Logos, Sequels and New Dwarf - Oh my!

OK, this is an advance warning. For those of you not enamoured of certain geeky things, I advise you to give up on this blog right now, as this is me geeking out about Dr Who, Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Red Dwarf and more....

Those of you who are still left? OK, I guess you're interested (or really bored, or reading simply because you cannot be bothered to click the back button in the top left corner of the screen).

So, there's been a great influx of news and events regarding some of my favourite programs and books recently, and every time I see it, I think about blogging about it. So I thought I'd go for a complete, all-encompassing post...

First things first. Dr Who. Whilst we are all waiting excitedly for the broadcast of David Tennant / Russell T. Davies' last three specials (the first of which is expected sometime in the next month, but nothing has been confirmed as yet), news has started to trickle out about the 2010 series. Including the release of the new logo, as seen here. (Image 'borrowed' from Official Dr Who site)

This has, unsurprisingly, caused a massive amount of discussion amongst fans, particularly on forums such as Gallifrey Base (where yes, I admit, I am a member, mostly a lurker it has to be said, but I do post occasionally). But this is my blog, so I'll say what I think about it.

After looking at it for a few days, I've come to the conclusion that I like it. Mostly. The DW tardis shape (or DWardis as someone on Gallifrey Base named it, which I love) is apparently an "insignia" so the assumption is that it won't appear in the title sequence, instead being used on merchandise etc., which I think will work well. The Logo I like because it FEELS right.. as opposed to the current one, which, lets be honest, does look like it belongs on the front of a London Taxi! Yes, there is too much lens flare on it, and yes the R looks a bit strange, but other than that, I think it's good, (plus, the lens flare will vary when it is animated, so my issues there might go away.. they could get worse I suppose, but I'm thinking positive) and I especially like the little serifs bend away to add a slight air of difference to it...

Also, there's been various set reports, photos and other spoilery type information slowly leaking, just enough to get me excited, not enough to annoy me.. which is good. If you want to find any of this info I recommend signing up for the Gallifrey Base forum and having a good nose around. :)

So, on from Dr Who, to Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy. I went to HitchCon '09 on Sunday (with Neety, Gav and Helen) and it was GREAT! :) Saw the "Douglas Adams Chat Show" hosted by Clive Anderson, where a selection of people from the world of Douglas/Hitch-hiker's sat around and talked about him, and answered questions from the audience. Also saw Eoin Colfer who gave us a reading of small bits of his new Hitch-Hiker's book "And Another Thing..." and again answered questions, before we got to witness the radio cast coming back together to read a specially adapted radio show which zoomed through elements of all of the novels, telling the same old story in a slightly different way. And then I got a copy of "And Another Thing.." signed by the author himself.

Then I took it home and read it. Do you want to know what I thought?

*Waits for answer*

You do? Well OK then. Here I shall attempt to write a mostly non-spoilerific review...

"And Another Thing..." is the sixth book in the Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy trilogy. And the first to be written by someone other than Douglas Adams. The previous book "Mostly Harmless" had ended on something of a downbeat note (if you can classify the destruction of the Earth (again) and the apparent deaths of pretty much all the major characters as "downbeat") and, for many years, fans such as I thought that this would be where it ended, especially as Adams died in 2001. However, such trivialities have not stopped the franchise, being as we have seen three radio series' and a film since Adams' death. However, these were all adaptations of existing works, and Adams himself had contributed however much or little to all of these. This is the first attempt to further the story without the man himself.

So, is it succesful? Let me start by saying that yes, it is a good read. It takes the characters and, mostly, stays true to their characteristics whilst going off on a whole new plot. The writing, whilst pretty quirky and verbose, is not the wonderfully surreal prose of Douglas's, but Eoin Colfer does a fine job of creating at least the overall feel of a Hitch-Hiker's book, and in many ways makes the book feel much more like the first two than Adams' subsequent, slightly more depressing (but still brilliant) volumes. We have all our main characters;

Arthur Dent-Not in a dressing gown anymore, but still craving Tea

Ford Prefect-Still researching for the Guide and generally relaxing as much as possible

Zaphod Beeblebrox-Still Mad as a box of Frogs and still in posession of three arms and two heads (kind of...)

Trillian-Still conflicted between her career as a journalist and her responsibilities as a mother

Random Dent-Still a moody teenager (mostly)

We also have a new selection of characters, some returnees from the previous books, and some brand new, which is all well and good.

So, the book itself then. Well, it starts very well, picking up from the end of Mostly Harmless and moving us on towards the new plot. However, it becomes apparent that once we are into the new plot, Eoin Colfer is much more comfortable writing for his own characters (including Hilman Hunter, an Irish Property Developer and Constant Mown, Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz's son) as well as Adams' much less internally complex or barely-defined characters (such as Zaphod, Trillian and Wowbagger, who is developed from a one-note joke in the previous books to a full character here) at the expense of Arthur and Ford. This means that we end up with some good subplots (Hilman trying to find a God) and some that I found a little dull (most noticeably the Vogon sequences with Constant Mown)

The issue with this, for me, is that Arthur Dent is, and has always been, the heart and soul of Hitch-Hikers, it's his story. And in "And Another Thing.." Arthur is sidelined for a good proportion of the plot. It is a good book, it just seems a bit, you know, sensible, for a Hitch-Hiker's book. Adams always complained that because he had created feckless characters, that it was always hard to involve them in a plot (the first time he had this problem was Life, The Universe and Everything, where he was trying to integrate the characters into an already exisiting plotline), whereas "And Another Thing..." ends up treating everyone a bit more like normal characters, who will actually do things to advance the plot.

But that's a minor complaint, because it's not like you can expect it to read like it's by Douglas Adams, because it's not by Douglas Adams.

The other minor issue for me is the ending. I like the very end (which is Arthur's story), but, not giving anything away for those of you who haven't read it, everyone's story is wrapped up pretty neatly, and it feels a bit too happy and optimistic for the end of a Hitch-Hiker's book.

As a novel on its own, I'd rate it 8 out of 10.

As a Hitch-hiker's book - 7 out of 10.

I've just realised how long this post is, so just as a wrap up for more geeky news

Red Dwarf is returning with a new series!! Those of you who know me, will be aware of how much of a big deal this is, and how excited I am

Chuck may be returning in October (in the US) instead of March! For those of you who have never watched Chuck (and I know it's only on Virgin1 in this country) you really should do it. It's horrendously well-written and entertaining. You can buy Season 1 on DVD now, and I suggest you do!

That's all for now, my next post will probably be another rant or discussion...

Is Bigger Better?

Good morning all you blog readers! Today's blog will be one made of pure awesomeness...

Well, no it won't. It'll be like all the others, it'll have bits that make you laugh (hopefully) and bits that make you think "You're not as intelligent as you think you are Brawny..."

But seriously. Over the weekend, which I spent once again with the wonderful Neety, we ended up having a conversation as to whether her new blog entry "MEN: Your Best Feature (Part 1/5)" was too long. Now just to clarify, we weren't wondering whether the 5 parts would be too long, this discussion was about part one (although, how impressive is it that she PLANS blogs in 5 parts? I barely plan mine at all before I start rambling!)

And it got me to thinking. As a fast reader (And I'm not kidding, when I was about 10 I did the whole of the Chronicles of Narnia in a day, when the last Harry Potter book came out I read it in two and a half hours), I'm a big fan of long blogs. Because if they're interesting (or at least semi-interesting at least) then I read them and they occupy a few minutes of my time, as opposed to a few seconds.

And I'm the same for other forms of entertainment. Put two DVDs in front of me, both films I want to watch equally, both priced the same, and tell me to choose one, it'll be whichever is longer / has the most special features. Anything that adds value for money to it. I originally balked at the idea of buying the Family Guy: Blue Harvest DVD when it was originally announced it'd be selling as an individual DVD - Pay for a DVD with only 43 minutes of episode?? What a rip-off! But of course it's not. If you want to see it. Which I did. Now they did bulk it up with special features so that I didn't feel quite so ripped off, but it seems to be an in-built part of me, that things generally can't be too long.

Many people moaned in reviews about Funny People, which I saw in the cinema a couple of months ago, that it was too long. Not a problem for me at all, it held my attention and I laughed throughout it. Which underlines my point. What is too long? Is Bigger always Better?

Well no. Not always. On Thursday night I had the wonderful (mis-)fortune to have to see a film that had been shot by a "professional" with some of the students from one of the courses at work. (Apologies for being quite so vague, but with recent stories about people getting sacked for posting innapropriate tweets/blogs about sensitive workplaces, I am not taking any chances!). The original brief for this film was that it should be a promotional film to highlight what the students do on the course. What we ended up with was a half hour documentary, which, frankly, could easily have had 10 minutes cut from it, and not been any worse, in fact, it probably would have been better.

Going back to my opening story, my response to Neety was that I thought that it was a good length and that she shouldn't worry about it. Because I enjoy reading long, well-written blogs, just as I enjoy reading books, magazine articles, graphic novels etc...

So do I think everything should be longer? Bigger? Well no. If the film last Thursday had been bigger I might have gone on a mad rampage and torn up the screen, if the extended film of "Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers" was any longer, I'd have fallen asleep in it more times than I already have, and if all Books had to be at least 1000 pages or more, a lot of books would be full of filler and bad writing. (A bit like this blog, I apologise for that, my defence is it's a Monday morning).

In my eyes, things have an ideal length. And that length should be obvious. For example, if I had an album of music which I enjoyed casually in a background noise kind of way, but was only 30 minutes long, I'd probably think was too short. However, the Wildhearts album "The Wildhearts must be Destroyed" (which is excellent) is only about 30 minutes, but it feels complete when you listen to it.

I myself fell victim to this trend when making "Norwich and Saggers: Smarter than the Average Bear" (to watch it on Youtube - CLICK HERE) I had written the script, and it felt the right length, and when I edited it, it mostly felt the right length, except for the improvised "Gruntfuttock" sequences, which seem to me now to be obvious padding....

So all of you writers / creators of artistic events/items/recordings/etc... my suggestion? Be aware of how long your final product FEELS like it should be. And make it that length. Don't try to pad out a 60 minute film to 90 minutes just because that's how long you think a film should be. Don't write a 10 chapter story and then add another 6 of extraneous rubbish just because you want it to look more impressive. When you've reached the end, it's the end.

And I promise, on my part, that I'll stop worrying so much about how long things are, and just enjoy the ride.

(Oh, and be impressed, I made it all the way through a blog entitled "Is Bigger Better?" without making ANY innuendos. :D )

People are idiots... FACT.

Have you ever noticed how people have a tendancy to assume that things they don't understand are easy to do and don't take any time? Isn't it annoying?

I'm currently sitting in my office, furious, because there are various things I need to be doing, but the idiocy of people is precluding me from doing any of them...

For example - the most pressing thing I have to do today is do multiple copies of a DVD. This is an essential thing that needs to be done by Thursday. Before I can run the copies, however, my boss needs to sit down and watch it, and before I can give her a copy to do that with, I have to have the original disc.

Which, so far, I don't have.

Oh and also, if my boss doesn't like any of it, or deems anything to be inappropriate, I will then be asked to re-edit the DVD...with no source materials, and no time...

So I ring the person who's supposed be giving me the original disc, and speak to the administrator, who tells me she'll be in by half nine and she'll ring me back. So she doesn't. So I ring her again at about ten, and get the administrator again, who says that she is currently teaching but will ring me when she's on a break.

OK... but this is the woman who was panicking about getting the copies done not three days ago... she couldn't spare 30 seconds to ring me? Or indeed, to drop the disc off early this morning as she had previously agreed to do?

Because of this, I have to sit in my office, waiting for the phone to ring. So I can't, for example, head downstairs and sort out a room that I need to clear, which I am getting hassled over, and I can't start any of the multiple-copy DVD runs I have in the queue to do in my office, because I will have to cancel them as soon as the urgent disc turns up.

Is it just me, or is this course of action about as productive as a fish attempting to crap out a diamond so that it can pay for it's adopted monkey baby's university tuition?

And I know this isnt funny or exciting. But I had to say something somewhere or I would explode.

Apologies for this rubbish blog, go back about your business.

Facebook - A Revolution?

So I've been thinking recently (braces self for jokes as witty as "I know, I saw the smoke coming out of your ears" or the ever-popular "Well, there's a first time for everything"), particularly about Facebook (and online social networking in general, but Facebook is my poison of choice as it were)


For me, as someone who has friends (and indeed, a girlfriend) living in different areas of the country to myself, it is incredibly useful, providing an easy method of contacting people who I don't see often. However, it does lead to some slightly wierd occurances. One that happened to me today was as follows:


A colleague at work (who I know has read this occasionally, so hi Sarah if you're reading, and hi John if you're reading over her shoulder) was having a casual conversation with me and happened to ask if the T-Shirt I was wearing was the one that I had got Sharpie on the other day. Which confused me, as I didn't remember having a conversation with her about it. Then I realised - I'd written a facebook status about it!

So it's good, because people can be kept up to speed with other peoples lives (and if you're a stalker, it's brilliant! Apparently... I wouldn't know... honest... I'm no stalker .. (runs off to hide restraining order within multiple sets of brackets (is it here? (Or here? (Too late, you'll never find it) No it wasn't ) Nope) - That confused you didn't it? Back to the rambling) but there's a flip side to this. For one thing, it means that all of those people on your friends list can see what you are in the mood to write, so I do occasionally find I have to self-censor, so that I don't have to deal with peoples objections to my opinions of things... Also, as I have mentioned before, facebook can lead to people getting the wrong idea about your life...However, none of this is as bad as that most awkward of things, the Facebook meeting...

I have (as I am sure many others of you who have facebook) a lot of friends who are people I have known and who I have, for one reason or another, lost touch with. Not that I dislike them, just that I last saw them ten years ago and our lives have taken us in completely different ways... So last summer (08, not the one just gone) I bumped into one of these people in a queue in a shop. Now, if I hadn't seen a picture of her on her facebook profile, I would never have recognised her, but recognise her I did, and she recognised me. So we opened with conversation "Oh hi, haven't seen you in ages! How are you?" ....

Approximately 90 seconds in, I realised our mistake. We had nothing to talk about (we never really had much in common 10 years ago!) and we were stuck in a queue which seemed to be never-ending and moving at a pace that would not trouble an arthritic snail who was getting on a bit and hadn't been out for a week... So we attempted to have casual conversation.. and it was horrendous. I'm not good with conversation at the best of times.. let alone casual conversation in a queue!

The flipside of all of this, of course, is those people who DON'T have facebook, who end up feeling left out of conversations, events and general tomfoolery because everyone contacts each other through the magical interweb nowadays...

So I don't particularly think that Facebook and social networking in general is a revolution, it's simply a different way of communicating, and does some things better (geographical location for example is unimportant, you can let everyone know what's going on at once) and does some things worse (still ends up forming cliques and groups (especially the have-Facebookers and have-not-Facebookers), and the fact that you can let everyone know what's going on at once!)

What do you lot think? Essential website? Or superfluous rubbish? Draw your own conclusion. I know for me, that I would have trouble doing without it... but is that just me?

(And we'll ignore for a moment the fact that for the last couple of weeks, it's been acting up incredibly badly, crashing, showing multiple chat windows etc..)

Brawny - Global Superstar?

At work, I use Spotify to listen to music in the office, and this works well. Yes, it interrupts every so often with adverts, but usually these are short and inoffensive...

I say usually...

There is one advert that keeps playing, advertising Pixie Lott (which, incidentally, is a stupid name). Fine, not really my bag, sounds generic and dull to me, but whatever.

But there's a phrase that's used in the advert which keeps annoying me...

"The UK's newest global superstar"

What?

So, basically, she's a global superstar is she? Well off I go to check the facts about her sales figures (because I'm at work, and you know, it's either do that or ACTUALLY do some work).

Her first single (the imaginatively titled "Mama Do (Uh Oh Uh Oh)", which frankly is a title so rubbish you wonder if they took a book, shredded it, threw all the bits in the bin, and then pulled out two words, before adding some random grunting noises after it, but I digress) does appear to have been released in quite a few countries, so she has definitely had an attempt at the global market.... however, it only made top 5 in this country (1) and in the Eurochart (5). Her second single (the title of which is marginally better than the first, although still horrificly generic - "Boys and Girls". Seriously people, work harder on your lyrics/titles!) has charted in three territories, the UK (1), Ireland (4), and again, the Eurochart (10). Her album has been released in six countries, with chart positions ranging from 6 in the UK to 92 in the Netherlands...

Now, unless I misunderstand the term "Global Superstar", then she is not one. I appreciate she may become one (I hope not, because she is generic and bland, but that's never stopped anyone before..) but she isn't one now. So surely they can't say that she is? Let's just check the definitions of the words..

Global - Now I assume that this refers to the first definition "Pertaining to the whole world; worldwide; universal" and that they are not calling her globe-shaped. Which she's not. I mean look at her. She has an annoying looking face, certainly, but she doesn't look like a globe. So I assume they are utilising that initial definition of global. (Being as the other definitions of global make no sense within this context, I mean, she's definitely not a piece of software..)

Superstar- OK, both of these definitions basically say the same thing - that you are very prominent or successful. Which she isn't!!

I know it's advertising, and the fact that they bend the truth should be less surprising than a male stand-up comedian telling a joke about the fact that women take ages to get ready to go out, but it still amazes me. I'm sure there are much better phrases that they could have used. Like the following examples:

Pixie Lott - The UK Chart topper
Pixie Lott - A shining example of the lack of taste in the UK Music buying public
Pixie Lott - Yet another blond singer-songwriter
Pixie Lott - Gives generic a distinctly average name
Pixie Lott - It could be worse, at least I'm not an X-Factor winner

Any other suggestions?

Fried Gold!

I can't believe this is true - but Spaced is 10 years old.

Interview with the main players here

For those of you who have never seen it - shame on you, it is Geek Heaven!

I must confess, I didn't see it when it first aired, missing it completely for a couple of years... But then I got the DVD of Series 1 on someone's recommendation...

And now it belongs to that rare group of things where if I had a little disposable income, I'd replace my beaten-up DVD copies with a copy of the shiny Region 1 DVD release - simply because it has new commentaries, yes I'm that sad!

So yeah - Celebrate the wonder of the show that gave us Simon Pegg, Nick Frost and Edgar Wright. Not to mention Jessica Stevenson :)

The (Supermarket) Empire Strikes Back...

So, I was reading through the Guardian news site during my lunch break at work a couple of days ago, and I came across this story.

Just a light-hearted bit of fun, I thought, as I started to read it, so imagine my surprise when I started to develop serious thoughts about it.

Basically (for those of you too lazy to click on the link above), the founder of the "International Church of Jediism", a gentleman by the name of Daniel Jones, was asked to remove his hood in a TESCO's store, and he refused on religious grounds. Tescos then refused to allow him into the store.

So far so good, you may think, because after all, the International Church of Jediism isn't real, is it? It's just people having a laugh. Like those e-mails that circulated a few years ago, getting everyone to write Jedi on their census form. He's obviously just having a laugh isn't he?

Well, I don't know. There seems to be a fair bit of Jediism information avaliable on the internet, and I don't really see why they should be considered any less of a religion than anything else. Obviously there is the issue that the basis of their religion was created by George Lucas in 1977, but as this article helpfully points out

"The Jedi were first mentioned in the 1977 movie Star Wars IV: A New Hope and remained central in the five subsequent Star Wars movies, along with novels and games also based in the Star Wars universe. While these sources are entirely fictional, their creator, George Lucas, researched a variety of religious perspectives during their creation. Daoism and Buddhism are the most obvious influences on his concept of Jedi, although there are many others. "

So basically, the basis may be in fiction, but that fiction was created by looking at a selection of religions. And isn't that how all religions start? Taking what were the elements of a religion you don't quite agree with, and changing the bits you don't agree with? (OK, I grant you, that sentence is a significant oversimplification of religion, but certainly you can just look at the history of Christianity - most notably the creation of the Church of England in order that the King could get divorced..)

But anyway, I'm not a religious scholar, so I shan't pursue this line of enquiry much further... Back to the TESCO story.

My point is that Daniel Jones has a perfectly respectable grievence and that TESCO's cause isn't helped by their response:

"He hasn't been banned. Jedis are very welcome to shop in our stores although we would ask them to remove their hoods. Obi-Wan Kenobi, Yoda and Luke Skywalker all appeared hoodless without ever going over to the Dark Side and we are only aware of the Emperor as one who never removed his hood. If Jedi walk around our stores with their hoods on, they'll miss lots of special offers."

Do you think they'd dare say that to a Sikh? Or a Muslim? "I'm sorry madam, please remove your Burqua?" There'd be outrage! But it's OK to ask Mr Jones to remove his hood because Jediism sounds silly?

There's a time and a place for mocking religion, and I do it a lot, but while you are shopping isn't one of them. It's not like him wearing a hood affects anyone elses shopping, it's just that shops are wary of late teen/early 20s males wearing hoods. I'm for religious freedom, and freedom of speech, and freedom of expression. People can wear what they want, believe in what they want, and follow the rules they set down for their lives, whether it be religious traditions from thousands of years ago, or my own personal choice that I should not wear hats as I look silly.

As I say, I will happily mock any religion, or belief structure, or idea if I want to, and I assume that other people will do the same. If, for example, my belief that I look silly in hats was a firm, unmoveable belief in my life, I still wouldn't punish people for mocking it, because they are allowed to. However, if TESCO asked me to put a hat on? I'd be furious...

That was a kind of serious post, wasn't it? Never mind, next time I'll find something sillier I promise

Enjoy.

Brawny - "I do look silly in hats - for proof see Norwich and Saggers"