Christmas plans

My mother worries that I won’t have anything enjoyable to do during Christmas, what with not being home and all. But I’m going to be a happy little camper curled up with the cat, some popcorn and Christmas goodies, watching the:

2008 Doctor Who Christmas special

(I’m a bit annoyed that David Tennant has decided to quit being Doctor Who after the next series but after the loss of Donna Noble, less so than I would have been.)

Space Star Trek movie marathon on Christmas Day

All 10 Star Trek movies, 24 hours of awesome Trekkie goodness.

Jane Austen marathon on W Network

Beginning December 27 and includes Emma, Lost in Austen, Pride and Prejudice (no, not the good one), and Sense and Sensibility.

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Die, Rose, Die (or wishful thinking for a Doctor Who finale)

Naw. Wishful thinking, that. When I first heard rumours that a companion was supposed to die in this finale, I was hoping for it to be Rose. I’m annoyed at the whole Doctor/Rose romance and would love to see it squashed forever. Ah, well, in my dreams.

I’ve just spent the last week watching *all* of the previous Doctor Who new series episodes courtesy of Youtube (a tip if you’re to do that: watch them in sequence, which is not the way I did it), and I’ve learned a few things:

• Billie Piper’s overbite seems to have gotten worse over the years;
• I would have liked Rose but the thing with the Doctor just changes everything (have I mentioned that I’m really annoyed by the whole Doctor/Rose star-crossed lovers thing?);
• I really, really like Captain Jack (and, knowing the prehistory in Doctor Who now, I appreciate Torchwood even more. Time to watch season 1 of that, I suppose — yay for Youtube);
• Martha Jones was a fairly ineffectual Companion (or perhaps Freema Agyeman just isn’t a very good actress); and
• I really don’t like Christopher Eccleston as the Doctor at all — not just because of his idiocy in quitting before it started but because he just really sucked. Kind of wishy washy, kind of meh. (Best thing he ever did for Doctor Who, quitting.)

Having gotten that sneak peek at some of what was going to happen in this episode after watching those few seconds of Confidential, I knew that my wish for Rose to be dead wasn’t going to be fulfilled. In fact, in a way, the Whoniverse made sure that the complete opposite occurred. I mentally prepared myself while I waited, worrying that I’d be even more disappointed than I was expecting…

It was fucking brilliant.

So absolutely brilliant that I will forgive them for making Rose and the Doctor happy in the end. The creation of the ultimate Doctor/Donna makes up for everything else. Have I mentioned before how much I love the Doctor and Donna together? This is even better — a smarter Donna and a less timelordy Doctor, even ignoring that they gave the quirkier Doctor to Rose. Awesome.

Favourite parts of the episode:

Donna hitting on Captain Jack after the doctor heals himself without regenerating (“You can hug me if you like.” “No, really, you can HUG me.”) and the later pushing aside of Sarah Jane in order to actually hug him. Now *that* would be an interesting match. Could be the one woman who could send him running in fear for his manhood. 😉

Daleks floating over the German countryside, speaking German. They’re saying “Exterminieren! Exterminieren!” but as far as I can see, that’s not a proper translation of “Exterminate!” – an Anglicized form or auto-translator mess up? (Edited to add link to Dalek Caan’s Doctor Who news base, which offers translations of the German that is spoken in the episode as well as some additional facts.)

Captain Jack allowing himself to be “killed” by the Daleks and then crawling out of the incinerator.

Awesome One-hearted timelord/Donna Noble mix (“Oy, watch it spaceman.” “Oh, watch it Earth girl.”)

“Well, isn’t that wi-zard.”

An absolutely brilliantly evil Davros

What a clever Earth girl/timelord.

Bye bye, Daleks

What everyone needs, a TARDIS tow truck

Then they fucking blew it to shit, turning Donna back into plain old, “Donna the temp”, with no memory of the Doctor and no recognition of her own self-worth, and leaving the Doctor alone, yet again.

Noooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!

A bitter, desperately unsatisfying resolution all around, to everything, to all of the lead up throughout all of the new series.

Pfft.

I’m pissed.

Makes me glad that Doctor Who is on semi-hiatus next year, if Donna Noble isn’t a part of it. Much as I like David Tennant, I’m not sure I want to watch it.

So, a really good finale. And I hated it.

If you want to check it out for yourself, it’s already on Youtube.

Edited to add a link to the post on Of Code and Cats — “To see my wonderful, fierce, smart, brilliant Donna returned to the shallow shell she used to be is awful. “Eternal death” indeed.” Indeed. Glad to see someone else whose fave companions were Donna and Ace.

You can see other Doctor Who-related posts here.

The wacky and marvelous Doctor Who

Back in the 80s and early 90s, when I worked night shift and television stations usually either stopped broadcasting at 1 or 2am or just aired infomercials, I used to watch the really early episodes of Doctor Who while most of my neighbours were fast asleep. Jon Pertwee, Peter Davison, and Sylvester McCoy were my favourites (Ace was my favourite Companion), but I watched them all. Not that I had much of a choice, mind you, but I’m not sorry about that. I might have missed them if I’d had a choice of programming, and no one should miss seeing early Doctor Who, at least once.

I had a hard time getting back into the show when it restarted in 2005, mostly because I was completely disgusted that Christopher Eccleston had decided to leave the role before it had barely started, because he was afraid of being typecast. After less than a year of filming and only one aired episode. What a schmuck. After that, I just really couldn’t stand to watch the show.

By the time David Tennant took over as the Doctor, I’d already completely lost interest in it and, other than catching a couple of minutes of “Rise of the Cybermen” while flicking through the channels, didn’t watch the show again. Billie Piper/Rose Tyler as Companion didn’t interest me. Freema Agyeman/Martha Jones as Companion didn’t interest me.

Now Catherine Tate, she interested me — she’s tallish, near to my age, a Taurus, and funny as hell. I was briefly intrigued by her appearance in “The Runaway Bride” but I only got to see small clips of it at the time. (Youtube being late off the mark there.) She’s one of my favourite British comedians. I first saw her during my McFly phase in late 2006, when I saw her in a skit with them for Red Nose Day 2005 as Lauren Cooper.

Sad to say but “Look at my face. Am I bovvered?” goes through my head periodically. LOL

Anyway, I watched David Tennant on the last episode of season ten on Top Gear last year and it got me a little interested in David Tennant as Doctor Who. I then watched him in the Best of Comic Relief 2007 show. Can I just say again that David Tennant in full dress kilt is a beautiful sight to behold? His Comic Relief 2007 skit with Catherine Tate was also absolutely hilarious. “Looketh at my face. Is this a botheredst face thou seest before thee?”

When I found out that Catherine Tate was going to be joining Doctor Who as the new Companion, I knew I had to give the show another chance. I watched the Christmas 2007 special, “Voyage of the Damned” — who could resist Kylie Minogue, the Titanic, Doctor Who, and Richard “Mr. Hyacinth” Bucket? — and waited for the new season to start. It was brilliant. David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor and Catherine Tate as Donna Noble are completely perfect together. She’s more his age, she’s not in love with him, she doesn’t worship him as “The Doctor” — it’s marvelous to watch, like close siblings bickering with but also protecting each other.

As I’ve been watching this season, I’ve been becoming more interested in the back story, which you can really only get from watching the previous episodes. Oh, sure, you can read through the plot summaries on Wikipedia but it just isn’t the same thing. So I’ve been watching seasons two and three of Doctor Who (courtesy of Youtube, naturally) for the last week. So much so that I occasionally dream about it. Still not too thrilled by Martha Jones (didn’t warm to her much in Torchwood, either). A little more open to considering possibly warming up to Rose Tyler. Maybe. But still absolutely adore David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor so I can put up with the rest.

Tonight was the penultimate fourth “new season” (series 30 overall) episode, “The Stolen Earth“. I’ve already watched it several times, and I’m sure I’ll watch it many more. It’s a fantastic episode. Won’t tell you about it — don’t want to spoil it for you if you plan to watch it, but I can hardly wait for next week’s season finale. I will tell you this — I’ll be mightily pissed off if what looks like happens actually really happens. Seriously. Impressed, but mightily pissed off.

[Edited to add link to Bloglines search for other posts about this episode. There are some seriously good ones out there, including KRAD’s Inaccurate Guide to Life’s post — “Ho. Lee. Shit.” is right. ]

You should see the other guy

I don’t wear makeup so I don’t often look at myself in a mirror without my eyeglasses on. The glasses makes my eyes look large and mask the look of black circles. Today for the first time in months I actually looked at myself in a mirror in good light without my glasses on. I look like I’ve been in a terrible fight or am about to expire from some gothic wasting disease. Huge black circles, almost craters, under my eyes. Looks a little scary, like death warmed over. Yummy.

So I did what any good Interneter would do: I Googled for information. Did you know there’s a name for these dark circles? No, neither did I. They’re called “Allergic shiners” and are a result of longtime allergies and/or sinus infections. iVillage has a good explanation, which says (in part):

In people with chronic nasal or sinus inflammation, venous blood circulating through tiny vessels in facial skin may have a hard time reaching the larger veins. If you can imagine the swollen tissues of the nasal cavity/sinuses acting as millions of separate tourniquets on these tiny venous channels, you will have a fairly accurate idea of what’s going on.

Thus, due to sinus/nasal inflammation, venous blood in the facial vessels is impeded in its return to the heart. This is venous congestion — “congestion” in the same sense as “traffic congestion.” When the small vessels in skin become congested with venous blood, the skin takes on a dusky or bluish hue … thus producing allergic shiners.

There’s no known treatment for allergic shiners. Aggressive treatment of the underlying condition is clearly helpful, but successful treatment does not always cause the shiners to vanish. Unfortunately, the only sure-fire solution to the problem is the artful use of cosmetics.

I suspect it’s tied to the same aspects of my allergies that are causing my eyes to be constantly watering or gummed up. Lovely.

(As a completely off-topic aside, I’m watching the best of Comic Relief 2007 special. David Tennant (Doctor Who) is wearing a dress kilt and he looks hot. No, I mean REALLY hot. I absolutely love a man in a kilt, especially a Scotsman in dress kit. I don’t know why. Genetics?)

(As another aside, what is with the horse riding pantomiming that people do to “I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles)”? It’s funny to watch but it must be a British thing.)

(As a last aside, the special also featured Take That singing Patience, which I first heard and blogged about here almost exactly a year ago. The circle spins around again…)