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Oct. 16th, 2010 06:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
newnumber6Let's start off with the Book Foo...
Finished: The Gunslinger: Dark Tower I, by Stephen King (reread)
Started and Finished: The Drawing of the Three: Dark Tower II, by Stephen King (reread)
Started: The Waste Lands: Dark Tower III, by Stephen King (reread)
So yeah, I'm rereading the Dark Tower series it seems. Gunslinger wasn't bad, but the story doesn't really get interesting until the second book starts. It's not quite as enchanting this time around as it was the first, Stephen King's stylistic quirks grate a bit more, but I'm still enjoying it. Nothing more detailed to say this time around.
Finished: Tesseracts 3 (short story collection)
Started: The Temporal Void, by Peter F. Hamilton
Tesseracts 3 probably had a bit higher percentage of good short stories than the first one... a couple left me cold but none I felt were kind of stupid. The best of the lot was probably Peter Watts "A Niche", his first published short story, which actually I've read before - it was expanded as part of his Rifters trilogy of novels. Also of note was James Alan Gardner's "Muffin Explains Teleology To The World At Large", despite being a bit 'silly' was still enjoyable fun, and the translated (from French) "The Winds of Time" by Joel Champetier had a whimsical but somehow irresistable premise.
Figured I'd move off short stories for a bit to read a novel, but I'll go back to them - there's plenty more Tesseracts volumes left.
Now that we're done with the books, what else has been on...
I watched Superman/Batman: Apocalypse, which is really more a Supergirl movie and, despite Summer Glau playing the role of Supergirl, doesn't have a lot to recommend it. Part of it's me. I've never really seen the appeal of the whole Darkseid business. The story (of Supergirl arriving and trying to discover where she fit in) was entertaining right up until Darkseid came and dominated the story, after that I just didn't care. I'm a little surprised (although, given these movies are probably targetted to the hardcore fan rather the casual ones) that they didn't even bother to really EXPLAIN Darkseid or Apocalypse, it was taken for granted that everybody would know. I do know the basics, but I probably would have appreciated some kind of primer on it, if only to get me reinvested. As it is, most of the time I was watching it, I was thinking about other DC animated movies I'd like to see (top of my list is still some kind of adaptation of more recent bat-universe stories, ones that has Babs as Oracle instead of Batgirl, that include Spoiler and Cassandra Cain and Nightwing and Huntress as part of a greater Bat Family. Maybe one to just introduce some of the new concepts, one of Cataclysm with the Batfamily dealing with an Earthquake, and a "No Man's Land" movie. Or maybe just an animated series with all this stuff.
I've nearly given up on The Event. I say nearly because there's really nothing on at the same time as it that's even remotely SF, so I'll still watch it for a while, but I just find myself not-caring an awful lot when it's on. The flashbacks are still annoying. (Seriously, last episode? They flashed back to Jason Ritter's character being asked to come home for Thanksgiving by his new girlfriend, followed by later in the episode, him interacting with them. There was no big revelation, aside from some stuff on his family history. But come on, at least when Lost did this it was relevatory of a large cast of interesting and mysterious characters or it had some sort of thematic resonance to the plot at hand. I keep expecting next episode, we'll randomly flash back to a time Jason Ritter and his girlfriend ordered a pizza and the delivery guy forgot the garlic bread, but because they're cool people they let it slide and don't make a complaint. . We don't need to know everything about this guy's life, I already don't like him and this isn't helping, just show me the interesting parts of his story. The SF aspects are semi-interesting but it feels like they're drawing them out too much for faux-suspense, and they've already pulled two of my pet peeves for shows like this: 1) The "Oh, look, we're getting close to the location..." followed by them showing scenes back and forth between the characters sneaking up on the house, and the people inside the house who don't seem to suspect that anybody's coming up on them, followed by them getting REALLY close, followed by the people inside getting paranoid, followed by the sudden "surprise" revelation that they're not actually in the same place at all, it's two completely different locations. (I scarequoted "surprise" because I'm rarely ever surprised. Prison Break did it so often that now I always expect it, and I'm more surprised when they DON'T do that.). and 2) "We're going to make big changes to the status quo. Yep, that's right, answers are coming!... oh, no, wait, the person with the answers just got murdered." When they had that alien who was willing to talk in exchange for freedom and better treatment, and kept hinting that he knew everything that was planned, and then asked for his girlfriend... of COURSE his girlfriend was going to kill him. That's not a surprise. What's more of a disappointment was how idiotic it was. I mean, he's the ONE person out of however many aliens there were who was willing to accept the deal and talk. He asks for his girlfriend. Any halfway intelligent spy agency would say, "Okay, here she is, you can see she's okay, we're going to let you see her and then put her in another room and you're going to tell us everything." And if he refuses to say anything until he gets more, they say, "that's a shame, because now we know she means something to you, so we're going to threaten to do stuff to her until you back up YOUR part of the deal." (I don't actually advise this from a moral perspective, but I'd expect any high level government agency involved in national security issues to THINK about it). But instead, what do they do? Put them alone together in a hotel room. She asks if he told them anything yet, he says no, he wanted to wait until she was out, and she kills him to shut him up. Well, DUH. Did it occur to NOBODY that she might do that, or even if not that, at least talk him out of spilling all their secrets? Cause it occured to me the minute he asked for her. Somebody should have lost their job over that.
. Anyway, enough ranting.
As for the rest? Mostly it's been a bunch of nothing special. No Ordinary Family is mildly interesting but doesn't break any new ground. Fringe isn't bad. Supernatural's been kind of meh still, although the recent Bobby-centric episode was fairly enjoyable. I still think Season 4 on would have been loads better if Dean was in Hell the whole year as part of an elaborate mindfrell where everything he cares about seems to be falling apart, while meanwhile in the real world, Sam, Bobby, and Ellen are preparing to storm hell to get him out (maybe revealed roughly halfway through the season).
Stargate Universe is probably my favorite show right now, finally back, and Caprica competing with it close behind. They're pretty much the only things I look forward to every week. And that kind of sucks when you think about it. But I enjoy both of them and at least it's something to watch. There are other shows that are solidly enjoyable, like Fringe, but if it suddenly disappeared I wouldn't care that much.
Finished: The Gunslinger: Dark Tower I, by Stephen King (reread)
Started and Finished: The Drawing of the Three: Dark Tower II, by Stephen King (reread)
Started: The Waste Lands: Dark Tower III, by Stephen King (reread)
So yeah, I'm rereading the Dark Tower series it seems. Gunslinger wasn't bad, but the story doesn't really get interesting until the second book starts. It's not quite as enchanting this time around as it was the first, Stephen King's stylistic quirks grate a bit more, but I'm still enjoying it. Nothing more detailed to say this time around.
Finished: Tesseracts 3 (short story collection)
Started: The Temporal Void, by Peter F. Hamilton
Tesseracts 3 probably had a bit higher percentage of good short stories than the first one... a couple left me cold but none I felt were kind of stupid. The best of the lot was probably Peter Watts "A Niche", his first published short story, which actually I've read before - it was expanded as part of his Rifters trilogy of novels. Also of note was James Alan Gardner's "Muffin Explains Teleology To The World At Large", despite being a bit 'silly' was still enjoyable fun, and the translated (from French) "The Winds of Time" by Joel Champetier had a whimsical but somehow irresistable premise.
Figured I'd move off short stories for a bit to read a novel, but I'll go back to them - there's plenty more Tesseracts volumes left.
Now that we're done with the books, what else has been on...
I watched Superman/Batman: Apocalypse, which is really more a Supergirl movie and, despite Summer Glau playing the role of Supergirl, doesn't have a lot to recommend it. Part of it's me. I've never really seen the appeal of the whole Darkseid business. The story (of Supergirl arriving and trying to discover where she fit in) was entertaining right up until Darkseid came and dominated the story, after that I just didn't care. I'm a little surprised (although, given these movies are probably targetted to the hardcore fan rather the casual ones) that they didn't even bother to really EXPLAIN Darkseid or Apocalypse, it was taken for granted that everybody would know. I do know the basics, but I probably would have appreciated some kind of primer on it, if only to get me reinvested. As it is, most of the time I was watching it, I was thinking about other DC animated movies I'd like to see (top of my list is still some kind of adaptation of more recent bat-universe stories, ones that has Babs as Oracle instead of Batgirl, that include Spoiler and Cassandra Cain and Nightwing and Huntress as part of a greater Bat Family. Maybe one to just introduce some of the new concepts, one of Cataclysm with the Batfamily dealing with an Earthquake, and a "No Man's Land" movie. Or maybe just an animated series with all this stuff.
I've nearly given up on The Event. I say nearly because there's really nothing on at the same time as it that's even remotely SF, so I'll still watch it for a while, but I just find myself not-caring an awful lot when it's on. The flashbacks are still annoying. (Seriously, last episode? They flashed back to Jason Ritter's character being asked to come home for Thanksgiving by his new girlfriend, followed by later in the episode, him interacting with them. There was no big revelation, aside from some stuff on his family history. But come on, at least when Lost did this it was relevatory of a large cast of interesting and mysterious characters or it had some sort of thematic resonance to the plot at hand. I keep expecting next episode, we'll randomly flash back to a time Jason Ritter and his girlfriend ordered a pizza and the delivery guy forgot the garlic bread, but because they're cool people they let it slide and don't make a complaint. . We don't need to know everything about this guy's life, I already don't like him and this isn't helping, just show me the interesting parts of his story. The SF aspects are semi-interesting but it feels like they're drawing them out too much for faux-suspense, and they've already pulled two of my pet peeves for shows like this: 1) The "Oh, look, we're getting close to the location..." followed by them showing scenes back and forth between the characters sneaking up on the house, and the people inside the house who don't seem to suspect that anybody's coming up on them, followed by them getting REALLY close, followed by the people inside getting paranoid, followed by the sudden "surprise" revelation that they're not actually in the same place at all, it's two completely different locations. (I scarequoted "surprise" because I'm rarely ever surprised. Prison Break did it so often that now I always expect it, and I'm more surprised when they DON'T do that.). and 2) "We're going to make big changes to the status quo. Yep, that's right, answers are coming!... oh, no, wait, the person with the answers just got murdered." When they had that alien who was willing to talk in exchange for freedom and better treatment, and kept hinting that he knew everything that was planned, and then asked for his girlfriend... of COURSE his girlfriend was going to kill him. That's not a surprise. What's more of a disappointment was how idiotic it was. I mean, he's the ONE person out of however many aliens there were who was willing to accept the deal and talk. He asks for his girlfriend. Any halfway intelligent spy agency would say, "Okay, here she is, you can see she's okay, we're going to let you see her and then put her in another room and you're going to tell us everything." And if he refuses to say anything until he gets more, they say, "that's a shame, because now we know she means something to you, so we're going to threaten to do stuff to her until you back up YOUR part of the deal." (I don't actually advise this from a moral perspective, but I'd expect any high level government agency involved in national security issues to THINK about it). But instead, what do they do? Put them alone together in a hotel room. She asks if he told them anything yet, he says no, he wanted to wait until she was out, and she kills him to shut him up. Well, DUH. Did it occur to NOBODY that she might do that, or even if not that, at least talk him out of spilling all their secrets? Cause it occured to me the minute he asked for her. Somebody should have lost their job over that.
. Anyway, enough ranting.
As for the rest? Mostly it's been a bunch of nothing special. No Ordinary Family is mildly interesting but doesn't break any new ground. Fringe isn't bad. Supernatural's been kind of meh still, although the recent Bobby-centric episode was fairly enjoyable. I still think Season 4 on would have been loads better if Dean was in Hell the whole year as part of an elaborate mindfrell where everything he cares about seems to be falling apart, while meanwhile in the real world, Sam, Bobby, and Ellen are preparing to storm hell to get him out (maybe revealed roughly halfway through the season).
Stargate Universe is probably my favorite show right now, finally back, and Caprica competing with it close behind. They're pretty much the only things I look forward to every week. And that kind of sucks when you think about it. But I enjoy both of them and at least it's something to watch. There are other shows that are solidly enjoyable, like Fringe, but if it suddenly disappeared I wouldn't care that much.
