Tasha Lem was so River-like that at first I wondered if she was a regeneration of the character (Lem being Mel backwards, after all), and later on just rolled my eyes at the homogeneity of Moffat's women, feisty and flirty and immediately interested in seducing the Doctor.

I felt that all the good ideas in The Time of the Doctor were thrown away - Time Lords granting regenerations, the truth field, the loose ends of the 2010 plot - while huge swathes of the episode were wasted on nothing-much (nudity gags and "the man who stayed for Christmas").

My problem is not that the plot doesn't hold together. (I mean, it totally *doesn't* hold together, but that's not the problem.) Lots of New Who doesn't hold up to hard sci-fi scrutiny, and that's because it was never meant to; it's fantasy more than sci-fi, in a lot of ways. I often love that kind of story-telling! But for me, this episode lacked the dramatic or emotional interest that could have led me through the nonsense-plot in an enjoyable way.

(And - yes, I've seen that deleted scene, and am similarly glad that it was cut!)

[robot-mel.livejournal.com]

My sister said she thought that Tasha Lem was supposed to be River downloaded from the library. But then why the big goodbye speech in the previous episode? With Alex whose just superior in every way. As it was it just seemed like a kinda 2nd rate River and makes it seem like Moffatt really only knows how to write one type of older woman. It was a bit blah.

I must admit I've not been picking up on the sexism directly this past season. I think I've been trying not to overanalyse the episodes too much and haven't bothered rewatching any. But there's been something I haven't liked and I'm guessing that's why.

I agree it did seem like the interesting bits were kind of after thoughts. Why did he have to pretend to be Clara's boyfriend?

I feel sad that Matt kinda went out on a fizzle. He was a really great doctor and deserved so much more. And I say that as someone who generaly prefers Moffatt's reign over RTDs. But the short seasons were really nothing to work with.

[sebastienne.livejournal.com]

Why did he have to pretend to be Clara's boyfriend?

I find I'm wanting to make an aside about Moffat's 'heterosexual agenda', here!

Mostly I feel like: the things I love about Eleventh's era (and there are a lot), I love despite Moffat, not because of him.

[sharaz-jek.livejournal.com]

Whatever happened to Space Gandalf?

[sebastienne.livejournal.com]

I wish I knew.

(That's a really good description, actually, because at first glance Gandalf is kindly and benevolent but then there are all these undercurrents of manipulation and being Not Quite Human that, say, Seventh always gave off.)

[marrog.livejournal.com]

I read the book of TtV before I saw the show and I think that in retrospect it might have been better the other way 'round (though then I'd've had Nan's voice in my head, eek), but yeah, it was bawdy and silly and ridiculous and panto-ish and I found the book to be not that at all, and it never quite sat with me as an adaptation, even though I think (a) it's really quite good and (b) they probably couldn't have filmed it any other way at the time (and (c) Anna-fucking-Chancellor - literally, who at the time was Caroline Bingley to me so OMG the sudden head-canon with Lizzy...). I gelled much more with Fingersmith when that was made. It was bleak and Dickensian and I felt like the director had read the book looking through MY eyes, and also in spite of being so much less graphic than TtV I found it a helluvalot sexier, like x10, because ANGST and FACES and DESPERATION.

Haven't seen Affinity though we have it on avi somewhere. Saw The Night Watch and I think it was ruined for me by Kay - for all I love Anna Maxwell Martin she was miscast, and by various other things now that I think about it, but then it was my favourite of the books so perhaps that's not surprising.

[sebastienne.livejournal.com]

Fingersmith is by far my favourite of the books, but the adaptation isn't as special to me as TtV - probably because it came just that little bit later and so wasn't as formative.

And, yes, I saw TtV before reading it, and I do think it's the right way round. (If only because I generally don't have a very strong visual imagination, and that's a book that *definitely* benefits from strong mental images...)

The only major mis-step I think the adaptation makes is to have Florence be clueless about the existence of queer women's subculture, while Nan knows all about it; it really really should be the other way around.