Uncategorized

The best laid plans of machines and men

Matt4 Comments

I’m sure there were blog entries like this one back when Battlestar Galactica season 3 premiered in the States. So, once again, I’m a year or so late with my reactions. Well, you know what? If you’re looking for cutting-edge reviews you’re in the wrong place anyway. Sorry… should’ve told you earlier, I guess.

Together with Firefly, it’s Battlestar Galactica that has revived my interest in sci-fi. After an overdose of bad Star Trek spinoffs, I’d really given up on the genre, but these two series show that there’s interesting stories to be told in outer space. What I like especially about BSG is the ambivalence of its characters – and that has never been as plain to see as at the beginning of season 3. The references to Iraq are obvious – lines about “insurgent uprisings” and “capturing their hearts and minds” are almost a bit too in-your-face – but the interesting thing is that it’s our protagonists who are strapping on bombs, killing the enemy as much as their own people.

And what other series could manage such a sick, compelling “Honey, I’m home!” moment as when Leoben is stabbed through the neck by Starbuck, only to come home a little later, freshly downloaded, telling her that it’s her choice whether she wants to sleep in the bedroom – but either way (nodding towards the Cylon corpse on the floor) she’d be spending the night with him.

Almost feeling a bit sorry for Gaius Baltar…

I must say I’m even feeling a bit sorry for Gaius. He’s in a situation where he can either do the wrong thing or get a bullet in the head. He’s never been heroic, exactly, but he’s in a place where he’s screwed, no matter what he does. It’ll be interesting to see where the season will take these characters. But I’m sure that wherever we’ll end up, it won’t be predictable.

I hate/love YouTube

Matt2 Comments

Okay, time for a short rant. Hey, it means you get a break from me writing gushing love letters to HBO series and mouthing off about films that you’ve either seen yourself or don’t really care about to begin with. (Come to think of it – why are you reading this blog? Chances are I got you to do so by means of emotional blackmail. I’m evil.)

Anyway, here’s my rant. I’ve been working on a project for work for which we solicited short YouTube application videos from people around the world. So far, so good. This afternoon, though, I would gladly have torn YT digital limb from limb. According to human nature, most people are submitting their videos right this fucking minute (I told you it was going to be a rant!), because the deadline is tomorrow. And I have to write back to all of them: “Hi, I received your video, thanks!/Hi, I received your invitation. Where’s your video?/Hi, do you really want to submit that? You might have a better chance posting two minutes of black!” (Okay, I don’t do the latter.)

Okay, rant point no. 1: YouTube has flood control, which means that you can only post four messages and then you have to wait for 10 minutes or so. Not great fun when you’re supposed to be getting back to 50 applicants. However, I get it, YT wants to avoid members getting spammed, and flood control can help with this.

Rant point no. 2, and infinitely greater than the previous one: This afternoon at work, YouTube reacted to 95% of my attempts to send a message by swallowing the said message and pretending I hadn’t written it. No “Your mail has been sent off”. No telltale traces in the “Sent” box. Nothing. Nada. Zilch. It was roughly like writing a letter, shredding it, writing another letter, shredding it, until it’s no longer fun and you’d rather shove your fingertips in the shredder’s slot.

Yes, I know YouTube is a free service. I also know that without it we couldn’t have done any of this. But this is my blog, so I get to stamp my little feet every now and then and run around screaming “YouTube sucks dead giraffes’ genitalia!” Or something.

This rant was brought to you by “Ritalin? We don’t need no stinking Ritalin!”

Morse code

Matt4 Comments

Ah, to live in the early 21st century… To be able to sit in a little café, drinking fresh, good coffee, listening to Bach’s Goldberg Variations while reading China Miéville’s Perdido Street Station. And then to come to the office, start up the computer, and blog about it, to validate the experience.

(NB: If this was an e-mail or a message board post, I would have put a winking emoticon at the end of the paragraph, to indicate the subtle postmodern irony – there I go again, being less than perfectly serious! – but I try to do entirely without smileys in this blog. After all, Jane Austen, Randy Newman and Alanis Morissette managed entirely without…)

However, this blog entry is not about irony, or cafe latte or the Goldberg Variations (which I am proud to say I can listen to almost without thinking of Hannibal Lecter). It’s more of a dire warning.

For I have seen the face of evil. And it looks like this.

Looks innocuous enough, you think? Look again.

You may be wondering what it is that makes me think David Morse is evil. The reason is quite simple: he’s the one responsible for dooming the human race. He’s the one who released the virus that killed most of humanity, forcing us to live underground. He is evil.

And this may be where you go, “Huh?” And, if you know where I am currently located, you may even be calling the doctors to come and take me away. If you know Terry Gilliam’s 12 Monkeys, you might understand what I’m going on about, but it might still not make that much more sense to you.

Yes, I can distinguish between fiction and reality. Yes, I know that David Morse is an actor, hired to play characters, such as the apocalypse nut in 12 Monkeys. And yet. Every time he pops up on screen, I tense up. I take an immediate and intense dislike to him. Sometimes I’m proven right (Dancer in the Dark). Sometimes I’m proven wrong (The Green Mile). Sometimes the film and the scenes he’s in are so atrocious that it’s hard not to feel sorry for Morse (Contact, anyone? Daddy issues on tacky intergalactic beaches?). But I don’t trust the guy, and therefore I cheered on the inside at the thought of Greg House, M.D. and PhD in Misanthropy deciding to thwart the Morseman’s evil plans. Who will come out on top in the upcoming fight between House and his newly found nemesis? Only time will tell. Until then, it’s drawn thermometers at dawn.

One is the loneliest number…

Matt4 Comments

Yes, I’m afraid it’s finally happened. I’ve created a monster… or rather, a blog.

 Why? Or, for that matter: Why?!

Well, two reasons, really. 1) I’ve been looking up blog software and free blog hosts for this project I’m managing at work – and suddenly there was this little voice in my head saying, “Join us…!” (Note: I don’t often get little voices talking in my head, and even when I do, I don’t usually go out and do exactly what they tell me to do. That one time with Jody Foster was an exception.) 2) I’m an opinionated bastard who loves having a say about books, films, TV series, comics, games and the world. More or less in that order.

 So, this is the raison d’être for this blog. If you check back in, say, two months, will there be more than this measly first post? Only time will tell…